Sarah update

Sarah spent a lot of time this past winter getting really strong and improving her skiing. She had her best results ever this season, including a first place medal at the Jay Cup slalom race. She placed third overall in Alberta and represented Team Canada at the international Whistler Cup in April. So, she's pretty much awesome!

I never get tired of this picture. 

This is Sarah in the Super G at Whistler in her Team Canada speedsuit. It is an incredible photo!

Sarah is off!

Sarah left for Colorado this morning. The new ski season has begun!

She left a note. What a great person she is.

Bozo Cup

Sarah won the Bozo Cup today. It is a head to head race that runs each spring. She raced seven times and didn't lose once, except for a crash. She is sitting at home with a trophy and bag of spoils while icing bruises on her knee and hand. It was a pretty good day.

Mauro Visit: Conquering the Ski Hill

How could we not take our beloved guests to our favourite ski hill? Lucas and Jack took snowboarding lessons one day, and then their favourite aunt took them on a little zip around the mountain on skis. We even caught some air! We totally rocked the place!

The boys soon discovered that snowboarding involves a lot of sitting.

Hey, look! Mary has her camera out!

Training trip

I just dropped the big girl at the airport for a two week training trip in Colorado. I hope she works hard and has tons of fun. I miss her already!

Ski Season Banquet Weekend

The ski season wrap up party was a month ago, but since Alison and Bob skied on May 21, it seems fitting that this doesn't get posted until it really is over for the season.

Wrap up day is a very fun event where children are encouraged to dress up like bears,


or cows that hide behind monsters,


race a sibling,


and then beat their dad.


In the evening, we have a banquet where girls present fun cheers or songs about Freezing Feet. Fun!

The Ethans come to Lake Louise

Woo Hoo! We got to share the routines of our lives with the cousins from Winnipeg! They took some lessons and then joined us on the slopes of Louise for a few fun days making lots of turns!


Learning to ski was a snap!

I think they had fun.

We went skating at the Chateau, too!

K2 Westerns

To kick off Spring Break a little early, Sarah and I drove up to Jasper so she could compete in the K2 Western Championships. She was pretty excited about missing a couple of days of school as well as the race!


Jasper was lovely and springlike and the hill the kids raced on was very different from what they are usually racing on, which made for an exciting four days of racing. Most of the team was there, except for Emily, who went to K2 Nationals in Collingwood, and Carson, who went with his family to Hawaii.


It was a big weekend for Sarah's friend, Alex, who won a gold and silver medal. Sarah had three front page finishes and crashed in the first slalom run on the fourth day. Smart girl, however, volunteered to forerun for the afternoon races and pulled off the 2nd fastest time in the ladies' course and 12th on the mens. Not bad!

Flag Bearer

This is Alison carrying the flag at the Doug Meyers Race.

(She's the one in the yellow t-shirt! Just kidding! She's in the middle, holding back the crowd until the parade starts with her mighty, mighty pizza stance.)

I'm so glad other people had the chance to take pictures!

Mook-tastic

Alison has been a busy little ski racer over the past couple of weekends. She had some fun and had a few good runs. One run in particular inspired her buddies to create a whole series of Mookie-modified adjectives. My favourites included:

Mooktastic
Mooktacular
Mookariffic
Mookalicious

I didn't take any photos but another parent did. I have one of her with pink hair, just because.

Rustle tried to cheer her on.

Not exactly about skiing...

I have some photos to share of us at ski hills, but not skiing stories. Just trying to balance my life, a little.

We had a free ski weekend at Revelstoke in February, the only time all season the four of us have skied together. We also had some time with Rustle, who can, apparently, pull children down hill at the speed of fun.

Alison and her pal Erin took time to play in the snow on the deck.


This was the sign at the base of the lift at Castle Mountain. -50 with wind chill was no exaggeration.

Winter Insanity

I realize that it has been a long time between posts. Mostly it's been because we have been very busy with skiing. Tonight, however, training is canceled due to extreme cold, so I've found a few minutes to share.


Sarah has had a pretty good year. She did tweak her knee over Christmas camp and found a fantastic physiotherapist (through her fantastic coach) who helped her a lot. She was a bit tentative in her first race, but had some solid finishes in races since. She's really going for it and it's working for her!




Alison has had a good year, too. Her new shinnies from Gramma mean she's banging into those gates. She seems to like slalom a lot - maybe it's because she wears shinnies for slalom!



Rustle is still enjoying the amazing amounts of snow he gets to play in. Life is good for Rustle if there's snow.



Parents have had a couple of chances to ski together this winter. Just a couple, though.

Training Camp

Since our days around the holidays are filled with skiing, I thought I'd show the other side of things - life in the after-hours, as it were.

The girls get together with the other skiers in the club and do Christmas-y things, like dancing with Bendy Santa,

(this is our friend Cleodie. She's lots of fun.)

or dressing up in war paint to dig tunnels in the snowbanks,

or playing a rousing game of Pee Spoons (if you lose, you have to drink a glass of water. First person to pee, loses. The coach thought this was a great way to get the kids hydrated after a day of training....)

or invite more kids for a Pee Spoon Tournament. On the floor, of course.


I also like to explore some of the non-ski related activities. I took Alison snowshoeing on the Bow River Loop, but she thought it was boring. And she was hungry. And miserable.

But Rustle loved it.

World Cup

The Lake Louise Winterstart World Cup Alpine Ski Races were held over the past couple of weekends. Alison and the Lake Louise KD team were flagbearers for the opening ceremonies.


And Sarah, in a very exciting happenstance, was invited to a Fast and Female event on the day of the Ladies Downhill race. She got to meet Karen Lee Gartner and see the gold medal, listen to Kelly Vander Beek, hang out in the VIP area, and meet Lindsey Vonn.



Alison met Lindsey Vonn, too.