Colorado, Snowmass time

All the photos are in the album on the right.
On Friday I drove the 3 hours to Snowmass and met up with Grandma and Grandpa, Jim, and Doug with Jack and Jeb. It was a mellow first night. Renting equipment, eating, acclimating to the new place. And then Saturday we were off!!!! Madeline, Jeb and Wesley were all in ski school. They did 1/2 day classes on Saturday and Sunday. That went well. They learned the basics to skiing and the rest of us got to enjoy the slopes. Wes talked about how fast he was, how he didn't' fall and would just "zoom by" the other kids. We saw Madeline and Jeb moving down one hill, and they had their turns and speed well under control.

The afternoon on Saturday was fantastic. We had babysitter come over to take care of the little kids. Jessie built snowman, played hide and seek and was just generally around for all of us to enjoy the day. Jim and Doug skied the rest of the afternoon. I went on a long snow shoe hike with My dad and Pat, and all the kids happily played at home. The bonus, dinner out with the adults and Jack....

Sunday was another day of skiing and fun. The day was almost identical to Saturday. Monday The Fisher's headed home. We put Madeline and Wes in all day school so they could perfect the skiing. Jim and I spent the day on the slopes and then did a long snow shoe hike in the afternoon. Jessie was back for another evening of babysitting so the adults could enjoy an evening out in Aspen.

Tuesday was hysterical.

It snowed all night on Monday. There must have been 6 inches of powder and it was still snowing in the morning. Jim and I decided to ski with the kids. Their teacher's gave them excellent reviews and said they could handle a few of the green runs off of this one lift. Well I suppose we should have dug deeper, or thought about the difference in skiing in groomed snow and fresh powder. What a disaster. The poor kids could hardly move. The powder was knee high on them in many spots, they couldn't even push out their legs to make the "pizza pie" to slow down and it was still snowing so their goggles were foggy. We ended up holding Wes between our legs and skiing him down the mountain that way. Madeline actually shredded it up. Once she got moving and out of the deep stuff she was able to kick it the whole way down the hill. It was really fun to watch. So one hour after we started, we made it down the hill and called for a ride home! Jim and I went out alone after that.

It was an awesome trip this year and so much fun. The kids can't wait to go back to the snow house and ski next year.