Bucket List #40 | Martha Lake Airport Park

You may have noticed, we're stepping up our bucket-listing! We took a small hiatus while I was pregnant/had a tiny baby at home. Now that life has leveled out though, we're realizing that our time here is on the downhill side; or at least, we are - in theory - more than halfway done with Landon's doctoral degree.

Anyway, we have a lot of parks on the list. Part of this is due to the fact that Seattle is bursting with amazing outdoor spaces. There are parks around every corner, it seems, and many of them are just gorgeous. It's also due to the fact that I knew we couldn't just have lots of expensive things to do here, or they'd never all happen. :)

This weekend we had gorgeous weather so we decided to tackle one of said parks: Martha Lake Airport Park.

While there, we found no indication of why it is called that. There's a very tiny pond at one end of the park (Martha Lake??), and some sculptures that suggest flying to the mind. Once we got home, a little research determined that it's called that because it used to be a private airport, and the owners of that airport took a low-ball offer from the city instead of profiting from the land so the park could be created, which was nice of them. :) In hindsight, there is a park actually at Martha Lake that we're going to check out in the future.

Anyhow, the short review of this place is that it's just a park. It does have a pretty extensive walking trail which we had fun exploring to our hearts' content. It also has a skate park and some interesting sculptures.

We enjoyed the 60-degree March afternoon immensely - Walt loved playing on the small playground and Zuzu soaked up the sunshine with us. We probably won't be back, but only because there are nice parks closer to where we live. If you're in the area, this is a great place to stop and stretch your legs!

Bucket List #37 | Seattle Public Library

Our Seattle bucket list is a list of adventures we're hoping to have while Landon studies at the University of Washington for the next several years. To view all of our bucket list posts, click here.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's pretty. And big. And fully awesome.

My cousin being in town gave us a great excuse to cross something off our list. Chelsea is about 2/3 of the way done with her masters degree in library science, so a visit to the Seattle Public Library was a no-brainer.

The library is positioned pretty much right down town. For some reason, I didn't have huge expectations for this particular excursion. I thought it would be fun to see, but I guess I was expecting another old building that couldn't possibly be as awesome as the UW library.

But it's not at all the same. They don't really compare. The downtown library is a really modern structure with all the frills. And it's hugeness can't be overstated. I've been to the library of congress, and I still think this library belongs in the "big" category. Just sayin'.

Anyway, we rate this one a solid

It was a super fun experience. There is a neat children's area, a gorgeous view from the top, even a gift shop...and it's free! Seriously, I would recommend this as a tourist stop if you have the time. We only had around 45 minutes and wished we could stay longer. Next time we'll probably plan about 2 hours for this.