spring-like weather, happy birthday ewan, rock climbing

we had the most beautiful january weekend. temps were in the mid 50s and the sun was shining for multiple days in a row! ha. this winter feels a lot like our first winter here. it hasn't gotten too cold (around freezing a handful of mornings), no snow, some breaks from the rain. it's my fourth winter here and it still doesn't fail to amaze me! 

this is unrelated, but last week i got this email, which was exciting! honestly my payments had been down to $55/month for quite a while, but it feels good to know my college education is totally paid off now! 

we had a busy weekend too! friday night, not so much, but that's pretty typical. saturday we hung out at home for most of the day, but azalea and i took a trip to bartells and the library. i've really been trying to step up my reading game this year. last year i think i read around 20 books, but i'd like to up it to 25-30 this year. in the afternoon, we took the kids up to the school/field with their bikes: 

sunday morning we headed to the zoo for ewan's 5th birthday party. vanessa invited our family and one other family to hang out at the zoo for a couple hours and then head to "zeek's pizza" a few blocks away for lunch and cake. the kids had a lot of fun. it was a bright, chilly morning at the zoo, much better than rain. at the restaurant we had pizza, salad, and a batman cake. 

immediately after the party, we headed to REI because the kids were signed up for a rock climbing class. thatcher saw it on their site on black friday and both kids were old enough, so we thought it would be fun. azalea has rock climbed once before for a birthday party. ashford was a little skeptical going into it, but he ended up having fun. all the parents stayed for the class, so we got to see them climb. 

this is about as high as they got before wanting to come down :) 

we ended the day (and the weekend) with a trip to "the boars nest" for bbq dinner. 

happy monday!