Life Lately: January 2025

What a time to be alive! January has been absolutely beautiful weatherwise so I was able to spend so much time outside in the garden. It’s been quite cold but I don’t mind when the sun is out! I have been heartbroken watching the wildfires devastate Los Angeles. I have donated to the Vote Save America and Crooked Ideas disaster relief fund and have been checking in with friends who live in the area.

I’m focused on making the most of this first month of 2025. Leaning into the coziness, reconnecting with friends, and doing activities that bring me joy have made all the difference! I have loved January and I am looking forward to what the rest of the year has in store! Here is what we got up to in January 2025!

Catching up with friends

After the craziness of the holidays, it is always nice to catch up with friends that I haven’t seen or talked to in a few weeks. I had two great video calls this month. One is with my friends Bri who lives in France and Emily who lives over in Bremerton, WA. I have known these ladies since my freshman year in college, we all lived in the same dorm together! My second call was with Nicole and Kristine whom I have known since our sophomore year of high school!

Later in the month, we got together with two other friends from high school, Mishell and Nick, who have a 4-month-old baby. We headed to their apartment for a catch-up and take-out Indian food for dinner! We also had our friend Randy who lives up in Alaska stay for a few days. It had been quite a while since we have seen him so it was nice having him stay!

Becoming Blacksmiths for a day & a Dim Sum lunch

While Randy was in town, Jake planned a morning blacksmithing class. We went to a place called Lawless Forge in Seattle and met our other friend Calvin there. We did a private class where we learned how to make a BBQ fork. It was such a different and fun activity to do! Afterward, we all went to a dim sum place for lunch that is near our house. The restaurant is called Lucky House and it is delicious. If you’re local and looking for a great dim sum place, we highly recommend it!

Quality time with Jake

Jake and I spent some quality time together this month. We have been so lucky with the weather so, crisp winter walks have been our favorite way to get out of the house, get some exercise, and catch up with each other. We also went out for a night of bar hopping and karaoke in Kent. Jake likes to check out places we’ve never been to and we were pleasantly surprised with the bars we visited this night!

Enjoying the beautiful weather with a trip to the plant nursery

As I said, we’ve been having beautiful sunny weather and I’ve been deep into planning my garden so I decided to make my first trip to the plant nursery of 2025! I picked up some seeds, a Swiss chard start, and two little snowdrop plants. I can spend hours wandering around our local nursery and I was so excited to get home and get my new plants in the ground!

Returning to a regular posting schedule on the blog and YouTube

Here on Learning to Bloom, I posted very little between Halloween and the New Year. Blogtober takes a lot of planning and the execution takes up a lot of time. I love doing it but I do feel exhausted afterward and tend to take a break for the rest of the year. My time between Halloween and the New Year was used to enjoy the holidays and plan for the upcoming year and what I want to write about this year. I have also gotten back to posting over on YouTube and am excited to share more going forward!

In the garden…

I am in full garden-planning mode! My seed starting plan is finished and my garden journal is updated and ready for the year! I will be starting my first seeds of the 2025 garden growing season this Saturday the 1st of Feb and will be starting more almost every Saturday from Feb through April!

Like last year, the weather has been beautiful but unlike last year, it has gotten quite cold this month. The crocus and the daffodils upfront have sprouted but looks like they’ll be blooming around the same time as last year in February! We also still have some calendula blooming in the garden, though with the hard frosts in the last week or so may have finally done them in.

Right now we’ve got broccoli, kale, cabbage, Swiss chard, thyme, and rosemary growing out in the garden. We’ve also had Italian parsley but the frosts may have finished this off as well. I thrifted some wired cloches last weekend so I’ve placed those out and even though I’ve never had a problem with birds in the garden, I love the way they look out there!