From Our Neck of the Woods...: Skiing!

This weekend, we went to the Poconos to ski at Jack Frost with friends. Jim and Simone have a family cabin up there so we had a place to stay. Their girls, Catherine and Elizabeth are the same ages as our girls and they get along great! Simone plays Rummikub with me at "Game Night" and Jim comes over to play poker with Doug and the guys. It was destined to be fun!

We got up there late Friday night, and early Sat morning, we headed over to the mountain for lessons. They don't give the kids poles because it requires too much coordination, but they did great without them. The 4 girls took lessons, though Caroline hated it and started crying uncontrollably about 1/3 of the way through so we had to remove her. She refused to ski and poor Doug sat with her until lunch. She drove him crazy with the whining. Meanwhile, I was in a refresher course before hitting the slopes. The other kids finished their lesson at lunch time so we ate outside without jackets. It was so warm, and uncrowded because most people don't associate warm weather with skiing, but the fake snow worked just fine! Unfortunately I forgot to put sunscreen on the girls and they got quite a sunburn.

Caroline was "ready" to try again, but everytime we'd put her skis back on, she'd want them off. Little by little, she'd get used to them and stay on for a little longer. The four adults took turns watching her while the rest ski'd. Nikki took to the slopes immediately and had a great time, though she wound up in the trees a few times early on. Pretty soon she was able to steer better and got so confident, she and Catherine would ride the chair lift together without adult help.

Finally, Caroline was ready to try the slopes with Doug holding her hand. Her main motivation was to ski down so that she could ride the chairlift up! We joke that three of us went skiing, and Caroline went chairlifting. She made it down the slope with Doug a few times and loved it! Just before we left, Nikki wanted to go down the "intermediate" slope with me so I let her. It was really fast and really steep and she fell a few times - once spectacularly and landed face first in the snow. I panicked that she'd throw in the towel in the middle of the run, but she hopped back up, turned to me and said "That was fun!" Thank God!

What a fun day on the slopes! I'm so grateful all four of us had a good time (some sooner than others) and that no one got injured! Doug and I didn't even fall once! I think ski trips are in our future...

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Nikki at her lesson (she's in the light blue jacket and black pants, orange helmet)