Fun in the snow

So, it's been awhile since I last wrote and for that I apologize. I will try harder to keep up with our life in the future.

That said, Andy, Hobie, and I had a lot of fun playing in the snow today! After church we made our way a couple of miles down the road to a series of trails that begin by one of the local golf courses. The path is well tracked out. Yesterday a friend and I (and Hobie of course!) traversed the trail on snowshoes. Andy and I do not currently have snowshoes but I had concluded that the trail was tracked out enough to walk in just our boots. Hobie had so much fun bounding through the snow along the edge of the trail. It was crazy how deep the snow was just inches off the trail. One wrong step and you could be up to your knee or thigh in snow! We had a lot of fun jumping off little ridges and cornices. Nothing like trudging through waist deep snow! At one point we ended up jumping into a river. Thankfully the river was covered in feet of snow. Unfortunately Andy had dug the snow a bit and found the river. Thank goodness for (mostly) waterproof boots!

Last week was memorable because we managed to ski at 2 different resorts in 2 different counties and still make it to church! We began the day at Beaver Creek which is the resort closest to our home and minutes from church. Our goal was to make first tracks. We did not manage to make the first chair up but we did make "fresh tracks". After skiing an hour we made our way over to the top of the Centennial chairlift where they serve free hot chocolate at 9:30 every morning. Nothing like a warm cup of cocoa after a few beautiful runs on the mountain. After finishing our hot chocolate we skied the rest of the way down the mountain, boarded the bus down to the parking lot, removed our skis and boots, then drove the 2 or 3 miles to church. We made it in time for the second service! After church we chatted a bit with friends, grabbed a bite to eat, then hit the road once again. 45 minutes later we had made our way over Vail Pass and crossed into Summit County finally making our way to Breckenridge. Breckenridge was one of the Vail Resorts that I had never visited on skis. This resort has quite a reputation. A regular stop on the annual Dew Tour, Breckenridge is referred to as "Breckenfridge" by many locals because of the intense wind encountered on many of its runs. Even on the nicest day, Breckenridge can be cold and windy. To it's credit, Breckenridge has many fun and challenging runs that continue to call locals and tourists alike year after year. Since it was such a bright, warm, sunny day last Sunday we decided it was as good a time as any to attempt a visit. We had a lot of fun. It was pretty crazy trying runs I had never seen before. We took a T-chair above tree line and took a very windy but powdery ride down a black diamond run that would have left me in tears only 2 years ago. We skied the mountain until it closed then returned home exhausted but exhilarated as well.

The weekend before that I did not make it out on the mountain but heard a lot of great powder stories. There was hardly anyone in church that weekend. Partly because we got so much snow they couldn't get out of their driveway (I was 35 minutes late for practice that morning because I couldn't get out) and partly because 25 inches of snow over a 2 day period is more than most avid skiers can pass up. Monday also brought a lot of snow. It was crazy out there! I could not see anything on my way home from babysitting that night. On top of that, my car decided to throw a belt in the middle of the crazy storm! I had Andy on speakerphone that night because I was pretty nervous about the drive. All of a sudden I interrupted his story with "It sounds like something just fell off my car! Oh no! Now it smells like something is burning!! Come get me!!!" I pulled off into a parking lot, turned the car off, and prayed that Andy would not get in an accident on his way down the hill to get me. Everything worked out just fine. A friend towed my car home the next morning and we found out that in the middle of the crazy snowstorm another friend had managed to make it to the hospital and had given birth to a healthy baby boy. Hooray!

What else? We skied at Keystone awhile back, that was fun. That was also the day that I discovered that my camera was broken. (Part of the lack of motivation to post lately...)

We are enjoying the great outdoors here in Vail. We are trying to make the most of our ski passes and having fun in the snow on the few days that our passes are blocked. For instance, our passes our blocked this weekend because of the President's Day holiday. Believe it or not, this is a very busy time for the resorts! Vail is especially in a tizzy this weekend with a swarm of secret service agents. It turns out that the Obama ladies are in town for a fun ski weekend. Who would have thought!

Well, that's all for now. I will try not to wait a couple of months between posts in the future. Happy Sunday!