(Above - Lotus Flower on display in the Swift Family Garden, adjacent to the Linnean House)
After the Garden, I headed straight to a local clothing store to participate in a fashion show.  After work on Thursday, I went there to be fitted.  I selected two outfits.  I got to the store with enough time for a facial touch-up and ready for the show at 2pm.  There were about 8 "models".  There was no runway or even a stage.  The store just re-arranged the clothing racks to create enough space for us to walk from the back room to the front of the store, smile, turn around, and walk to the back.  We had to quickly change into the next outfit.  The store manager mentioned the name of each model, explained how the outfit was put together, the price and about special discount of the day.  All the models were geezers like me, no beauty queens there, just ordinary looking women who agreed to participate in the fashion show for the extra discount.  We get 40% of the regular price items or additional 10% for items that are already marked down.  We all had fun during the show and make purchases because we believe that we save 40% and not that we spend 60% on clothing we did not really need! 
(Below - A giant lotus is set in the waters of the Miles Sculpture Garden ponds, between two 60 feet long dragons.    The dragons are created using approximately 40,000 porcelain cooking utensils.  Photos of these porcelain dragons will be in the next post.)

Most people associate cherry blossom with Japan even though cherry trees grow naturally in China.  There are almost 200 cherry trees in the Garden, mostly in the Japanese Garden.  For the Lantern Festival, these Cherry Blossom lanterns line along the path leading into the Chinese Garden.  When illuminated, the light will create a cherry tree with glowing petals in the dark, I can't wait!