winter ski trip (january 2015)

While we are a wrestling family, what we are not is a skiing family;). I skied just a few times growing up and Kevin was pretty much the same. That said, we like to be active, enjoyed the times we had skied, and have good access to skiing here in the Pac NW, so decided it would be fun to give it a try as a family.

I'm thinking the reason we waited so long to do this in the first place, is because of the difficulty of learning to ski ourselves while also helping the kiddos learn. Not to mention the expense and overall planning and execution of a ski trip with 7 people.

However, last winter we decided it was time to try it out!! After doing some research (and because we barely had a flake of snow last year in our area), we decided to venture a few hours over to Wenatchee. I had read good things about the Mission Ridge Ski Resort (https://missionridge.com), so we signed up for a ski class, rented a vacation home in Wenatchee for the weekend (through VRBO), and headed East.

We thought Joseph would have way more fun playing with toys and other children than attempting to ski, so we signed him up for the on-site childcare instead. We did pay for him to have a brief "snow experience" (see top two pics below) which he certainly enjoyed!! The rest of us ended up in what ultimately turned out to be a private group class. We had a great time together, first learning to stop and start and basically just stand in our skis, and then ultimately going up and down the learning hill.

It was a super fun day, and by the time we were about to head back to the rental to crash and relax in the hot tub, Kevin and James decided to take a trip or two down one of the main slopes.

The next day, we packed up our stuff and headed back home, making a detour through Leavenworth. The kids had never been before, so it was fun to show them all the different Bavarian-style shops.

We definitely stuck with the kid friendly types, so of course The Gingerbread Factory (bakery and cafe) was a must visit.