Skiing!

For the first time in a long time, I have a picture of me on this blog and not one of the kids.  This morning we were off early.  I learned that it pays to get to the mountain early since it guarantees you a nice parking space right by the lodge instead of having to trek from the lower lot.  Aiko and I dropped the kids off at ski school and then we were off to hit the slopes ourselves.  Aiko hadn't skied since high school and I had been snowboarding for the past decade, so we were both a little apprehensive,  but it all came back.  

After the kids lessons, we had the idea to take the kids to the smallest hill there was.  Aiko's kids are a bit older and could handle it, but Lucas and Liliana could not.  First, they haven't learned how to stop yet.  They are probably one of the youngest in ski school (had to fib a little to get them in) and they don't seem to have the muscle control to turn their skis inward to stop.  Second, they had already skied for 90 minutes and for little kids, that is a lot of energy used up, so they were extremely tired.    So imagine me on a slope with two preschoolers who don't know how to stop.  Interesting to say the least.

Realizing that it wasn't going to work, I left Aiko and her boys and took the twins back over to the learning area.  We went up to the top and Liliana says "Mom, I want to go down all by myself"  after which she turned her skis to point straight down the hill and started off before I could stop her.  On her way down, she clipped a young kid on his skis and he fell down and then she continued to pick up speed until she hit the mesh fencing that bordered the learning area and she hit it so hard, she went right through it and crashed in the snow.  That was it, we were done.  We loaded up the van and the kids were asleep in two minutes on the ride home.  

It was a great day.  A little exhausting, but it was exhilarating to be out on the slopes again!