The fun began when we went to the airport to pick up this stranger. I almost didn't recognize him. I can't believe how grown-up and manly he looks. He had spent the previous week visiting his friend Pranav in Dallas/Austin. It's always good to have him home.
On Christmas morning, Chuck took it upon himself to make homemade cinnamon rolls, we didn't protest too much. It's so nice having teenagers because Christmas morning no longer begins at 6am. We had a nice leisurely start to the day since everyone slept in.
This was the first year the kids were all super excited to give us their gifts. They actually insisted that we open our gifts first. It was very special. They each put so much thought into what they bought us - with their own money, nonetheless. We got the kids ski helmets and goggles this year. Chloe spent a large majority of the morning with hers on.
We bought Gavin an SNES (a classic nintendo game system) which he promptly went downstairs to plug and play.
The day after Christmas, we drove to Snowy Range in Wyoming to ski in the Medicine Bow forest.
It is so beautiful and serene. There were not a lot of people around and we feel we lucked out with good weather as well (the day after we went the high only got into the single digits and it was super windy).
Chair lift photo op. Every time I took a picture on the ski lift I was terrified of dropping my phone. Luckily, none of us fell while disembarking the lift...we saved our falls for the slopes.
I think each of us fell a minimum of twice. Fortunately, no one broke anything. Unfortunately, I almost went down the wrong run twice. Once I skied into a tree to keep from going down the scary blue slope. The second time I was going too fast because I was going down the wrong slope and Chloe called after me to stop. I did. 50 yards down the mountain. I couldn't get my skis off because of the way I landed. It took like 20 minutes to get them off and walk back up the steep slope carrying my skis to where Chloe was waiting. Then it took an eternity to get them on again. I was a mess.
The boys had their own adventures in skiing. Chuck skied right into a snow bank one time to avoid hitting a kid. He also accidentally dropped a ski pole twice - while riding the chair lift. They even dared to go down the super steep blue runs. They estimated their speed to be somewhere in the 70-80 mile an hour range. I'm sure that number is not an exaggeration.
We also celebrated Gavin's 20th birthday early while we were still all together. It was so surreal. We still are having a hard time believing he's actually 20. We did the appropriate amount of reminiscing about what we were doing 20 years ago and how it seems like it was maybe only 5 years ago.
To cap off the birthday fun, we went to see Aquaman at the theater that evening. This was definitely the year of the Superhero movies!
We also found this fun game called Puzzling Adventures that we did. It's part scavenger hunt, part sight-seeing, part Amazing Race. That combo definitely piqued our interest. We had so much fun following the clues and walking all around Old Town Fort Collins.
And finally to celebrate New Year's Eve, we thought there could be no better way than to jump it up at a trampoline park.
I tell ya, this family is the best. Crazy, loud, goofy, smiley. I just love all the fun we have together!
Obviously, that was not a complete list of activities for the entire 2 weeks. Those were just the highlights. We watched a movie every night, I think. Tons of Brawl was played on the Wii. Lots of games were interspersed here and there. We even ate out at Taco Bell one day. Also, Gavin cooked his famous fare for us...kielbasa and mac'n'cheese. We made a couple of trips to the library, shopped alot, and read alot. Overall, it was just the way we like it.
