Summer and Winter Collide

I feel like we're making up for a lot of lost time with blog posts here - we were so busy having fun while Sarah was in town that it left very little time for letting all of you know about our fun!

Last Sunday, June 22nd, we officially ended our ski season! Yes, you read that correctly, Snowbird was open until June 22nd this year. And you ask us why we love Utah!

To be truthful, the conditions were definitely spring-like (can you have summer-like ski conditions?). Steve ended up with one core shot and I got a wicked forehead sunburn but managed to escape most of the rocks in my path. But it was still a lovely day skiing and how can you beat being comfortable, if not a little hot, in your tele gear and a long-sleeve T?

The best part of the day is that while we were at the top of the mountain enjoying winter, Sarah and the boys were enjoying summer! And, yes, Sarah definitely did earn her stripes as the best Godmother ever letting us ski while she stayed at the base of the mountain! She didn't come to Utah in June expecting to ski, but even if she had I think that the numerous "backcountry conditions" and "experts only" signs and warnings would have been ample deterrent. It wasn't really that scary, they just make it sound extreme to ward off lawsuits - I promise!

Snowbird has lots of fun summer activities at the base, and Sam spent the majority of his time on the rock wall, which he was surprisingly adept at. I guess that I still think of him as a little kid, but seeing him climb that wall (over and over again) sure reminded me that he isn't as little as he is in my head!

Ben, on the other hand, preferred the trampolines. By the end of the day both boys had perfected their back flips, but Ben really took it to a new level doing a flip with every bounce and laughing it off each time he landed on his head instead of his feet! Honestly, I thought he was going to toss his cookies, but his stomach stayed firm even though he would get off of the trampoline from his allotted five minutes of bouncing and run around to the back of the line to start all over again! I guess we are fortunate that he and Steve evidently share tummy genes. Poor Sam, getting saddled with my defective carsick constitution... but even Sam did more than his fair share of flips, so maybe there's hope for him still.

We stayed up at Snowbird long enough to catch dinner (the kids were that into the summer activities) and were rewarded with a moose sighting after dinner! We hadn't seen one all day and were just remarking that maybe we were still too early in the year to see a moose when one came within 100 yards of the restaurant patio we were eating at! The boys and I went down to take a closer look (but not too close - I am wise enough to have a very healthy fear of humongous hoofed animals). This picture is of the boys with their "quiet" faces on and the moose behind Sam's head. Apparently these are the faces that you wear when you're respectfully and quietly watching a moose - who knew? Actually, I wish that the stupid preteen girls next to us could have been as still and respectful as the Morningstar boys - they ended up squealing and taking cell phone photos and scaring it away. Oh well, at least we got in our first real moose sighting of the year before they arrived.

So I guess that now that you can't ski at Snowbird anymore, Summer has officially arrived. Time to hit the pool!