Visiting a pretty garden with Ruthie

 We took Ruthie to look round a pretty garden that's near where we live. It's called Whatton Hall but they won't let you look round the house, just the gardens. They are quite big though and it took all afternoon.

There were lots of these plants called  ro-do-den-drons and they have pretty pink flowers. And there were yellow ones too and red ones but this one was the prettiest.

 There was one bit of the garden where they put their pets after they died. I think these were all dogs but it was hard to read because the stones were all crumbly but one of them said it was a terrier so that's why I think they were all dogs. The stone said he was faithful but I couldn't read his name, which was sad.

 There was a big pond with ducks and we sat by it and watched them. It was peaceful under the trees by the pond.

All round the garden there were funny looking statues of animals and things. These were called cass-o-waries and they were big strange birds. We thought they were funny.

There was one bit of the garden where there were all Chinese things and some of them were scary looking men. The sign said they were copies of statues that were found in an old Chinese king's grave. He had lots of them made out of terracotta that's a red sort of pottery and he had a whle army of them. The king's name was Chin and that's why they call it China. The scary men were very tall and some of them were standing under big umbrellas.