Final Pictures From Our Ski Trip

So, we packed up the Jeep and headed back out of the mountains just in time to miss a big winter storm (go us!). Any sightseeing for the remainder of the trip was to be done at 70 mph (in true Griswold fashion). See? Here we found a waterfall completely frozen over...a veritable blur for the camera...
We also met up with fellow Blogger, Laura, and her girls! What a treat! Laura and I have been reading (and commenting!) on each other's blogs for at least two years now, and we are also connected through Facebook! It was nice to visit, even if it was short, and get to see each other, face to face!

Group shot!!!!
We whizzed through Colorado, heading south, and saw (quickly) one of my most favorite sights... Pike's Peak. And then we passed into The Land of Enchantment - NEW MEXICO!!!! One thing the kids did notice on our five-state venture - the roads in the other states are NOTHING compared to Texas roads! New Mexico - do something about that! Your roads are horrible! I'm going to need to replace a few fillings now, indeed!

And, did you know there's a VOLCANO in New Mexico???? There is! There is!Soon afterward, we zoomed across the Texas border (and you thought I was kidding).Well, we couldn't stop for the night in Amarillo without spending a few short moments with college friend, Carol! Carol and her kids welcomed us for a bit and we had a great visit. One of these days, we'll plan that visit when Brian is around! HAHA!The most impressive part of the journey home was the Wind Farms. Seriously. It was creepy looking.

We'll be back soon, Colorado - the boys had too much fun to stay away for long!

Country Roads, Take Me Home...

Sorry about the lack of pictures in this post - I'm stuck in the Hampton in Amarillo with my camera in the Jeep and it is 30 degrees with FREEZING FOG outside...you'll just have to wait until I get home and can do the photo thing from the house!

Leaving was bittersweet. We loved Winter Park. The boys were in awe of the wonder and splendor of God's creation - you just can't help but be inspired and impressed with every little thing. But, while our trip was short, we needed to leave. A big storm was coming, and it's arrival was expected in the next 8 - 10 hours. And, we wanted to get to Texas to stay for the night. Which we did.

Today we begin the last leg of our journey - homeward bound. I'll finish off the photos tonight of our journey home - we've seen lots of neat things on the way home, and I got to meet up with a long-time blogging friend, Laura, in Denver! That was a HUGE treat! Last night, we stopped by the home of a college friend and got to visit with her and her kids (her husband is in the Dallas-Fort Worth area right now, so we didn't get to see him). Just a wonderful trip home.

So, away we go. There's no place like home...

Video: The Boys on The Bunny Slope!

Tyler does really well - check out the boys coming down the baby slope. I had to cut the video short because Tyler lost it at the end because Travis "won"! HAHAHA No competitive spirit there AT ALL!

Day Four and Back to The Mountain!

Today was MUCH better on the slopes, even though we didn't spend but a few hours on the mountain. We weren't rushed for lessons or shuttles. We just went. And it was GREAT. Travis was, OF COURSE, a skiing maniac. He definitely loves it. His comment today as I was cooking dinner was that he wanted to go skiing over Spring Break. Whew! Even carrying skiis and walking in those silly boots, he had a smile on his face (for the most part - he did complain a bit about lugging his equipment, haha). Tyler, and TYLER, man, we put him on the "learning slopes" and he went to town! By the time we left for lunch, he was going down all by himself. *sniff* My little man is growing up!

We got a nice man to take a picture of the four of us together on the slope they use for lessons (where Tyler was top dog today)...The smiles tell the whole story. After a late (LATE) lunch, we headed into town to do a bit of shopping. Every year, the boys get ornaments for the tree. So, this year's ornaments are from Winter Park, of course! While at the little shopping center, the kids wanted their picture taken with the buffalo statue...

The view here is just spectacular. Who can come here and see this and not believe in God? Seriously?Of course, I should at least let you see my "other" outfit...the one where I look like I robbed the highlighter department at Office Depot...

We are headed home tomorrow. It will be a sad day for some little boys, and we're looking at another two-day, 20 hour trip home. Go us. But, the memories of the past several days will make it all worthwhile.

DAY THREE - SKIING!!!!

Oh. My.

Scott and I skiied about 15 years ago in Red River, NM. It was fun, but man, it was hard. Winter Park is soooooo much more awesome than our Red River experience! Everyone took class - the boys were in a full-day class with lunch included, and Scott and I took a morning class with time off to eat lunch and load our stuff up. There's a free shuttle that runs from our condo to the mountain, but we just drove the Jeep ourselves and it was perfect for us!

I was quite apprehensive about lessons...I'm a faller. I'm happy to announce that I didn't fall one single time! My toes were numb, but hey - I rocked the slopes! Anyway, here's a view from the tallest point we skiied from - we saw Travis and his group up here, too - they were all over the place! Scott loved it, too. Definitely a great experience for all of us. And no, we didn't just ski down this slope - we just got off the lift at this point! HAHA

Here's Tyler with his ski school. They were so cute, and by the end of the day, he was doing pretty good for a Texas boy!

And Travis, man! He was a skiing maniac! He loved it and did very well - we are very proud of both boys, but it is quite evident that Travis can ski circles around the rest of us - several times over!

We had a BLAST!!!!!!!!

Day Two - COLORADO!!!

So, day two saw us trekking across Kansas. Guess what? Kansas is WIIIIIIDE. I thought we'd never get out of there. It just went on and on and on and on!!!! We finally passed through and I was messing with something and missed getting a shot of the really cool Colorado sign, so I'm hoping to get one as we leave the state in a few days. I was really upset about that. Anyway, we drove through the prairie and the kids were pretty tired of the Jeep (who wouldn't be???) when all of the sudden, this MOUNTAIN appeared on the horizon! From then on, we were on mountain watch! It was awesome! We flew through Denver, trying to beat sunset to Winter Park (which was no easy feat). Here's a really cool tunnel the kids wanted a picture of - I dunno...whatever. I just take the pictures. It was short, but the boys loved driving through it - we'll leave through the same tunnel on Tuesday!

Of course, the drive up to Berthold Pass was incredible. The trees are flocked with REAL SNOW! Not that mess we get in Texas that you spray on Christmas trees! It was beautiful. The icy roads were somewhat okay (I wasn't driving, so I'm not sure how all that went. I tried not to think about it!). We did see a search and rescue team of about 30 people at Berthold Pass and learned later on that avalanches were highly likely in the back country. Apparently they were looking for a missing person. Scary stuff. Not the kinds of things we see in Texas, that's for sure!
This is a lodge just across from the mountain at Winter Park - we have a little girl in our church with this name, so I snapped a picture for her.

It truly is beautiful here, and I can't wait to show you our fun!

OOOOOOOOOO-Klahoma!!!!

Day one and we hit the road at 10:10 a.m.! Destination - KANSAS (yes, I know, we're nuts...12 hours in a Jeep Wrangler with two kids and more luggage than Imelda Marcos' shoe collection). We were all in high spirits as we crossed into our neighbor to the north - Oklahoma!

The kids' reaction? "It looks the same on this side of the red river as it does on the Texas side." I dunno - were they expecting some massive change, like in those colored maps of the US where Texas is yellow and Oklahoma is green or something? I will say this, though - Oklahoma roads BITE. They are AWFUL. Sorry Oklahomians...but they do. And the Red River? Well, its RED.

Of course, we passed into Kansas and it was DARK. No fanfare, couldn't see the sign, but I should have taken a picture of the toll booth. Yep, I-35 is a tollroad in Kansas. It was $1.90 well spent, though, because we hoofed it! And look what we found when we pulled into the hotel at 10:15 p.m.!
SNOW!!!! It was the first REAL snow for both boys. And let me just point out that this was the first time either boy had been outside of the state of Texas, save the time we took Travis across the border into Mexico...
YAY!!!!! Day one is DONE!

And Away We Go!

Our first REAL family vacation. *sigh*

We are heading out in the morning (around 10 a.m.) to drive our faithful Jeep Wrangler 12 hours to Salina, Kansas. We'll stop there for a bit of a rest and some breakfast, then we'll hitch it over to Colorado where we will experience MOUNTAINS and wheel into Winter Park, CO. Sounds simple, right? We hope so.

The boys are beyond excited to get to see snow. REAL snow. We'll ski, tube, shop, and even SWIM (yes, I hope we will!) and have a blast before trekking back to Texas in hopes of beating old Santa to our house. The schedule is tight, but doable.

We've never taken a big family vacation like this.

Anyway, this is where I'll store the pictures and stories of our journey. I hope you will follow along with us on our Family Vacation 2009!!!!