Part of the kid's Christmas was an overnight ski trip to Timberline Lodge. Unfortunately the day we chose to go skiing was a blizzard! This was good for the mountains since it was basically their first big snowfall, but bad for those that are only fair-weather skiers! On the drive up to Mt. Hood, Will complained his stomach hurt. I just wrote it off as motion sickness and gave him a grocery sack in case of any re -visitations of his breakfast. All I can say, is they don't make plastic bags like they used to. Oh his breakfast did make a second appearance and then continued to present itself all over the back seat of the car as it drained out through all the holes in the bag. It looked like a punctured water hose at full throttle as we stopped to find somewhere along the road to dump it. We finished our drive to the lodge with the windows open and already frozen.
(These pictures were taken the day we left the lodge. Yes, chose the wrong day to ski!)
I love this photo because I didn't even mean to take it. I borrowed Kennedy's camera for the trip because it was small enough to fit in my pocket. While trying to figure out how to use it, I accidentally took this picture. That is my $125 credit card bill for goggles. We realized very quickly there was no way we could ski in this weather without goggles (or a full face mask for that matter). We were hoping to get away with purchasing as little ski-wear as possible since we only use it here in the Northwest every 4 years!
Kennedy really wanted to try snow-boarding so Dad and Layton joined her for a half-day lesson. Because Will was younger, he had to go into a separate snow-board lesson. He wasn't too excited about that. In fact, he wasn't too excited about anything. He still didn't feel very well but I figured it was just car-sickness and he would perk up soon. But that wasn't the case. 20 minutes into his lesson, I got a call from Will's instructor telling me to come pick him up because he had thrown up again.
Cassidy and Karsyn wanted to ski so I had planned on skiing with them. We started out on the bunny hill just to watch the others during their snowboard lesson but I soon realized that was were we needed to stay all day! Karsyn had only been skiing once before and seemed to forget everything she had learned and Cassidy was having almost as much trouble. So while I went to hang with Will inside, I told them to practice on the bunny hill while I was gone and then we went hit the slopes that afternoon.
Kennedy was the only one that kept a positive attitude all day throughout the blizzard and freezing cold. She had a great time learning to snowboard and was grateful to all the fresh powder for cushioning all her falls.
Scott came in after his lesson to stay with Will. So I headed back out to the girls and off we went to hit the trails. What I would give now to have had a map of the resort! We took off down the nearest trail and soon discovered there were no green circles anywhere! So we did the best we could on the blue squares. Our best included 17 falls, 6 times I had to hike up the mountain to put skies back on the girls, one lost cell phone, 2 crying fits (one of them was mine) and my hypothermia-induced hallucination that life flight came and took me immediately off that mountain! Between that one run, then the second lift we had to take to get back to the lodge, we were gone over 3 hours! We entered the lodge covered in ice. Cassidy is trying to take out her retainer and can't because it is frozen to her teeth! While I would have to say I can't ever remember being more miserable in my life...we definitely made a memory. We went and found Layton and Will in the lodge where Will had just thrown up again in the cafeteria area. Scott had gone back out with Kennedy to try a real trail on the snowboards. Layton told us that the teenage janitor mumbled "I really hate this job" over and over again while cleaning up Will's vomit. Once we were all reunited, we headed to our rooms at the lodge, unthawed, then headed out for a delicious dinner.
The entire meal was fabulous, but they hit of the night would have to be the hot chocolate. It was a huge mug of chocolate, caramel, toffee and cinnamon cream delight!
After dinner we went to the room to build a fire and play games. Building a fire turned out to be much harder than we had expected. Every time we would get the fire going, the room would fill up with smoke. It got so bad that the we actually set off the fire alarm! The real embarrassing part is that Scott's partner, Jim, was in the room next door! After hotel security came and opened our windows, leaving us with a drift of snow in our room, they told us not to build any more fires. They said when it is really windy, the wind blows all the smoke back in the rooms and the wind was not going to let up any time soon. So instead of staying inside and cozy by a fire, Scott and the kids went outside to the pool and hot tub. This is Scott's partner, Jim, modeling the correct attire for blizzard hot-tubing. I stayed in the room with Will (who was still sick) while Scott went with the other kids. The girls weren't too excited about going back out in the cold, but Layton was all over it! Not only did he hot tub, but he got out and made snow angels and jumped in the pool!
We did the lodge's buffet breakfast before heading back home. Talk about a spread! If anything, the whole trip was worth it for just the food. You will notice we did the death-by-chocolate hot cocoa drink again.
Poor Will, he was still not feeling well. He threw up again while in the hotel room so we didn't let him eat anything. All he remembers about the food from this trip was that they had good 7-UP. I promised him a date to his favorite breakfast restaurant when he felt better but that still wouldn't put a smile on his face.
After breakfast, we waited for dad to break his way through the ice on the car so he could open a door and start to unthaw it, then we were headed back for home. I just hope these memories last a long long time because it might be a while before I am up to trying this again!
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