February 2010 archive
Brighton, 2010
The kids didn’t have school Friday so I took the day off and took Isaac and Micah skiing at Brighton again. Ily took Reece to the childrens museum and they didn’t have to put up with any complaints of, “this is boring,” from older brothers. A good time was had by all.
Being a Friday, we basically had the place to ourselves. The one time we had to wait more than 30 seconds in a lift line was when we got caught behind the ski school. We quickly moved to the other beginner lift to avoid that again. It was amazing, especially considering how long lift lines were the previous two times (Saturdays) that we’ve gone skiing there.
The story for the day was the halfpipe. The bigger beginner lift, Majestic, goes right over the terrain park and right next to the half pipe. It’s fun to watch everyone doing their tricks while you ride up. Something about the halfpipe intrigued Micah, and as we dangled our legs over the run next to it he stated matter of factly, “I want to ski on the half pipe.”
“Really?” I asked.
Very calmly again, “Yes.”
When he’s that calm about something, you know he’s serous. I talked him into just doing the green runs a few more times, and then maybe after lunch we’d give it a try (or he’d forget about it, I thought). You have to take a steeper blue run just to get to the half pipe, and he and Isaac had never skied one of those before. As we rode Majestic for the first time after lunch he started talking about the half pipe again. Isaac thought it over a bit and said, “I don’t think we should ride the half pipe, it’s pretty steep just to get it.”
“I want to ski on it.”
“Micah, I really don’t think we should.”
“Let’s do it.”
“Um, I just dropped my poles.”
“What!?” I interrupted.
“I just dropped both my poles. They slipped out of my hands” replied Isaac, far too calmly.
I looked over my shoulder and sure enough, there were Isaac’s poles on the ground below us, right next to the half pipe. While he was concentrating on his argument against the half pipe, his hands had betrayed him. There was no way we were going to just leave them and pay the rental shop for them later. To the terrain park we would go.
They did fine on the way down to the park entrance. It was steep, but really wide open, and again, nobody else there. We took big wide turns back and forth down the hill and they did fine. Micah stopped at the top of the half pipe and Isaac and I went down just past that to get his poles. He skied on down beside the half pipe and I sidestepped back up to Micah. I had a blast skiing up to the rim on each side a few times as I went down (I cautiously avoided catching any air, as a, um, responsible father I didn’t want to chance hurting myself) and when I got to the bottom I looked back and Micah was actually making turns and heading up each side a tiny bit as he went down. After a few turns he skied down the middle, a satisfied little shredder. My initial frustration with Isaac dropping his poles was gone. When we caught up to Isaac and told him how awesome the half pipe was, he fully gave in, “I want to try it!”
So we did it again and all three of us took turns doing our Winter Olympics inspired runs. It was great. After a one more run down the normal runs their legs were tired out and we headed back home. Good times. Here are some cell-phone pictures (I never remember to bring my camera skiing, it’s an old tradition that the cell phone is saving me from).
The kids didn’t have school Friday, so I took the day off and took Isaac and Micah skiing (Ily took Reece to the childrens museum). For the first few runs we literally had the mountain to ourselves. We were skiing down the hill and right onto the lift. A few more people showed up as the day went on, but never had to wait more than 30 seconds to get on a chair.
One beginner lift goes right next to the halfpipe, and Micah decided we needed to try it. We did, and the boys had fun snow plowing down it.
... See my Tabblo>
Posted by Bryan on February 28, 2010 | Filed under: Family News | 3 comments
Super Sweet!
Today Micah got a package in the mail from his former kindergarten class at Fisher’s Landing Elementary in Vancouver, WA. All of Micah’s sweet little classmates had given him Valentines too even though he was no longer there! His old teacher Mrs. Bates even gave him one. She is really into bean bags and she made them into valentines and he has spent quite a bit of time throwing his new bean bag all over the house. The whole package was super sweet! Micah felt so cool and was so excited to have double the valentines this year too. I love that old school! Oh how I wish we could go back!
Posted by Ily on February 17, 2010 | Filed under: Family News | 2 comments
The Design Company
Today I went shopping ins search of drapery hooks. I decided to be smart about it and call places before I went to them to verify whether they had them or not. I called a few places and I was able to find that a place called the Design Company http://www.designslc.com/ at 2200 South and 500 East in Salt Lake had some for inexpensive. I went there after Reece and I picked up Micah from morning Kindergarten.
I found it in a less than desirable neighborhood and it had lots of old windows that were cracked and broken. I thought “Oh dear, our van will get robbed while we are inside and the building will collapse on us too-great.” We decided to go in anyhow and boy was it magical inside. Totally like something out of Harry Potter! Dilapidated and small outside, enormous and beautiful inside! This place has all sorts of decorator fabrics and denims and trims and tassels and window treatment hard ware… and even better were their examples! It was truly beautiful inside! It was like a maker’s heaven! I loved looking at all of their window treatments that they had everywhere and I wished I could just fork out money for them to make my dream drapes. I can make curtains, but they can make DRAPES. Like works of art those window treatments were.
Ok. So that was an exciting place to find here in Utah. Next time I will drive Bryan’s car though. Save myself worrying and about my treasured family van getting stolen.
Posted by Ily on February 17, 2010 | Filed under: Family News | 1 comment
FYI
We bought a new camera charger so we can take pictures once again. We were certain we would find the first charger just after the new one came in the mail (via Murphy’s law) but it does still remain missing.
Anyhow, the pictures from the Monster truck jam would not have been possible without the new camera charger. So hurray for the internet!
Now you may say, well why aren’t there more pictures of the house and the family other than just at the monster jam? Well, I guess it boils down to me being too lazy to clean up my house enough to take pictures. You see, I am ok if you stop by and see the bit of mess that is here, but to document it on the Internet for the whole world to see forever after is too much for me. Not gonna do it. Nope.
And some rather anticipated news to add to this blog post… As a baby, 6 teeth came in rapid succession and tortured us with tears and discomfort. As a 5 year old, 6 teeth fell out in rapid succession also and have provided a different source or agony- an embarassing lack of certain mastication skills. Micah has been a toothless wonder for 6 months or more. It has gotten to the point where he gets mad if I give him an apple because he can’t eat it without front teeth. I have to cut everything for him now. How does he even do pizza? It is a miracle that he can bite into anything at all! He is an example of superb adaptation. So the excitement is that his front two teeth on top have finally started to pop out- wahoo! We keep marveling at the new teeth and are so glad he will soon be able to eat apples once again. I’ll post a picture soon! His cute toothless grin is about to be a thing of the past!
Posted by Ily on February 14, 2010 | Filed under: Family News | 1 comment
Monster Jam
Our old friends, the Whaley family, invited us to attend Monster Jam with them yesterday. Since we both have all boys, it seemed like a safe bet that the kids would like it. They’ve actually been to a monster truck show or two before.
I remember monster trucks from when I was a kid. Bigfoot appears to have disappeared, but Grave Digger is still around, along with a bunch of others like Monster Mutt and one sponsored by the Air Force named, Afterburner. There was even a local truck from West Jordan that did pretty well too. We had a fun time walking around the pits before the show, watching the big trucks do their jumping, racing, and freestyle contests, and seeing the motor-cross jumpers defy death on their 60 foot jump.
Micah insisted on taking all the pictures. I sorted through and found the best, and cropped them in close. He did pretty well:
We got the pit pass and got to go down on the floor before the show and see the trucks up close. This is Monster Mutt, complete with floppy ears and tail … See my Tabblo>
Don’t worry, Ily and I went on a date (without the boys) for Valentine’s Day afterwards.
Posted by Bryan on February 14, 2010 | Filed under: Family News | 3 comments
