Glow at the Botanical Gardens

Happy New Year's Eve everybody! Today I'm officially back to work after many glorious days off celebrating the holidays and experiencing our fine city all decked out for Christmas.

While we were off, we spent time with our families and friends and took advantage of a lot of free time by exploring new places and revisiting favorites. When I was invited to visit the Cleveland Botanical Garden for their annual holiday extravaganza, I jumped at the chance. I'd always heard about how beautiful it is at this time of year and was looking forward to seeing all the bedazzled trees and gingerbread houses.

Today is the last day to experience it for yourself - they are open from 10am - 3pm so get there before it's too late. You'll be treated to Christmas trees, endless gingerbread houses, a train ride and more.

Everywhere you look are festive decorations.

The Cleveland Indians Dixieland Band even made an appearance

And the gingerbread houses are really impressive!

Some of our favorites were local landmarks

The West Side Market and Christmas Story House were fabulous!

And we even got to explore the Eleanor Armstrong Smith Glasshouse and enjoy the perfect 72 degree temps while butterflies flitted from branch to flower and birds showed off for us.

It's a great place to escape all the snow and squeeze in a little bit more Christmas cheer before the New Year begins. Plus you can get your very own delicious piece of gingerbread.

You can get an annual membership here and enjoy the beautiful gardens year round plus get discounts.

And they have a winter cooking series coming up that you won't want to miss! The Winter Gourmets in the Garden begin on Jan. 16th with one of my favorites: Chef Ben Bebenroth of Spice. For $45 for members and $65 for non-members you get to sample two dishes created for the class with wine pairings and chat with the chef during a Q+A session. Parking is included. Here's the schedule:

January 16 – Chef Ben Bebenroth, Spice Kitchen & Bar

January 23 – Chef Brian Goodman, The Greenhouse Tavern

January 30 – Chef Ali Barker, Radius

February 6 – Chef Tony Smoody, Bon Appetit

I've been to the summer classes and really enjoyed them. You can sign up here. If you sign up for all four classes in the series, the price drops to $120/$165. 

**Disclosure: I was provided 2 tickets to attend Glow. This in no way affected my opinions or this post.**