visiting friends and starting school

The day after skiing we had a couple friends over. 

That's Luda and Lena, the orphans Denise's family was hosting for a month.

They played outside, freaked out over the mud on their new clothes, hung out in Evie's room, and experienced their first video game. Mostly they tried to communicate via Google Translate on a pair of smartphones.

Evie really grew to love them!

Sunday, January 6th, was our first Mexico/L.A. mission trip meeting after church. It's been four years since Terry's last mission trip and is time for another. This time I get to go along! He's done the trip twice, two weeks long both times, and I've always had babies to stay behind with. Noah and Evie are coming too! Noah is going to be 14 so he's plenty old enough. Evie will be 11 and as long as I'm along, she can go too. There's a group of about 30 going! It's a much younger group than last year so it'll definitely be a lot different, but we're praying for a great, faith-building experience.

 After we meeting Evie and I finally went to visit my friend Katie and her baby Sylie.

I hadn't been to see her since the day Terry got back from Utah back in August!

The next day, Monday the 7th, we started school up again.

I thought Trouncer's expression as he waited for lunch was funny. 

I accidentally surprised Evie and Samuel practicing a dance for the party she was planning that evening. Her reaction was so funny when she saw me. 

Dance party!

Dancing quickly turned into wrestling.

I occasionally take selfies at work to prove I do go there sometimes (two or three times a month). 😁 This from January 10th.

A few days later on the 11th, we went to the Swim Center with Denise, her girls, and the orphans. Here's Lena and Zhenia.

Luda, Evie, and Zoe.

The next night we went for a quick dinner date with Paul and Jana while Jack hung out with our kids at the house. We miss them! We love them!

Next day after church we and Terry's family went to Pizza Ranch to celebrate Jerry's birthday. They have a new game room now instead of a basketball court.

Samuel and Ezra won a ball. 

He was so excited.

Shari and Sarah.

Grace, Noah, Jack, Terry, and the littles.

After we got home Evie and I went to Denise's to say goodbye to the orphans. 

They had to leave the next day. It was so sad!

The next night Evie insisted we do a science experiment that she had seen from a video Shari had posted on my facebook. 

The following morning she insisted on another one - adding dish soap to milk with food coloring mixed in - and all the coloring swirled around on their own.

The remnants of Nathan's Christmas snow pile. It won't be gone until June.

Egg shell dissolved! It was like a bouncy ball...that smelled like vinegar. The kids loved it.

Next up Evie begged to make slime. So we did it. 

2nd time family skiing

On the second day of the new year we went skiing with a homeschool group for our second time. 

The kids had to do ski school again, but since they were intermediate beginners it didn't take all morning. Before we knew it we were all on the slopes, far away from the bunny hill. Evie found Norah pretty quick and they hung out for the remaining morning. 

This was just after we had finished ski school so we were all still figuring things out. Not Terry though, he's a pro. Evie, however, really picked it up quickly. She had motivation to keep up with Norah.

There's Samuel. It took him a little longer to figure it out, but he did immensely better than last year.

This was a green slope that was super easy for all of us.

Me and Evie on the lift.

Our ski tips.

Look at the concentration.

I think this was still pretty early on too, maybe one of his first trips down the big blue hill.

I passed them and took this video from the bottom. 

Noah in the foreground, Samuel on the ground in the back, me in the black, and Evie in pink.

All of us making our way down. Noah is very cautious, just like me. However I had immense improvement by using no ski poles! Wish I had tried that about ten years ago (I'm not a good skier). 

Samuel was on the ground a lot in the morning but he improved quite a bit in the afternoon. That's me gesturing towards him on the ground. 😂

Samuel and I a little farther down.

We swapped taking photos for a couple at the top of the lift. It was nice to have a picture with all of us...minus Ezra. He was too little and had to stay at the ranch.

I think Evie was off somewhere with Norah.

Terry and Noah.

Noah (and us behind him) going down that easy green.

To get to that green we had to go down this steep little section one at a time. Terry filmed us coming out.

A little further on there.

Further on yet.

A pano of Noah at the top near the end of the day. It was so beautiful up there.

We stayed until they closed right at 4pm and this was one of our last runs down the blue on the back side of the mountain. It sure gets dark this time of year.

2019 New Years sledding

Since Terry didn't have a New Year's Eve party at the church, we had an even more enjoyable and relaxed New Years Day. In years past I've had to wrack my brains for ideas to get us out of the house so Terry could sleep off his all-nighter. We ended up going sledding, much like we did after Christmas in 2017, which incidentally was the last time we had been to the Meadowbrook hill. 

Aren't filters great? Here I am looking better than I ever have, all without a shower and still in my pajamas. 😂

Before we left the house the kids played all together outside in the tunnel that Terry and the littles had made the day before.

Evie!

Trouncer!

Jumping! That's Samuel.

Ezra's expression is my favorite.

There's always a decent pile right there from shoveling the deck, worth even breaking off our rain gauge so they can jump from there...

After lunch we went over to Meadowbrook, along with a whole ton of other people who I tried not to capture.

There goes the Dwidgie. He's the lightest and fastest.

Another smile from Evie.

Some video of Noah and Evie heading down after Samuel and Ezra.

Ezra wipeout...

...Samuel smokes him...

...But Ezra gets him back later.

A classic Six Pack pileup. 

Video of the collision.

The troupe trouping back up the hill.

Just one more time.

Not wanting to cook, we stopped at the store and got the makings for jalapeño poppers. We had to get up early the next day for skiing so we didn't want a lot of work.