Birthdays are a big deal to Silas. He’s been asking me, “How old am I today?” to see if he’s still three or if he’s gotten older overnight. We talked about my birthday this past weekend, so now he knows I’m thirty-one instead of “thirty-zero.”

Monday was my birthday, but we had a whole weekend of fun events. Last Friday we joined some friends for an excursion to the Wildlife World Zoo. It was my first time there, and I liked it better than the Phoenix zoo!

Their aquariums were fun to walk through and see all the sea creatures. Silas and Cooper liked the sting ray pool, and Silas was actually able to touch one as it swam by.

One of the best things about this zoo was that you could get up close to a lot of the animals. There was even an opportunity to feed the giraffes.

Visiting all those animals was exhausting!

Saturday morning we made a valiant attempt to attend the Luke AFB air show, but so did everyone else in the valley. The traffic getting to the base was so crazy that we decided to go birthday shopping instead. This beautiful bedding set was Stephen’s gift to me. I’m loving having a beautiful bed!

After lunch, we drove over to Tempe where we rented a surrey bike at the park and pedaled by the lake. Silas rang the bell to warn people we were coming through. Though we missed most of the air show, we did make it back to the West Valley in time to catch some of the Thunderbird‘s amazing performance.

Thanks to our dear friends–the Horkavys–who offered to babysit the boys for us, Stephen and I were able to have a nice little date the night of my birthday. I’m thankful God has given me another year of life. I praise Him for His grace to me!