New Year’s weekend we spent in Denver, teaching the kids to ski and visiting with family and friends. We flew in on New Year’s Eve day and headed to the Ellis’s house. They graciously invited us to stay at their house where they fed us dinner, taught us how to play Kinect games, and then fed us chocolate fondue!

We stayed up chatting until the wee hours of the morning (until around 3:00 am I believe). Needless to say, we weren’t up real early the next morning!

We packed our bags and headed up the mountain to Loveland ski resort where we were determined to teach the kids to ski.

Eventually, we made it out of the lodge with all the gear we needed — but not before a minor meltdown. (What were we thinking when we put 15 layers of clothes on a kid who hates to wear anything besides shorts and a t-shirt and then made him sit around in the sport shop while we buckled hard plastic boots on his feet?!! Of course he lost it! But we’re pros at handling meltdowns and soon enough we had him outside and geared up.)

The next hurdle was getting them to the base of the lift. Wow, we were on the verge of a Mommy meltdown before we got anywhere close to that lift! Seriously, who puts the lift 100 feet uphill from the lodge?!! It is hard enough to duck-walk yourself that far uphill in skis, let alone drag a small child that far — a small child who has never even stood up on skis, let alone maneuvered them up a hill! And yes, we eventually took the skis off and hiked up in our boots but hiking up hill in ski boots, carrying two people’s skis, is no simple task either. Luckily, once we got to the surface lift, it was a cinch to ride with a brand-new skier.

The kids quickly figured out how to balance and we made a bunch of runs down the bunny hill before we headed back to the lodge for lunch.

As soon as we finished eating, however, I looked over to find Carter fast asleep on the bench. The kid can sleep anywhere!

Daddy and Raine went to try the chair lift while I waited in the lodge with Carter. She was pretty good by the end of the day.

Eventually, I had to wake up that sleepy kid because we were loosing daylight. I convinced him to put on all his gear one more time so we could make a few more runs. This picture is him showing me how he could jump in his skis — I love the tongue!

After an exhausting day of skiing, we headed to Idaho Springs where we checked into our cabin at Indian Hot Springs.

We had dinner at the Main Street Restaurant and then headed over to the mineral hot springs to soak our weary muscles. (Actually, I think that I’m the only who had weary muscles, but it sure felt good.)

The next morning we drove back up to Loveland, dropped the kids off at the kid’s club, and then Daddy and I skied the rest of the mountain.

It was a great day for skiing; the temps got all the way up to 25 degrees so we didn’t freeze to death! They didn’t have any fresh snow, but it had been so cold the week before that the snow they received earlier never melted.