Go skiing - check!

At the beginning of my second year of high school I discovered I could no longer do sports or be very active without extreme pain in one of my legs. Consequently, while I went on several ski trips in high school and early college with my church groups, I never actually went skiing. I did not begrudge the fact that I couldn't join everyone on the slopes and made the best of the trips - sledding, building snowmen, and hanging out in the lodge (I pride myself as one of the best bag-watchers out there and used to play a mean game of cards).

So, when I finally got to go skiing in 2008 (after two surgeries), it was a pretty big deal to me. And I loved it. Therefore, it gave to reason that I would add it when compiling this list. I just didn't expect it to get checked off so quickly!

Over the holidays we had talked about the possibility of going on an extended weekend vacation with my brother- and sister-in-law, which could include skiing, and at the beginning of January everything came together to go this past weekend. We ended up at a nice resort in the mountains of Virginia, staying for free at the house of a kind benefactor who was out of town. We went skiing Friday night, as we wanted to take advantage of recent snow and the prices were more reasonable on weekdays than on the weekend.

I did pretty well, staying mostly to the green but venturing to the blue slopes a few times. My having been sick caught up with me at the end, though, as my legs started to just give way. Not while I was skiing, mind you...but while I was just standing there. The first time it happened we had just gotten off of a lift, and were discussing which slope to take. My husband and brother-in-law had gone a little ways away, and I stood there and slowly just fell over for no good reason - I later realized my boot was loose, and someone pointed out that having been sick my equilibrium was probably off, but at the time it was just hilarious to me. As I lay there, I lost it laughing at myself, and my compadres just pointed and laughed. This resulted in a nice kid named Logan awkwardly, unexpectedly helping me up, resulting in a story that got more elaborate through retelling as all good stories do. I found the next few times of falling to be equally as funny and called it quits not long after.

The rest of the weekend was heavenly. I completely unplugged, and we spent our time watching movies, eating, going for a walk along the beautiful snowy mountainside, and playing games (from whence Sandy the sock puppet emerged; I highly recommend the game Quelf. And Batman UNO). A wonderful break from the craziness of life. A wonderful time with family.