Miracle Gardens and Butterfly World.

I love visiting the gardens in Ajman, not far from the Mall of the Emirates and if you're visiting Dubai, there's a frequent shuttle bus.

Entry to the gardens costs AED 50 and to Butterfly World AED 55. Sadly you need to enter one from the other or face a longish walk around the perimeter as once you leave the gardens you can't re enter on the same ticket.

I visit in term time when it's quiet, but avoid the end of the school day as the roads round there are chaotic at the end of the school day and make sure you have google maps handy and 3G switched on as the roads are changing on a monthly basis with new developments.

Each year the theme for Miracle gardens changes. This year it's cats and there's a full size replica of Emirates Airbus A340, festooned in flowers.

Creating a garden in the desert requires a lot of water and planning. You can see more of my efforts on the gardening tab.

 If you look closely you'll see that not many types of flowers are used, just tried and tested ones, with built in irrigation systems and regular dead heading and replacing.

Designed inside a circle, paths lead you to new finds as you explore freely.

View from the pavilion. It's quite a skill getting photos without anyone in them, hence why it's better to visit during the school day.

There are tonnes of restaurants to choose from under a covered area of plants and umbrellas, but watch out for the over head irrigation section.

Every time I visit I have yet another idea for the garden, sadly I neither have the space or the skills required to do anything on this scale.

Next up is the Butterfly World.

It's easy to just walk round the first dome and go back outside. There are a further 4 chambers accessed through a string/rope netting/door. Make sure you walk round the whole place.

I'm not a big fan of the dead butterflies creating the art work in the entrance area by the cafe. I'd like to think they were made a long time before we wised up to the damage we were doing to the species, but sadly this doesn't appear to be the case.

Be careful as you walk round though, there are butterflies on the ground.

There are clear pictures on how to hold a butterfly in special areas, sadly too many parents weren't supervising their kids and wings were being grabbed. The adults were placing butterflies on their children's heads for photo opportunities and some of the kids were hysterical swatting the butterflies away while parents laughed and took more photos.

The rooms were large with high ceilings and there was lots of space for the butterflies to fly around and escape to. 

And plenty of feeding stations where you could take close ups without disturbing the butterflies.

This is only my second visit to the butterfly world, both times with visitors, don't think I'll be going again though.

But Miracle Gardens has a big thumbs up from me and my next trip might involve a book and a spare hour or three.

One daily Positive - Week 5. Golf, a chest infection and the kids fly home.

I'm fed up of being ill, went for routine bloods on Monday to be told I have a chest infection and now on antibiotics. Had this cough and cold for 2 weeks. It's flu season, everyone has it, but no, mine has gone onto my chest. Doctor asked why I didn't come and see her earlier, my reply...I'm always ill, I can't come here every 5 minutes, she said I'm always ill because I don't go soon enough.

Iron levels have risen after an infusion last month, next blood test 3 months away, lets hope I don't need anymore infusions now as the last one gave me an 8 day migraine.

Now it's February I have to start counting the days or I get out of sync with this project. I've numbered the whole year in my diary and made several mistakes so it's now one big mess. How do you remember?

27 Sunday Dropped 2 & 2a at the beach then I headed off for the final day of the golf. I walked out with Sergio Garcia and Lee Westwood. I don't see much golf as a marshal and the golfers rarely introduce themselves or say thank you after the round. Some are very friendly and chatty afterwards, not these two.

28 Monday Dr's for a routine blood test after last months iron infusion. It was a year ago today I woke up to the news that my SIL lost her fight with cancer over night. Headed off to Mall fo the Emirates for the day and visited the Frame in the evening.

We're 150ms in the air on a glass floor here. All 3 of us have also stood on the glass floor in the CN Tower, Canada which is 342ms high.

29 Tuesday Visited the Souk Madinat, took a walk on the beach and after Peter finished work we went to Global Village for the evening and dinner.

Peter photobombing.

30 Wednesday I popped to get my nails done as 2 and 2a sleep later, then off to the local mall for lunch and 2 and 2a went off on a desert safari in the afternoon. Peter and I watched TV all evening.

31 Thursday 2a and I went to Miracle Gardens for the morning as 2 doesn't surface until midday, spent a couple of hours at home catching up with the washing then headed off to the beach in a taxi, for a walk, dinner and to see the fireworks. Peter was working near by and joined us.

Too many nice things for just one photo.

32 Friday Brunch, not much else to say, ate and drank far too much but it was worth it, evening spent in front of the TV.

33 Saturday Up early to take 2 and 2a back to the airport. We were home by 6am, had breakfast and hit the last day of the sales. Dinner in front of the TV and the football on.

On the blog this week:
Do you actually get to just sit and enjoy your garden or is there always something that needs doing?
2a came to visit. It's the first time our Daughter in Law has visited our home.

An InLinkz Link-up

One Daily Positive Week 1 2019.

I'm starting this year by including the last 2 days of last year in this weeks post also. I also went into the new year with a bloody migraine and my chronic pain has flared up, I'm aware of every part of my body hurting, including my teeth.

The thing is, resting makes no difference, it comes and it goes, it mainly stays. I came close to going to the hospital on Monday, once Mum goes home next week I'll go back to the Dr's for some more medication.

364 Sunday Having a lazy day, dropped mum at the local pool while I blogged, washed, cleaned and generally sorted stuff out in the house and measured up for new furniture on the mezzanine. Popped out in the evening to Riverland an area of restaurants and shops from which you can access Legoland, IMG world and Bollywood theme parks.

365 Monday The day's plans were cancelled as I had to give into the migraine on day 5 and spent the day in bed. Spent the new year at a friends house, to watch the fireworks for New Year from their roof top. They're in the UK for new year.

2019 Happy New Year

1 Tuesday Up at 8am and drove home. Peter and I took Bob to the dog park as he'd been stuck indoors for 15 hours, thankfully no mess, but the cat thought it was going to starve to death. I went back to bed, blogged and watched TV in the afternoon and we had a BBQ and an early night.

2 Wednesday Had my car re registered similar to a MOT, no problems. Went to Miracle Gardens with mum and called in at the Mall of Emirates, chilled out in the afternoon. Pub quiz was cancelled.

3 Thursday Mum spent the day pool side, I tidied the garden and did some batch cooking went to the Marina for dinner in the evening after Peter finished work. The Dubai Shopping Festival fireworks go off every Thursday and Friday at 8pm till the 2nd of February.

4 Friday Took a drive out to Masafi to visit the local markets, had lunch out. Drove to Fujairah and paddled in the Indian Ocean and chilled out in front of the TV in the evening.

5 Saturday Dropped my sewing machine and overlocker off at Dragon Mart for repairs and ordered a new sofa, just need to sort out a TV unit, desk and side tables, so a trip to Ikea is called for. Went to Dubai Mall to watch the LED show on the Burj Khalifa had dinner overlooking the fountains. Finally found a Christmas tree big enough for mother. All 828m's of it.

On the blog this week:
My year in pictures

An InLinkz Link-up

Miracle Gardens and the Airbus A380 with HDYGG?

My mother is visiting and as a keen gardener I decided to take her to see the Miracle Gardens. While she loved every minute of it, I was less than impressed on this trip and I very much doubt I'll be going there again.
While it is a lovely place to visit and the flowers themselves are gorgeous and the aroma hits you the second you walk through the gate, I can't help but feel that it is missing out on being something altogether better.

This years display centres around a full size Airbus A380 made of flowers. I expected to see just that, however on arrival it turns out to be a full size plane, covered with flowers in pots.

I took a few photos as we walked to the restaurant area where I sat and did some work for school and left my mother to wander around by herself, I just didn't feel inspired.

Animal Tales and the cat has lost it's spot again

My mother is visiting, the cat and dog are happy to have her around as it means there is someone at home all day while Peter and I are in work.

There are strict instructions NOT to feed them, even though both of them will bother you until you do.

My mother is managing to ignore the cat's demands, however it keeps turning up randomly around the house and making her jump, like the bathroom.

Her resolve with the dog hasn't been as good and the dog has been 'sharing' yogurts and cheese sandwiches.

The cat and dog have their own bedroom, yes I know it's a luxury, but Peter and I live in a 4 bed house, so why trip over them all day and besides the cat has a habit of knocking on the bedroom door for attention during the night so we shut them both in their room so not to disturb our sleep.

The cat's sleeping place of the coffee table has been taken over by my mum, so we're back looking for her spot again, she's currently favouring random boxes and is back to demanding cupboard doors are left open for her to choose from.

I haven't seen our stray cat for a few days, I'm assuming it's found a house where someone will feed it, it's very friendly and has probably been a pet at sometime, if I see it again I may take it for a microchip check. Normally if it's lost there are posters around and I belong to several online animal groups, I'm assuming it was dumped.

With National Day over and Christmas on the way, the UAE is out in full force with their decorations, which include lots of animals. The Falcon is the national bird of the UAE and there are several light up ones at The Mall of Emirates.

 My Mother loves her gardening so we visited Dubai Miracle Gardens

And of course no trip to Dubai is complete without a visit to Dubai Mall to see the aquarium, we won't however be visiting this one as you can see so much from the outside, but we'll be going to the one at The Atlantis on the Palm for an afternoon as I've not visited there yet.

Christmas is shaping up in our house, and while not technically real animals, it does involve some Panda's this year as my alternative to 'Elf on a shelf'

How do your seedlings grow in Dubai with HDYGG?

My attitude to gardening is 'throw it in and see'

We'll it's now time to transplant into bigger pots and try to work out what everything is.

I bought 2 of these with no idea what I was buying, now it's flowered I can see it's an eggplant.

A couple of 'guess the plant' to fill up two hangers.

My strawberry seeds came to nothing and I'm still waiting for the garden centre to get some plants in so I can fill these hangers.

My mother is visiting for the next 3 weeks and is 'green fingered' although she says she's not prepared to do any weeding as it's still too hot for her, coming from the UK.

We have trips to the Botanical gardens, Miracle garden and Za'beel Park for the How does your Garden Glow night display.