WE LOVE SKIING!!

Skiing is what gets us through the winter here at this house.  I even paid hundreds of dollars to buy Erin new ski clothes to get her comfortable (she hates miss-fitting hand-me-downs) so she would start skiing with the family again.  She got to use them once until they accidentally got thrown away.  How does that happen you ask?  Well a well meaning daughter put them in a garbage bag so they wouldn't get her other clothes wet after a cabin trip and upon leaving we had to haul our own garbage out.  Well you can picture the rest of the story.  Mom grabbed bags in van and tossed them  in to the big garbage bin.  goodbye clothes, gloves, hats, coat and pants.  So sad.  Back to hand-me-downs for the rest of the season.  They sure looked hot for that one ski trip though.  

Russ and I signed up for classes at Brighton.  I got to ski with six very fun friends.  We had a crazy, fun time.  Russ skied on Saturdays with David Fonda and we would join him for the afternoons.  We love skiing.  This Friday we have organized a couples night ski with our neighborhood at Brighton to end the season.  It should be a blast.  If we can just leave the mountain this year with no injuries.  Somebody on the night ski always manages an injury.  Why do we continue to do this??....because it keeps us young.  So we think!!

Christmas Highlights

Christmas was great!!  These are my highlights.  Talking to Spencer in Armenia on Christmas day.  Exchanging love gifts as a family and getting my hand crocheted plum scarf and hat made for me by Trent.  Yes my 17 year old son.  I loved it!!  Also getting together Christmas eve with my family for games.  And yes, finally getting Erin to join the family skiing on Christmas eve day.   

Talking to Spencer was a treat although I have to admit when I got off the phone I kissed it because he seemed to be right there in the room with us for a few hours and then poof * he was gone.  It left me feeling very melancholy.  We learned that he is without water up to 3 weeks at a time.  No baths or laundering of clothes.  He also returns from a long cold day of walking on ice packed roads to an apartment of 45 to 55 degrees.  That is as cold as my garage on a very cold day.  He seems to be all good with it though.  We sat around a speaker phone.  I had prepare two pages of questions and was eager to get as much out of every minute that I could.  The family had other plans as they started talking about movies at the beginning.  I kept telling them there wasn't time.  Then you can guess they used that quote against me every time I asked a question.  "NO TIME!" will go down in our family now as a famous quote.  HA!  

 He is always optimistic and finds the humor in everything.  He spent his Christmas doing not the normal things we are used to.  A ward party with Santa dressed in red long underwear and a skull cap with fireworks in the church.  o.k.   His job was to entertain the group with games.  Right up his alley.  I miss and love him so much!