Keystone Nov 6 2011

For anyone who has ever woken up on a ski day with Jason, you might appreciate the start to our day on Sunday.  Often Jason can go from sleepy / groggy / relaxed, to up / packed / fed / ready to go skiing in 5 very hyper minutes.  I used to get left behind in the transition... but now I'm prepared and know to get going early and not be fooled by the short-lived groggy sleepiness.  Also, Rachel helps me slow things down quite a bit.

Our second day of skiing began with some excitement.  On Saturday, Jason bought a summer sausage at the grocery store - a particular kind that he wasn't able to find in Canada - and we decided to start the morning with some kitchen softball.  Rachel's soft soccer ball was the ball, Jason pitched, Meggan bat with the sausage, and Rachel was in the outfield.  All of us were a bit hyper and ready for a great day.

The drive up was good, with a little snow, and we bundled up to prepare for the gondola ride.  We decided to take Rachel up to the top of the mountain in the gondola and make a base at the lodge there.  She therefore got her first ever season's pass, and it was free.  Several staff members gave us the friendly reminder that we could not ski with Rachel attached to us in the baby carrier, and they each seemed relieved to hear that we were not planning to ski with her but would be taking turns with her in the lodge.

One long run and one park area were open, but the snow was reasonable.  The lift lines were short by 11:30am and the kids behaved wonderfully.  Our friends Sarah and Dustin and their little guy Aidan joined us again, so the four adults rotated.  It was fantastic.  The sun gave us great views of the valley all day and we each enjoyed many runs.

 The kids had plenty of room in the warm lodge and we were able to spread out and play nicely.

Rachel looks like a Jedi knight while playing in the lodge

This Friday is opening day at Breckenridge so we'll be there for the holiday for sure!

Halloween

Rachel was too little to do anything for Halloween last year.  This year, she was a pumpkin. 
Classic cuteness. 

Rachel and Meggan went downtown to Parenting Place at 2:30pm as usual for Monday afternoon playgroup.  This is where we've met most of our friends.  All the kiddies and parents walked to the Munckkin Masquerade on Pearl Street.  Businesses all have 'treat stops' and tents are out with stickers, games and entertainment.  It's a zoo full of little kids, music and entertainment.  Jason joined in after school.
Meggan, by the way, was supposed to be a Scarecrow.  However, her hat kept blowing off and Rachel kept pulling off all her straw bits... so her costume was a bit of a failure.  Jason was a retro basketball player at school and had fun showing off his Globetrotter skills with some other staff during the school day.

Sorry I don't know how to rotate these videos. 
Rachel kept dropping her chocolate bar, then stopping to pick it up and take off her hood.  Whenever there was music around, Rachel wanted to stop and dance.

After dinner we decided to head out to Trick or Treat.  Our street is a friendly residential street, but there are only 1-2 other kids on our street.  Our next door neighbor gave Rachel a small toy pumpkin, and 2 other families gave out candy.  Nobody else on the street participated or had candy, which was a huge shock and disappointment to Meggan.  Apparently here, if you want to take part you turn on your light and have a pumpkin outside, and if not, kids don't bother with your house.  We only had a few kids come, so we have loads of leftover candy we don't know what to do with.  Oh well.  Maybe next year we'll find a more child-friendly street to really enjoy the real thing.

We really enjoyed watching Rachel work so hard to walk down the street.  She really is entertaining these days!

For all the pictures, click here

Spoon Feeding and Snow

This post is really just an excuse to post a few videos and picts.

Food and gaining weight has been such a huge focus for us in the last couple of weeks, that even our pictures and videos often revolve around food.  Rachel has decided (not very conveniently in the gaining-weight department) that she is going to feed herself with a spoon and won't let anyone else give her anything with a spoon.  She's... getting better... very slowly.

In order to make feeding Rachel more fun (ie. to get as much in her as we possibly can!), we invent games like moving her high chair in and out and shoving the spoon in her mouth when she is close to us. 

Last week, as many of you know, it snowed.  Wednesday was not a snow day at school, so Jason went to work despite 6inches early in the morning and more all day long.  This meant short stints outside, bundling up in all our snow gear, and more time inside than usual.  At least we didn't lose our power like some friends, even though we lost 4 huge branches in the yard.

View out door Thurs am

Reading with Daddy

Sunday we got out and went hiking in the sunshine again!  This week it will snow again, so we have to get out when it's still hot before to cold front hits...

Jason on big rock