Spring Break: Day 8 & 9

Spring Break 2010: Day 1
Spring Break 2010: Day 2 & 3
Spring Break 2010: Day 4
Spring Break 2010: Day 5 & 6
Spring Break 2010: Day 7

Saturday, March 20

We left Eagle, CO at 9:30 a.m. The boys kept themselves entertained for about two hours. I'm not sure what they were doing, but there was lots of laughing, explosion sounds and screeching. The roads were not slick, but were wet and slushy. We saw several cars that had gone off the road, but we're not sure if it was today, or yesterday during the huge snowfall. The I-70 stretch between Denver and Salina gets longer every year. The boys colored and played with transformers for a while, then we put in a movie. Twitter and Facebook kept me entertained. I know these are hard to read, but you can see I didn't lack conversation.
Both KU and K-State were playing March Madness games, so that kept Scott occupied. We arrive at our hotel in Hays just as KU went into overtime. The boys and I checked out the hotel pool while Scott listened to the last few minutes of the game. (KU lost, in case you didn't know). In between the KU and K-State game, Scott took the boys to burn off some energy at the pool. I continued to be entertained by facebook by posting this, which resulted in lots of comments and "likes." K-State won their game (in case you didn't know).

Sunday, March 21

Are we home yet?

Spring Break 2010: Day 7

Spring Break 2010: Day 1
Spring Break 2010: Day 2 & 3
Spring Break 2010: Day 4
Spring Break 2010: Day 5 & 6

Adam and Zach have been quite the helpers during this trip. If you've ever been skiing, you know that the actual skiing is NOT the hard part. Carrying all the gear is. Skis, poles, boots, helmets, goggles, ski pants, coats, gloves, hats.

Scott carried his skis and mine, plus both of his ski boots. I carried the boys' skis and boots, plus one of my boots. The boys wore their helmets and goggles. Adam was in charge of poles. Zach carried one of my boots. About halfway to the ski slopes Zach decided the boot was too heavy. So I carried the boot and he carried his skis. After a few steps that was too heavy too. So I ended up carrying both boys' skis and my pair of boots. Zach helped by not whining.

We have skied three FULL days. We leave the house before 8 am, and get back around 5 pm. The first two days the boys were in ski school from 9 am to 3 pm. On Thursday, we skied from 9 am to 4 pm, with only about a 45 minute break for lunch. That's a lot of skiing.

BeaverCreek saw 10 inches of new snow today. The powder was heavy, and if you weigh less than 50 pounds, it's really hard to plow through. It's a good thing Scott and I are decent skiers, because we ended up hauling the boys down the mountain. We think Adam's skis had no wax because he was going nowhere. Scott had to hold him up and ski down blues just to get some speed.

I skied with Zach's skis between my skis. Once we got speed, I would hold my poles horizontally in front of us so that he had something to hold onto. Then we'd hit a huge pile of snow and come to a dead stop. I had to push not only myself, but Zach too. About halfway down, Zach started crying because he was cold, wet, hungry and tired. He cried the whole rest of the way down. It took us about an hour to get down the mountain. We met Scott and Adam at the bottom, rode the Gondola one time, and then called it a day.

We saw lots of other kids taken down by ski patrol. Note to self: Do not ski in 10 inches of fresh powder!

Spring Break 2010: Day 5 & 6

Spring Break 2010: Day 1

Spring Break 2010: Day 2 & 3

Spring Break 2010: Day 4

Wednesday, March 17

The boys ended up wanting to do another day of ski school. Actually Adam did, and Zach SAID he did, but then this morning, said he didn't want to. We told him it was just one more day, and then we could all ski together. He seemed a little sad when I dropped him off. Since Adam moved up a level, they were not in the same class, and I think that had something to do with it. And the fact that Adam moved up and he didn't.

Another beautiful day. I think it reached 58 degrees. Scott and I skied a different mountain this time. Beaver Creek is made up of three mountains. This trail map shows how big the ski area is.

When we picked the boys up at 3:00 p.m., Zach was so excited because he could stop on his own and got to ski down the training runs a couple of times. Adam wanted to ski some more, so he and Scott skied down a few times, while Zach and I rode the Buckaroo Gondola.

Thursday, March 18

Olympians in training for Winter Olympics 2022.

Wow! What a difference a day makes. All four of us skied together and the boys did great.Temps in the high 50s again with plenty of sunshine.

We rode the Gondola and skied down several times. Then headed to the two person chairlift. I rode the lift with Adam, who told me the "rules" of the chairlift. (Put the tip of your skis on the red line. Then follow the chair in front of you until you reach the blue line. Then squat down and wait for the chair. Lower the bar when you get to the yellow sign. Make sure you hold onto everything.)

I took this picture of Zach below on our ride up.

We ate lunch (burgers and chicken nuggets) and then decided to try the quad chair lift that goes halfway up the mountain. Here we are on the Centennial lift.

And all of us at the top of the chairlift.

We skied all greens ("Cinch" run on the map). We did accidentally go on a blue, which was quite exciting. But we all made it down in one piece. We rode up the Centennial lift three times, and skied down. The boys even went through some easy paths through the trees.

The video below shows Zach in the light colored coat, and soon you'll see Adam zoom through the trees. Adam is wearing a red coat. If you can't see the video, it's on my facebook page.

Spring Break 2010: Day 4

The view from here:

Kid's ski school is not for the faint of heart. It's chaotic, with parents trying to prepare kids for a day of skiing. We had rented the boys boots and got them signed in the day before. However, we still needed helmets and goggles. Scott had parked the car and called me twice to ask where we were. I told him we were in the same place as yesterday. He walked through the mess three times before he finally found us. We were told to stand in this line, put on this sticker, make sure your child has sunscreen, go talk to this person, and then they wisk your children away to the "parent-free zone," behind a curtain. I forgot Zach's pull over so I asked if I could run back and give it to him. Denied! No parents allowed! They wrote his name on a sticker and said they would get it to him.

We couldn't have asked for better weather. It was 50 degrees in the afternoon and the boys were in just their turtlenecks and bibs when we picked them up. Scott and I got quite a few runs in, including a some of the most difficult black runs. Scott even went on an "unmarked" trail. I chose to meet him at the bottom.

We mostly skied blues and greens. We stopped by the ski school to see if we could see the boys, but it was really hard to see with all the kids in helmets. We picked them up about 3:30 p.m. and Adam wanted to do the training run with Scott. Zach said his feet hurt, but then perked up when we found out that we could ride the gondola. We ended up riding it up and back four times. Adam and Scott did two runs before we headed home. 

The ski instructor said the boys were very well behaved and nobody whined. They made friends with their classmates and enjoyed the day. Adam was ready to move up to the next level because he could stop on his own. Zach can stop with help.

Spring Break 2010: Day 2 & 3

9:28 a.m.: Depart for Eagle, CO

Mileage: 289 miles / 375 miles to go

We stopped five times between Colby, KS and Eagle, CO:

10:00 a.m. Goodland, KS

11:00 a.m. Siebert, CO

12:00 p.m. Limon, CO for lunch

12:45 p.m. Denver

3:15 p.m. Frisco

4:30 p.m. Arrived in Eagle, CO

It was snowing when we got to Denver. The boys like going through the Eisenhower tunnel, although they were concerned because our GPS did not work in the tunnel. We saw skiers on the slopes as we were driving by, and frozen waterfalls on the side of the mountains.

Monday, March 15

We hung out at Shawna & Marty's house in the morning. The boys played catch in the yard and then we drove to Beaver Creek and rented out skis and got the boys ready for ski school. In this picture, Zach is being measured for his skis, and he said he was a little nervous about the whole skiing thing.

 Adam getting weighed.

Our family, Shawna and Sophie.

We ate a snack at the Avondale restaurant in the Westin Riverfront Resort & Spa and took a short gondola ride (the boys went twice with Scott).

Spring Break 2010: Day 1

3:25 p.m.: Depart for Colorado. 

Miles traveled: 0

Miles to destination: 664 / 9 hours 50 minutes (according to mapquest)

Scott promptly falls asleep. The GPS occupies Adam and Zach for an entire three minutes. We stop in Salina to get gas and set up a movie for the boys. 

Just west of Salina on I-70, we passed Smokey Hills Wind Farm. A quick search on google revealed the wind turbines are relatively new within the last three years. I don't remember passing them on our last trip to Colorado in 2006, so that seems about right. It was really neat to see the huge "windmills" (according to Zach) turning. I tried to educate the six and seven year old crowd about the turbines, but a movie trumps anything educational. I wish I could have taken some pictures, but using a camera while operating a moving vehicle is probably frowned upon. (this photo is from the Smokey Hills Wind Farm website)

Scott entertained me with his experience testifying for an article 32 hearing, whatever that means.

We stopped in Hays to eat dinner. It was decided that we eat at IHOP because Zach said he's never eaten there before (he has). Adam had a hamburger and fruit. Scott ate a chicken sandwich and onion rings. I had scrambled eggs, bacon, hash browns and toast. Zach had eggs, sausage and five silver dollar sized pancakes. We were all members of the clean plate club.

The last hour and half of the day proved to be the most challenging. The boys were tired (they each had their first soccer game of the season earlier in the day) and bored with riding in the car. We almost made it to Colby without incident, but had to separate them with only 25 minutes left in the day's trip.

8:31 p.m.: Arrive at Holiday Inn Express, our usual preference for overnight accommodations in Colby. I announced I would be making a Starbucks run in the morning, but nobody but me seemed to care.

Miles to destination: 379

Miles traveled: 285 / 5 hours, 6 minutes

Dayton, OH: 2000 - 2002

This is third in a series. See Charleston, SC or Birmingham, AL

Dayton, OH
1102 Katy Meadow Court

If you can't see the map below, click here

2000-2002

Scott finished his degree at UAB, so we headed to Dayton, OH in March 2000. We did take a two week vacation to Germany, but that's another post for another day.

We built a house in Fairborn, a suburb of Dayton. Scott documented the four month process by taking 2,694 pictures of the house in varying stages of development. Although I made fun of him for doing that, those pictures did come in handy when we had to go to court because of a red paint incident.

In process

Finished!

Scott worked at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, and I sent out about a million resumes before landing a communications position at The Dayton Art Institute. This ended up being a favorite job of mine, even though I knew nothing about art. And Scott will tell you he had to "suffer" through some artsy events, like the one below, but I think he secretly enjoyed them.

Art Ball 2001

Life in Dayton was ordinary. We hung out with neighbors and friends, ate yummy ice cream at nearby Young's Dairy, entertained out of town visitors at the Air Force Museum and The Dayton Art Institute, and took weekend trips to Cincinnati and Columbus.

The most significant event that happened in this period of time was Adam's birth. (September 11 also happened, and you can read about it here.)

So we had our first child. And I wasn't ready. I had just reduced my work hours from full-time to three days a week. My office was not cleaned out. My replacement had not been trained as we had planned. I did not have my hospital bag packed.

My due date was Sept. 4. My water broke around 2 am on August 28, and it took us two hours to actually arrive at the hospital.

After 12 hours of nothing, the doctors suggested a C-section and little Adam was born on August 29, big eyes and all. This picture always makes me laugh. 

I had left my job, so my days were filled with dirty diapers, bottles and pacifiers. Scott introduced Adam to Monday night football and I showed him the mall.

In December, we put our house up for sale and headed to Washington, D.C where Scott had accepted a job at the Department of Justice.

Adam's First Grade Music Program

Scott and I spent our 13th anniversary at a Circus themed first grade music program. Adam was one of the popcorn dancers, as you can see from these pictures. I didn't upload video this time.

Adam is second from the left.


Related posts:
Adam Kindergarten music program: April 29, 2009