Beaver Creek Skiing!

 We made it to Colorado to ski!  And I think it was our best ski trip yet.  We've skied at Beaver Creek before, and it's one of our favorites.  If you're looking for extreme skiing then you'd probably like other resorts better.  But this is a great resort for families, with a big variety of terrain.  Also, this year we skied at Beaver Creek every day, which was really nice.  In the past we've gone to another resort on one of the days, and somehow it just never worked great.  So it was nice to not have to deal with the stress of getting to, and figuring out, another resort.  We also stayed in a different hotel this year.  This hotel was right at the base of the resort, so we were by all of the restaurants and shops.  That was super nice.  We didn't drive our car once after we got there.

On our first day of skiing we put Sage in lessons.  She was so mad and insisted she didn't want lessons and would hate them.  The first thing she said at the end of the day..."Can I do lessons tomorrow?"  That girl.  But so glad she had a great experience.  We ended up putting her in lessons the next day, along with Kate.  Unfortunately, Kate didn't have such a great experience.  But we now call Sage the bullet when we ski because she goes so fast, so that was a definite win.

The first day we were there it snowed all day, so we got to ski in powder.  Jake and Zack made us go on blacks all day.  My legs were beyond exhausted by the end of the day, but for once I actually enjoyed skiing blacks.  The other two days were blue sky and amazing groomers.  Best of both worlds for sure.  I love a good groomer.  

Anyway, we skied our guts out, and enjoyed just getting away from everything.  Another win for the trip was that the roads were clear for our drive.  So amazing.  That drive is treacherous in the snow.  Definitely an epic ski trip!!

Why am I sitting in the back?  Because I can't even handle my kids fighting in the back seat.  So, so sick of it.

When you skied hard all day.

My favorite thing to do is the glow worm.  We were all so exhausted I had to beg everyone to do it.  But you ski down the bunny hill with glow sticks in the dark.  It looks like a glow worm coming down the hill.  So fun!

The candy cabin is a tradition.  Obviously it was a very sunny day.  Oh yeah, we watched a kid from ski school loading his pockets with candy.  I gave him the evil eye.

Warm cookies at the base every day at 3:00

Sister Trip

 In January I got to take an unexpected trip to stay with the Balls.  Mel had surgery to remove the melanoma in her leg and it was more extensive than they thought.  Gratefully, they got all of the cancer.  But recovery was going to be hard.  As in, stay off your leg and keep it elevated for a week.  Super easy to do with five kids.  The stars aligned (really I know God had a hand in this) and I had a week without too much going on that made it possible for me to head to Sammamish.  Yay!

Sister time is the best.  I had great fun being able to talk about all the things with Mel.  It was also fun to be a part of their family for a week.  I had great talks with all of her boys, and probably had big eyes while I watched them wrestle to the death in the evenings.  A little different than our family, but I loved it.  I got to take kids to and from school, go grocery shopping, and do some cleaning.  All of these things are more fun when you're doing them for someone else.  More of an adventure I guess.

I managed to go running in the mornings.  It was sooo nice to run in capris and a t-shirt.  On Friday I got to do an amazing hike.  Beautiful and green on the way up with amazing views at the top.  Loved it!

I'm so glad I was able to go help out.  I know I was representing Mom, plus the rest of my sisters who would gladly have been there if possible.  Thank heavens for family!

One of my runs.  It was just so nice to see beautiful green!  This day was a bit rainy.

I stayed in Big Rock Park for my whole run.  Some good trail running!

The big reveal of Mel's leg.  It's looking much better now!

Mel used crutches all the way in to the office.  On the way out we made the wise decision to get a wheelchair.  Much better!

The view from the top of my hike!

On the plane ride home we did a nice circle around Mt Rainier.  Beautiful!

December Happenings

 I'm trying to persist in getting caught up.  Someday....

December was fairly low-key.  We never have lots of family things, friend things, or recitals.  Obviously we're super cool.  We did have a fun Christmas.  Although the 2.5 week long Christmas break about did me in.  Who plans a break that long in the middle of winter??

We did our annual neighborhood food drive.  Mostly just the old people come, but we still love it.  My friend and I that is.  Not so much my kids.  Kate had a piano recital.  She's getting so good at the piano!  We made some yummy Christmas cookies.  Not sugar cookies.  Learned my lesson with those.  And we went to a family Christmas thing with the Wrights.  We don't see them very much, so we had a great time catching up with everyone.

On Christmas Eve we went to the Johnson's for yummy dinner and fun.  We even went caroling to a couple of houses without Dad there to make us do it!  Funny the things you find yourself doing when you don't even have to.  Some of the families did a talent.  The Ditto's won by burning and goat and dancing around it.  Not sure how anyone will top that!  Christmas day was epic in that Jake and I were the first ones awake.  You know you're getting old when...  We opened presents, had a good breakfast, and then went skiing.  I love skiing on Christmas because it breaks up the day.  Still time to play with new presents, but not too much time.

New Years happened.  By far my least favorite holiday.  Definitely not a holiday made for introverts.  The girls both invited friends over and had lots of fun.  Jake and Zack let me watch the new James Bond movie with them.   And then I think they were both in bed by 10:30.  We party hard here.

The only picture I have of the service project we did.  In addition to the food drive we did, we got to help distribute the food this year.  Loved it!

Seran wrap ball!

The live nativity in Heber gets better and better every year.  This year they even had a camel!

The YW who came.  Notice they're all young.  It's mostly impossible to get the older girls out.

Kate's piano recital.  Her teacher looks like one of the kids.

Christmas cookies!

Jake dressed up for caroling this year!

A really blurry picture of the goat dance.

Christmas pajamas!

Zack and Kate both got new coats.

Sage got a sherpa.  She looks like a walking blanket.

Christmas day skiing!  Yes it was cold.

Sage got up one morning and made pancakes from scratch, cut up an orange, and had hot chocolate.  

I didn't get a picture of all the girls at our house, but you can tell they were here.

The only New Years picture I have.

November Happenings

 November was a fairly low-key month.  The highlight was probably the weekend we got to spend with family right before Dad and Kathy left for their mission in New York.  The Dittos were kind enough to offer up their house so that we could stay for the weekend and not just be there for a few hours.  The adults had great fun hanging out, and the cousins had a great time.  Sometimes the teenagers are unsure what to do with themselves, but they survived.  It was great to have everyone together since it's going to be a while before that happens again!

Thanksgiving was pretty uneventful.  We were supposed to go to Moab, but that ended up not happening.  We went to Greg and Tracy's for Thanksgiving dinner where we ate lots of delicious food.  Then we spent a lot of time working at the office so we could get footings in before the ground froze.  The glamorous life of a contractor.  We'll all be really happy when the office is done.  For a lot of reasons...

The Spjute Family!  Minus Dad.  We kind of forgot him...

A YW activity making truffles.  I had to include it since YW takes up a lot of my life right now.  Thank heavens both of my girls are in there!  Makes it so much better!

Two years later we finally got to go see Frozen.  Worth the wait!

We took the kids to a trampoline place so they could get some energy out.

This is Zack climbing up to that steel beam.  The one that's really high.  He proceeded to jump into the foam pit and almost break his back.  It's a miracle that more teenagers don't die or become disabled from stupid decisions.

All of the grandkids!

A sunny picture of our annual turkey trot.  There are no words for how much my kids complain about this.

This was Thanksgiving dinner.  Even though it looks like Christmas

Sage looking way too old.

My grandma who's still going strong!  She's amazing!