Vermont, and more skiing

Went to Vermont last weekend. The kids love it and get pretty excited in the days leading up to it. Tough to say what they love more: seeing Nana and Baba, taking a trip (until about an hour into the drive), playing with the 40-year-old toys, or checking out the Disney catalog of VHS tapes. Jack also enjoys rifling through my shelves for books and (a new one this trip) digging through drawers in Scott's room for knickknacks I have never seen before and in some cases don't even know what they are. He came back to New York with some of my Choose Your Own Adventure books, an HWR stamp/seal or some such, and my old reporter's dictaphone. And Kate saw 101 Dalmations and I believe Lady and the Tramp, although maybe she didn't finish the second one.

The first day we went skiing at Okemo, and got up pretty early to do it. Quick breakfast, quick drive, I had no idea it was less than 20 minutes away. Rented skis, checked in, dropped both kids at their lesson, insanely got on skis ourselves, thought we were crazy all the way up the magic carpet, fell a bunch on the way dpown, but kept doing it, and got better. And had an absolute blast.

We checked in on Kate before lunch. I walked in and asked after her at the counter. The woman looed at a sheet behind her, then said, "The good news is, she's not on The Cry List." That's right, there's a cry list. And Kate wasn't on it! She then checked with the teacher, and came back to say, she's doing fine. "She's apparently a little stubborn," she added. Emily and I laughed at that one. OH, not our Katie!

We collected Jack from his lesson; the instructor spoke well of him but seemed reserved, which was weird because we couldn't believe how well he did later with us. Maybe he ran over the guy's foot or something. We had lunch with Jack, which was a blast, 'cause we were all starving and ate everything, and then skied together. It was funny, because he was basically lapping us. "Go straight," he encouraged. "Fast!" as we made S curves down the mountain. He just cruised on down, stopped on a dime, turned to avoid people. Considering it was just the second time he had been on skis since a very introductory lesson two years earlier, I kind of couldn't believe it. Amazing! Better than us already. He probably could have handled the lift, I thought, since he didn't know enough to be concerned. And he continued to encourage us to speed up, as he lapped us yet again.

Eventually we got a call saying Kate was done (refusing to continue, in fact, which is fair; it was a longer lesson than we intended anyway), so did a few more runs, Emily collected her, and we took turns doing runs with Jack. Kate had a blast sliding down a little slope on her butt, saying "Wheeeeeeee!"

It was an awesome day. Got some pictures of happy skiers, cruised home weary and sore to shower up for a steak dinner, and spent the rest of the snowy weekend sledding, making a snowman, hiking in the woods, and playing. Kate laughed a lot during sledding, even when she fell off the sled halfway down (which was typical). Emily and Jack had me in a near-panic when they wandered off in the wood exploring and were gone for what seemed like an hour. I went after them, only to find them way behind the house with walking sticks, looking at deer and bunny tracks. Not lost, not hurt, but walking trails my family and I walked 35-40 years ago. If there is a better way to spend a Vermont weekend with kids, I don't know it.

Crazy it took us so long. It won't again. To quote George Eliot, thanks to the front quote of The One and Only Ivan, "It is never too late to be what you might have been." Hey, maybe not.