Fun in a snowstorm

Ross came to town for a load of stone and for Grandma's birthday. She was fielding phone calls all day and didn't want to go anywhere, so we took Ross (with Moss' borrowed skis, poles and boots) up to Cedar Breaks to cross country ski. He had done it once about 100 years ago and was excited to do it again. He did great...only fell down once. It was really windy up there this time. We got to the yurt just in time for lunch. When we arrived we took off our skis right next to this little kid carrier that the hosts of the yurt had carried their two kids up in. On closer inspection, one of them was still in it taking a nap. He was sleeping really well and was nice and warm (the yurt hadn't warmed up yet) so they had let him continue napping. He woke up while we were there and came in for lunch. There was quite a group of people there by the time we were ready to leave - the volunteers, some other cc skiers, and several snow mobilers including some rangers up working the area. We went a little further after lunch, but with all the blowing snow and poor visibility you couldn't hope to see the Breaks, so we decided we'd better head on back before the wind filled in the road. Luckily the snow plows were hard at work packing the blowing snow down on the road edges, so we didn't have any problems. It was really fun and Paul and Ross had a good visit while I had a good nap on the way home.

All work and no play...not a chance!

Saturday Paul needed to get the scouts to and from the merit badge pow wow, and it was raining, so we decided we would just have a stay home and work Saturday. The house was in great need of cleaning and Paul needed to work on his next Grandma gate project. I cleaned and cleaned and he scouted and welded. About 2:30 when it had stopped raining we decided we had had enough... and took off to Pine Valley. We were relieved to find that it was not raining. We parked by the entrance to the equestrian campsites and headed out for yet another cc ski session. Pretty soon it started snowing pretty hard, but it was so pretty that we just kept on and ended up doing the full loop and back around to the campgrounds. We saw where they have made some new sites up along the road between the equestrian sites and the Lion's Lodge. There's the Forsythe Group areas and the Gardner campground. Of course we couldn't see much since they were covered in snow, but it should be fun to check them out next spring. It was very hard to ski in the fresh powder because it kept sticking to the bottom of our skis, but it was very good exercise. After a while it quit snowing and was just white and peaceful. There was no one else dumb enough or lucky enough to be there but us. We had to walk a little ways on the road back to the car where the snow wasn't deep enough on the road that had been cleared before this snowfall. We got back to the car about sunset and didn't feel bad about laying around watching the Olympics that night after all that exercise. We sure don't ski as well as the people we were watching! (But we only fell down once apiece...that's improvement!)

More snow...more practice

Happy President's Day! We decided to try once more to find the Cedar Breaks yurt and cc skiing trails that supposedly leave from it...and we did. We got a pretty early start and it wasn't even crowded. You park at the junction of the road to Cedar Breaks/Duck Creek. The road towards Duck Creek is cleared, but they don't plow towards Cedar Breaks after that. It's about a mile to the yurt. It is manned by volunteers. There was a very nice couple there and we had hot chocolate and visited with them for quite a while. It was about 40 in there when we got there, but they stoked the stove and by the time we left it was about 70. It's such a neat little place. Then we headed off on some cc ski tracks/and on the road (snowmobiles keep it well-packed) along the rim overlooking the breaks. It really was a beautiful day with lots of sun and blue skies and hardly any other people. We saw some snowmobiles and a few snowshoers. We went quite a ways, fell down less times than before, saw beautiful scenery and took lots of pics. We headed back after we reached Chessman Point. We had a great time. It was actually nice to get out of St. George for the day, even though it was 70, because there are so many people in town for the Parade of Homes. On the way back we stopped off at Kolob Fingers and just drove to the top, looked and left. We got home about dinner time. We have decided that with this nice weather the snow won't last, so we'd better take advantage of all the practice time we can. I have to say I have never really enjoyed the snow much and never wanted to spend much time in it. I've never had the equipment or clothing for it before, but this has been really fun now that I do have some things that make it so much more comfortable - gortex outer layer, good under layer, wool socks, water proof boots and gloves, ear bags and skis.

We're getting a little better...not much

Saturday we decided we would head to Pine Valley to practice our cross country skiing skills. (We don't have many.) We have watched the library video a few more times now. It was a perfect sunny, crisp day up there. There were quite a few people there - a scout troop finishing up a winter camp out, crazy kids tubing off the dam and even someone with a tent set up to ice fish out on the lake. Lucky for us someone else had been there cc skiing and left us some nice tracks to follow. (In case you don't know, on groomed trails, they put tracks in for people to use. It makes it a lot easier than just having to push through brand new snow.) We decided to head up to the end of the road to where the new camp grounds are being put in. It's kind of uphill, so pretty soon we were shedding some of our layers. It's a real work out. Here and there we fell over. When we got to the top we went over to the stream and up the trail a for a little while. We had to go up a hill to what we thought was the main trail and let me tell you, the herring bone just wasn't cutting it so we just went up it sideways planting our skis as we went. Paul thought it was so funny watching me that he took a movie, but luckily he didn't do it right and only caught seconds of my clumsiness on video. We went off on what looked like a trail for quite some time, but found that it must be the ditch that heads off towards the cabins by the cemetery. We backtracked until we found a pretty open space to head back down the hill to the road we came up on. If getting up the hill was hilarious, going down was even more so. Snowplow just wasn't cutting it, so we resorted to the sideways ski method again and stair-stepped and fell our way to the bottom. Four or five crashes later, we made it back to the road. Thank goodness those other skiers were no where in sight for all of our antics. We did so much better going back down the road and even started getting some real speed and gliding into it...then we would fall down. I'm afraid we aren't too well coordinated yet. Even with all the crashing, it was still fun and so beautiful and lots of exercise. I have some sore muscles and a few bruises, but I learned a lot about better ways to get up when you crash. We finished up by eating lunch in the car and then walking across the dam to watch the crazy sledders and see the frozen lake. On the far side of the lake we were so pleased to see tracks of the other skiers crossing the overflow area of the dam and going up the other side using the sideways method we had been using. Hey, maybe we aren't so dumb after all. They didn't show that method in our video, but we figured it out on our own. After we got home, we were so tired out we had to take a nap. Then we did our Costco run and stopped in to the the first day of the art show at the college. They have some wonderful paintings as usual. Be sure to get there. We will probably head back up to Pine Valley on Monday for a few more chills and spills.

Happy Birthday #6 Kennis!

Kennis celebrated her #6 birthday on the 11th. We got to see her and give her her present yesterday afternoon. With so many birthdays popping up, we have a hard time always getting to the celebrating part on the day of. She was able to come by and we sang over some birthday bears in lieu of a birthday cake and she opened her present. Tavin informed us that the day after her birthday she lost her first tooth. If she hadn't lost it then, she probably would have pulled it out on one of the chocolate covered cinnamon birthday bears. Happy Birthday Kennis! We love you! (Koen came in his Buddha disguise - JK - his shirt got dirty and he didn't have a spare.)

Grandma's new gate

With the addition of a dog to her household, Grandma has been wanting to get some gates so she can put Wonka outside to play. Paul just finished and installed a beautiful new gate for her for a Valentine's/Birthday present for her. He welded it up and then had it powder coated. Doesn't it look just spiffy? His next project will be one for the other side of the house. It will be quite a bit bigger project...maybe a Mother's Day/Christmas present deal.

Our first daffodil is out!

We've been watching this little flower and yesterday it started to open...today it was all the way out! The sun just happened to be out too. I love seeing the bulbs popping up in the spring when everything else is still looking pretty gray! Hooray for the daffodils!

It's complicated, but it can be done

Ferf decided to surprise Ryan with a little get away trip. With lots of planning, she was able to make it happen. She and Ryan dropped their kids off at Weed's Thursday morning, came to our house, traded us cars (so I would be able to pick their kids up from Weed's after work) and then headed off for their get away trip. Meanwhile the rest of us had a good time with the kids. Weed and kids kept them entertained until I picked them up. It was kind of a cold, rainy type day, so we played out a little, but then headed indoors and Kennis said how much they had been missing the Little Rascals. We decided to watch Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken and have a dinner intermission and then finish and see if we had any time for Little Rascals. After all of that it was time to be getting to bed. After teeth, prayers and piddling were taken care of we had stories with Genghis walking around the bed on us while we read and otherwise showing off. Grandpa put Koen to sleep. We have three available bedrooms now, so everyone was comfy. Everyone slept through the night, except Grandma worrying about if everyone would sleep through the night. Next morning Grandpa got the fire going and Grandma got the breakfast ready. After getting dressed and brushing teeth, the kids headed outside with Grandpa while Grandma got Koen taken care of. Pretty soon it was too cold so the Little Rascals kept us entertained. We had an intermission snack and pretty soon Ferf and Ryan returned. Thanks are due to the Stucki's who lent their cabin for the get away couple. I think everyone involved had a good time.

A Waterfall Day in Zion

Saturday we both had the same idea for what to do...let's go to Zion and see how beautiful it is with snow and waterfalls. We took it easy and didn't actually get there until about 11:00. This turned out to be a good thing because it had been raining a lot before then, but it had stopped for a while. We headed up the road toward the Temple of Sinewava and spotted several waterfalls going full blast along the way. There was a triple near Weeping Rocks, another single along the way, some little ones at the place where Lance's sister got married, the giant one at the end of the road at the Temple and then we walked the trail up to where the Narrows start and there was a big one on the way. There was lots of water running everywhere. We ate a little watercress out of a little stream on the way...mmm good. I don't know if it's legal to eat foliage at National Parks or not. It was so pretty with the mountain tops covered in misty clouds. We saw Lynne Godfrey and some of her hiking buddies and also had quite a visit with a boat captain from Alaska while at the parking lot at the Temple of Sinewava. The boat captain wanted to talk our ears off. He was an interesting character with very colorful language. On the way back to the junction we walked up to the wedding spot and then ate lunch in the car. After lunch we decided to drive on to the East entrance of the park and see the sights en route. It was colder with more snow up that way and was really pretty. We pulled out one place and had a snory little nap and then drove on. There were more waterfalls to be seen. We turned back at the East entrance and on the way out hiked through some snow to visit one waterfall and pulled off to take pictures of some others. It was now starting the rain, so we decided there would be no more hiking around and headed home. It was a very scenic day.

Scrabble revisited

Now that it's just Paul and me we are finding we have a little time on our hands here and there. We have had some time to start playing Scrabble again. It's been quite a while since we played games that can be for just two people...weird! We played a couple of games and realized that our old game was missing more tiles than we thought, so we went out a got a new one on Saturday. I guess we could have just ordered new tiles, but this was faster. I thought maybe I would beat Paul if we had a full set and was anxious for that to happen. It hasn't yet, but I'm going to keep working on it. He does much more pondering and employs more strategies than I do. I just get sick of having three g's and want to get rid of them as fast as possible. Along with buying a new Scrabble game we had a great yard clean up and tried to go to the dump Saturday. The truck had some problems so we ended up having to drop it off and walk home. Hopefully it's nothing too terrible. The yard looks a lot better. We have been enjoying eating whatever we please. We've had lots of mushrooms with no one turning up their nose about them. The house seems pretty big for just the two of us, but it's staying pretty clean. We've been listening to old people music and no one's complaining about that either. It will take some adjusting to having just the two of us, but I think we'll get the hang of it pretty soon! Oh, Genghis thinks he's a big help to us while we play. He has to lay on the table and be involved in such activities as trying to knock over glasses of water, attacking the dictionary and trying to eat a dice that ended up in the Scrabble box. After a while he gets bored and just takes a nap. He just likes to hang out wherever we happen to be. He had to be out getting tangled up in things while we did our yard clean up. I guess we still have one baby around the house with us. He misses his boy, but he's learning to hang out with just old people.