....Downhill Skiing......

We have done our share of skiing this year. Well, Ivan, Liza and Greg have done our share of skiing this year. Sonja was hard at work so she missed our Mondays with Grandpa. Grandpa Larry would carpool down to Discovery with his fellow sexagenarians and septuagenarians. He graciously helped the kids on and off the lifts when the lifties were not quite paying attention and skied with us to help keep an eye on them as we skied down. Liza was the only one who suffered from the lifties slacking on the job. Once with her mom and dad she did not get loaded on the chair. She ended up waiting for us in the shack at the bottom of the hill eating the guys chocolate bar from his lunch.

Here they are getting geared up for the first downhill skiing day of the year. It was their second time trying downhill skiing if you count the one effort last year.

These photos from last year at Maverick Mountain remind me that Liza liked bonking her helmet against Ivan as much as she liked skiing. This year they both did great! By the end of the season Sonja and I each had a mini-me following in our ski tracks each run.

This year we put them in kinderski for half of the first day. They did not get as much attention as expected but had fun and became comfortable with the magic carpet.

I suspect that Ivan is politely telling the girl in the pink that her goggles are not on correctly.

Steve and Ayla posing.

Greg and Liza...

Snow bunnies.

Sledding...

We found the local sledding hill and enjoyed a few days on the hill in the snow.

The Janzens came by to visit. It was a beautiful sunny day.

Liza and Ayla traded mothers for a bit.

Brandy and Liza above and Ayla and Sonja below.

We had a bunch of races down the hill. Ayla acted as "the girl at the bottom who says GO!"

The next photos are from a colder day at the same hill. It was around zero with 15-20 mph winds.

Sonja and Ivan like to scope out the course and visualize the run before competition.

And he's off!

This is Liza getting chased by a wolf. Darn those wolves! Why can't we just hunt them all the time? On second glance, that may just be a Boxer.

Maggie got some training runs in. It reminded her of her old skijoring days with Hobie

The old days with Hobie:

These are from a hill on the road from Anaconda to Wisdom, MT.

We usually take a break in the van for snacks and warming up.

And then back to sledding.

There is always time for snow angels.

Winter highlights

We have enjoyed winter thoroughly this year. We missed mentioning Sonja's next step toward adulthood. She turned 21 in December. Four more years and her car insurance rates will drop. Boy will that be nice. In the meantime we celebrated in the normal 21 year old fashion.


Ice cream and cake with our 3 and 5 year old children!

We gave her a new wetsuit for her birthday.

Liza learned to wink just for the special occasion.

Happy Birthday Sonja!