Park City Weekend

Weekend Getaway plus Seven!

Last Friday we took the kids, plus two friends to Park City to go skiing and to visit Grandma and Gramps. They were gracious hosts as always, fed us constantly and I again had a difficult time controling the "grazing" issue that I seem to have at Grandma's House. The kids obviously had a fun time and I think Chase and Zach loved having friends to go skiing with.

The weather was really warm, making for crappy snow, but also providing many hours of fun play time outside, which Macy took advantage of. It was picture perfect, so I took a few.

I love the sunglasses girl!

Jake, falling again. He just wants to go down fast!

On Saturday we ventured off with SIX KIDS and two adults to Park City ski resort. Can you say CRAZY? It was a circus for a while.

This is our theory about kids and skiing. Put the youngens on skis, send them to the top and then let go. They are so resiliant that even when they crash down the mountain they come away unscathed, uncut with nye a broken bone to be found. Super good time. Of course, this goes without saying that there is much weaping and wailing going on, cause they think it hurts to crash. Whatever! Deep down they really, are having a wonderful time, as are Dan and I.

Our Ellie,who consistantly, though very cautiously made her way down the mountain.

Two clever ten year olds!

Lucky for us the older ones are now beyond this type of torture and can venture out by themselves a little, mostly cause we are so far behind with the youngers that we can't keep up with their "SKILLS". However, later we learned that both sets of boys ventured into double black diamond territory and ended up at ski lifts that were closed. One set of boys took an elevator (That is what they said. They even called it a glass elevator! I think I believe them?) down to a neighborhood road where they then asked around and found a BUS STOP which took them back to the RESORT! While I am in the car waiting for skiers to return--because I'd had to take tumbling, crying child home-- I suddenly see these two little boys stepping off the bus! I was shocked. Minus two for parenting skills. However it got even better when we had to wait another forty-five minutes for our oldest two boys (Chase and friend) to venture back to reality as they too had gotten themselves stuck at a closed lift and had to walk their way back. (They aren't as clever as to find a bus to take them back. Two points for the younger sibling and friend)

Two less Clever thirteen year olds, but we still love em!

Over all a great success! And Dan was red as a beet that night. Sunscreen? He says he did...Oh well, he had great form on the hill and that is all that matters.

MACY HAD A BIRTHDAY!

I can't believe it, but my baby just turned three years old. She had a great day; first thing in the morning we do a breakfast in bed. I didn't know if Macy understood this concept, or even if she would catch on that it was her birthday, but when she came down and saw Dan cooking pancakes and setting up the bed tray, she said "Oh, is that my pancakes for my bed?" and when Daddy said yes she said, "Okay, I'll go back to my bed." And she rushed back up the stairs and waited in her bed for another twenty minutes. An amazingly long amount of time for her, but she stayed put.

She was princess for a day with her new crown, but princess didn't cut it and she announced she was Queen Macy and though she is on most days, today she had the crown to prove it.

We went to the fun park and were joined by dearest friend Avery and the rest of the dirty rotten Kirschman clan, (they are moving and I'm not happy can't ya tell?) Grandma and Grandpa Bryan showered her with gifts and love and cousins Cassidy and Bridget and Abby and Josh and Matt came along. We had a great time playing laser tag, roller blading and playing in the soft play. I have no pictures since I was too busy playing in the soft play. NOT by choice though. Macy was freaked out by the mere fact that there were two hundred little scampering children bullying and pushing their way through like little mice. I have to admit I was a bit nervous myself. Everybody in Cache Valley had spring fever on Saturday and took it out on the Fun Park. Great time was had.

Happy Birthday Mace!

March is living by its name!

So I woke up yesterday morning, lifted the blinds and found this lovely, actually gorgeous picture in my window.

The best part, and I failed to get a picture of it, but the greatest moment of my day came when my almost three year old crawled into bed with me and together we watched Daddy shovel snow. Dan's hat had so much snow on top that Macy commented that Daddy was a snowman! It was really beautiful and if I must choose whether to have snow in March or April, I know without a doubt I'll take it in March.

It's a wet, heavy snow and my kids came in from playing yesterday afternoon completely soaked through. Only this morning did we realize that Zach's coat was still in the garage, wet and cold. We double layered him in jackets and sent him off. So much for being prepared.

On another note, our carpet will be laid today. Pictures to follow...

And on yet another note. My dearest Macy Jane will be three on Sunday. I can't believe that our baby is three! She is such a hoot and so much fun (when she isn't throwing a tantrum) I love having her around. She is such a helper and loves her older brothers and sister so much. This morning on their way out to catch the bus she yelled to each one individually, "Goodbye-- Name of sibling--, have a good day. See ya later. Then when Jake failed to return the salutations she yelled, "SAY GOODBYE TO ME JACOB!!!" What a sweety.

The family room is nearly complete!

After nearly three years of using this dark spider infested space for junk, boxes, odds and ends, old college binders you just might need one day; we bit the bullet, forked out the cash, lived with the dust and mess and now have a wonderful new, bright family room, minus the carpet and touch up paint, which I plan on doing, but couldn't bring myself to pull out the brushes again today. Perhaps because I couldn't deal with Macy or Jake's "help" We've already ruined and outfit a piece and Macy put her adorable stamp on several pieces of trim when she began painting them with the wall color...yeah, I'll finish the paint tomorrow.

We are so excited to have a bigger, more family friendly room to watch movies and hang in that we can hardly stand to wait for the carpet. Which should be here any day... just waiting... and waiting...

Dan and I were very pleased with all the things handyman Mckibben did,(he doesn't really go by that, but it seems to work well for this purpose, so we we'll leave it at that) with of course a slight amount of help from us, but we made one very slight error and I know that it will be the first thing that Dan will point out to every one, since he loves to share all our mistakes with others that come to entertain with us, so I am going to get it out of the way right now, so that it never has to be discussed again. Got that Dan? This is it, for all the world to see and then we are going to zip it cause I ain't moving the darn things!

Okay, so here is the dealio, we, okay-I- told them were to put the pendant lights and I swear there was a reason behind it, like there were big black pipes everywhere else and it was our only choice, but we'll never know since the ceiling is all nice and tucked away under a layer of paint, sheet rock and insulation. When we went to hang the pendants once the cabinet was in, we discovered that it didn't hang over the sink--directly-- but more like over the person using the sink. Okay, so I made one teeny, tiny mistake, but who cares? It's not like it's in the kitchen or anything, and it's in a corner far out of every ones provision anyway.

So there you have it in black and white, my first mistake ever! I know, it's pretty amazing isn't it. Besides that one little fop aw, the room has turned out quite nicely, now if we could just get some carpet...waiting...still waiting.