Wonderful Holidays and a Happy New Year!

I stretched out our early December activities and posted them over the past couple of weeks, but in reality we had a prolonged break for the holidays. I notice a number of comments and will try to get back to you soon.  In the meantime, I want to rave about our amazing break.

We had Grams and Gramps with us for three wonderful weeks.  We did so much together. We saw holiday light displays and of course celebrated the holidays.  We ate too much, played lots of games, took the kids ice skating, roller skating, and we just got back from a skiing trip. During the week we were away, we also went to a cave (above).  Grams and Gramps spoiled me and hubby rotten -- letting us go on dates, letting us sleep in, doing the dishes and cooking endless meals, helping get things tidy.  [Thank you again!! Hugs! I know you're reading!!]

We took the kids skiing for the first time. (It's been about 15 years since hubby and I last skied.)  We were stunned to find out that there was a homeschool deal on the day we decided to ski, so it cost us 1/3 the price.  If you plan to go skiing this season, it's well worth a phone call to see if there's a homeschool special on particular days. (You may want to bring a homeschool ID with you. You can create one for you and your children at the homeschool buyer's co-op. It is free.)

For the most part we came away unscathed, though at one point I took LD and DD up to the top of the mountain. LD was in the chair ahead of me and lost a ski as he got on, so I brought it up with me.  When we got to the top the attendant came towards me to get the ski. I was paying attention to him, not poor DD when I realized she hadn't gotten off the chairlift!! Oh my goodness!! The attendant rushed back and shut down the lift, but not before DD was up about 12 feet in the air.  They had her slide onto her belly and dangle down (we still couldn't touch her ski she was that high up).  "Is she athletic?" they asked me. "Ummm..." "Okay honey, now drop down and we'll catch you." And poor DD dropped out of the sky into the two attendants' and my arms.

Another event later in the evening, had LD slip off the chair just as they were starting out.  Dad hadn't even lowered the safety bar when LD started slipping. Dad managed to grab LD's arm and he dangled down (not too terribly high, but enough for LD to make a good story of it and scare the pants off me!).  They stopped the lift and LD safely got down to the ground and rode the next chair up.

Overall, the kids had a blast.  Even ED had a fantastic time... skiing for probably about five of the eight hours! That meant endless runs for me (or Dad) up the carpet lift and down the hill bending over and holding ED upright. (She never did really get the "pizza" position properly.)

So now we'll be getting back into the swing of things this week.  I did get quite a bit of planning done for the new semester. I'm feeling refreshed and ready for the new term; hopefully the kids are too!