This is why I like skiing

Because it's something we can all enjoy together as a family.

Alex amazed me. She was so confident in her skiing and you could tell she really enjoyed it this year. Mostly she enjoyed how independent she could be on the slopes. She proved that she could get on and off the coach's chair lift and ski down all by herself, and do it well. She gave me her own personal tour through the green and blue runs on the other side of the mountain that she had gone on with her teacher and showed off as she went off the usual path to climb the side of the mountain and gain some speed. She can't wait until she's old enough to go up on the buses with her friends and play on the slopes all by herself. She'll have to wait a few years for that though.

Johnny thought it was great that everyone there knew him by name. His name is taped to the top of his helmet for lessons and I hadn't taken it off yet. He loved that he had so many new friends on the mountain that day. As you might expect, Johnny had a little too much confidence. He was great at playing "green light, yellow light, red light" but he didn't like "yellow light" very much. He wanted to go fast, always trying to race you down the mountain instead of follow you through turns and practicing control. He could maneuver his way around with ease and nothing about it made him nervous. He wanted so bad to go on the higher lifts and steeper runs. He wanted to ride the lift all by himself and have the independence Alex enjoyed. Next year I'm confident that we'll all be riding the bigger lifts together.

Every time we went up for lessons I would alter between hot chocolate and apple cider because Johnny is a chocolate fan and Alex loves her cider. This time we brought up a thermas of each of them and they thought that was a real treat. They were excited to go up stairs and eat at the lodge even though they had been having so much fun skiing that neither of them noticed how hungry they were until we stopped to eat. I wasn't surprised at all when Johnny crashed on the way home. A lot of mine and Brad's favorite sports are things that the kids won't be able to really participate in until they get a little older. Skiing is one they can start out in early. It won't be long before we can all go up together and ski casually down the runs together as a family. I'm looking forward to that time.