Spring Things (Wrangling, Climbing, Painting, Building)

The theme is loose here. 

And to be fair, 'spring' is used loosely, too, since the weather is basically unchanging this year. 

Lunar New Year in Avery's classroom (led by Mama and Zeal)

Carrying pigs

Zeal's first time hanging in the treehouse

Zeal's been into the cactus toy. His first real independent building.

4 spoon soup.

Toucan coming out of an egg

Tiger

And Avery's tractor project is the first time he's designed something out of wood. 

He's learning how to drill, too.

Dawn Ranch, Revisited

We spent a night at Dawn Ranch, the spot where we got married over 5 years ago. 

It was lush and practically all ours. No one was staying in any of the other cabins, so it was easy to relive our magical day.

Over the bridge and in the orchard was the ceremony 

The dinner and dancing field

We stayed in a quaint cabin

This is how we travel now

Don't look too closely at the Z-Squeal...

To the river

Avery swore he could "smell the turtles" here 

"Dah!"

(A little pink eye)

The Dawn Redwood with its dried needles

The firepit we played music around

Cozying up after a shower

The boldest move of all: a 2-hour dinner at the restaurant on site

The next day, we explored a beach filled with forts, just 30 minutes from Dawn Ranch.

And ate breakfast as pirates would

Pruning and Dating!

We have been pruning our fruit trees and weeding like crazy. Even though we have not gotten enough rain this winter, we did get some huge storms that thoroughly spurred our weeds on. 

Avery and Zeal collected all the fruit tree sticks and did some "wood work."

And then we went on a *date* to San Francisco for an entire day. Without kids. It was incredible just to walk around without a thought of snacks, water bottles, diapers, other people's needs. We didn't bring our diaper bag or ergo baby carrier, just our wallets. 

We went to the DeYoung Museum and then to lunch at Plow in Potrero Hill.