Raining with Cats and Dogs: Family Ski Day

We recently learned that kids 6 and under are free up at our local ski resort, Stevens Pass. Since this will be Cammy's last snow season before turning 7 we decided to get the girls on skis this year. Better to have it be free just in case the girls didn't like it or if they ended up liking it then we would be fine paying for them later. It was kind of a test run.

We planned to go on a day Cammy had off from school for a teacher work day, but the weather ended up being rainy that day and we didn't want their first experience to be a wet one. So we all played hookie on Thursday, Feb. 1st and headed up to Stevens for a family ski day where it lightly snowed all day.

Since no grandparent help was here we chanced it and took Brielle up with hopes she would take to skiing. Thanks to some of our amazing friends we were able to borrow a set of toddler skis for Brielle to use. We knew taking a 2 year old up to learn to ski could be iffy, especially a stubborn "do-it-yourselfer" 2 year old!!

One of Jason's work friends happened to be up at Stevens on the same day and was a huge help in getting the girls going on their skis in the beginning. 3 kids learning to ski definitely should be done with 3 or more adults!!!

Cammy and Hailey took to skiing really quick! Cammy was a little more reserved and sensitive to falling and not getting things perfect (darn perfectionism that she gets from her mom). She pretty much self taught herself how to make a little turn at the bottom of the hill to help her stop. We started Cammy off with no poles, but half way through she asked to try some and it seemed to help her at least get around a little better. By the end of the day Cammy had mastered the bigger Magic Carpet hill and almost got down it with no falls.

Hailey came down the hill with a smile every single time not really phased by any fall. She tended to lean back a lot and that took a bit of practice to get her to put her weight in the front leaning more forward. Hailey was good at just going straight down the hill and hopefully stopping before hitting something (she made it right up to a building on one run, slowing down just in time).

Brielle liked the idea of the skis and discovered that she loved riding the Magic Carpet up the hill. But once at the top she refused to come down without throwing a good tantrum and Jason would typically have to carry her down. She enjoyed scooting around on the skis on flat ground a bit. We both agreed that next year will probably be her year. She is still a bit too stubborn to want to learn, but boy does she have that wild, carefree and adventurous personality that will be great for learning when she's ready!!!

If it wasn't for Brielle being way overdo for her nap we would have stayed later into the day. But at 3:30 we ended up having to drag both older girls off the hill protesting that they weren't ready to go home. We promised to come back up without Brielle after school one day for an afternoon/early evening of skiing. How fun to think that we might have two little skiers on the horizon!!!