Fare the Well Winer!

Procrastination time!  I am having a hell of a time with my comprehensive accounting problem and I need to distract myself from it. So I figured I'd get a blog post done.  It is no longer winter, yet it has been lingering on here in Minnesota.  I love the snow, but let me tell you, I am not a fan of it this far into the spring.  I am a rain girl.  Weird I know!

But I figured I'd give it a bit of a homage or a goodbye if you will.  Snow!!!  I love the stuff, honestly I do.  I've been skiing literally my whole life.  My cross country skiing not as good as my downhill.  But I try.  I am sure I mentioned it previously.  The skiing is a lifelong love.  It will never go away, I hope.  I learned the sport in Michigan and have been lucky enough to get to ski in the western mountains, including a great spring skiing trip to New Mexico.  Exciting I know. 

The skiing is different in the Midwest.  For one thing the hills are a heck of a lot smaller! And it is a bit icier, not a lot of powder.  That's ok by me though, I grew up with it.  Honestly it was much harder for me to adjust to powder than I expected.  Kinda like moguls.  I know how to ski moguls, I just don't like it.  I feel like I don't have enough control.






So New Mexico, I went in the spring, I won the New Mexico fight! I didn't get sick!!!! Yay, I am not a New Mexico fan (for reasons I've previously mentioned).  But I put it aside for the joys of the snow!  We (my parents and I) had been up in the Colorado Mountains.  It was great fun!  Gorgeous weather! Gorgeous Mountains! Amazing skiing!  New Mexico was a different horse all together.  The weather was great, although much warmer.  This led to slicker skiing.  A bit more work and a lot more speed.  I have a need for speed, always have- always will.




Don't get me wrong as spoiled as I've gotten I still love Minnesota and Michigan skiing!  The problem is that the hills are so short in comparison and while you get a ton more runs in.  But they are short and quick!  Not always the most fun.  Oh and if you fall, the ice is a bit more painful!
 



I am not actually sure what this blog is about today.  It is kinda a rambling of my winter/skiing thoughts! Golly!

Lazy Days

waitin' for sunset- Lake Michigan

So yeah, I am horrible at this posting thing... I am gonna blame the holidays and school... It isn't that I don't want to blog, it is just I lacked the inspiration and what not.  I gotta get my bum out and start taking more pictures, but dang it! it is cold in Minnesota this time of year.  Yeah, yeah, I know not an excuse, it is not like I haven't spent most of my life in Minnesota... I am being lazy.  So what do I do, I come back and write a lazy blog post.  So I guess that is what this one is gonna be dedicated to... Lazy!

I guess you gotta start with the laziest dog that I know.  Koal, he is a Gordon Setter.  They are gorgeous animals.  Wickedly smart, and like most setters they hate listening to you.  Koal is, for the most part an, outside dog.  When we lived in the city he almost never wanted to be inside, cause we lived on a busy corner and everybody interacted with him.  But the older he gets, he doesn't mind being inside.  He is under the impression that he should get to go out and then come back in for a few hours... after all the feather comforter needs to be guarded.

We will pretend this is me being lazy...

The winter is a lazy time.  Don't get me wrong I love the winter, I love the snow, and snow sports rock!  But not much tops lazy afternoons, movies & hockey games to watch, cookies to eat and the like...  You know grand times.  The are much more common outside of Yellowstone!  And I am ok with that.  Sometimes you just don't want to do anything but laze about!

Grant Village (of the damned) YNP

So what else is lazy.  I think it depends.  Rocking on a porch gazing at a most beautiful lake... Probably.  Napping in overstuffed leather couches...yes!  Friends, drinks, late night chats... Coffee breaks and smoke breaks when you don't smoke... Sometimes lazy can be good.  Sometimes it seems like you need it in order to continue at a high pace... And maybe going places, where you can relax is lazy.  Not have to hike miles and miles just because.  But going somewhere that you can have as much fun, but don't have to always be movin'.  And it is not always a bad thing!

Unforgettable--Niagara!

The great differences between voyages rests not with the ships, but with the people you meet on them.

~Amelia E. Barr

Honestly, in my opinion, truer words have never been spoken.  And it is not just the people you meet, but the people you go with.  That can make or break a trip.  When I started this particular post I figured by default it would be a Yellowstone post.  And I could probably wax poetic about my Yellowstoners for days on end.  They are some od hte most amazing people in the world.  Kind, generous, loving, accepting, fearless, everlasting, you name it.  They embody it.  And I love them all for it so very much.

But this post is leading me in a different path.  As mentioned I took a trip this summer with my mom, her two sisters (The three of them being "The Aunties") and two of my cousins.  I had the time of my life honestly, it was one of the best trips I had ever taken.  Barring a few minor conflicts... (two of the aunties were a bit anal about the packing of the van and the phrase give me the f*cking bag comes to mind.)  It was an unforgettable trip of a life time.  So I am sure I mentioned it, but we did Niagara Falls in class and stlye!  Oh yeah, we were kinda awesome.

Top of the Dunes

Our rendition of the Sweet Sisters

With the obvious exception of the aunties (even that to a point) we the younger three are all different( is the only word) from each other.  Susie is in her early 30's, I am late 20's and Erika is the baby in her very early teens.  Yet, I think there is a bond, that somehow we forged.  Maybe not as a trio, but each with the others.  Ericka and I perhaps a bit more than we needed to.  Lets just say that we have a silly (some call it annoying) side a mile wide...  So for some reason in Michigan we decided we wanted to learn how to dance.  I am fairly certain it started as a polka and ended in a waltz, much like each time we tried to dance.  We made a pact that we would waltz in front of Niagara falls (we did!).  And sometimes when we get together we do still.

 

AWESOME!!!!!

Sand dunes are all shades of awesome, even if I almost lost forever my most prescous possession, a perl from my beloved gramma.  The dune ride was just a crazy, crazy time!  And then there was the cheese and the super awesome wooden show fuzzy slippers.  The cheese, oh gods, the cheese.  Garlic basil Gouda... like manna from the heavens... good gods that was good.  Wooden shoes were awesome, expensive so we settled for awesome slippers.  Around this point, Ericka and I were "banned" from sitting together in the car... it seemed we grated on the Aunties nerves a bit... 

Did I mention the matching clothes?

Windmills are just cool!

 

So on to Canada!!!! I love Canada by the way.  I think we were on Wayne Gretzky Parkway (or something) all the time.  And then we got to a swanky hotel in Niagara.  Over looking the falls!  And the bellhops were adorable!  There was this really cool quasi interactive video thing called Niagara's Fury and it had a super cute animated video.  Me and Ericka have really curly hair and it was a constant battle not to poof. Especally on the Maid of the Mist!

 

 I am sure I could go on and on, and maybe no matter who I saw Niagara with it would have been memorable and a good time.  But I think that there was some magic about this trip.  Maybe it is the 6 of us, the lack of anything set in stone, but something made it a great and wonderful time and fun was had by all. 

Ski, Little Speed Demon!

OK, so one of my favorite things in the whole entire world is downhill skiing.  Not to brag too much, but I have been doing it for 24.5 years, and my 27th birthday is later this month.  So, it is something I just know how to do.  This, coupled with the fact that I have no frame of reference of learning it, made it very hard for me to learn how to cross country ski (not that I am very good at that anyways).  I learned how to ski in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

big brother 'n me in Michigan

It was a small hill, I mean there are some good sized ones in Michigan, but compared to the west, they are small.  But it was a fun place, and when you don't know any better then it is great.  We went up to the cabin all the time.  Summer or winter, but it was always the most fun in the winter.

Montana

Especially when you know the hill backwards and forwards and there is nothing you can't ski there.  Don't get me wrong there is a hill or two I avoid now a days.  Otterslide for one because it always has the moguls and I hate moguls, at least pre-made ones, cause I haven't switched to the shorter more contoured skis yet. (I refuse to unless I have to). There are some others, for whatever reason, I just don't like skiiing on.  We were a little spoiled growing up, because our parents did have this cabin in the UP.  But we didn't go skiiing in the west until almost high school.  But like I said we didn't know any better.  But once we started going west, well it was a completely different world.  Loved it either way!

big brother 'n me in Montana

I love skiing fast, so fast my eyes water.  And I take a ridiculously large number of  short turns.  It helps, it really does.  When I was little I used to try to use my arms as propellers to get more speed.  Sometimes I like to tuck go, just long turns with my hands practically touching the snow.  A little speed demon, I was, and the boys (my brothers, friends, even my dad) always wanted to race me.  But they never told me until it was over-IF they beat me down the hill.  Silly boys, I always won then, and still do now!

My dad loved this, he claims they weren't laughing at me, but there are enough pictures for me to assume they were.  What I loved is that that I landed with my head downhill and the one ski stabbing into the snow, holding me to the mountain.

A Light to Guide

What can a girl say about lighthouses?  Other than they rock!!!  So this love affair with lighthouses, I think it comes from my dad.  He is a history kinda guy.  He is a retired engineer, but always said if he would have fail engineering school then he would have been a history teacher.  I think he was much happier as an engineer with a history habit.  The man reads everything, coincidentally so do I (especially if it is nerdy!).  He is one of those people that can read a book and watch the history channel at the same time, and follow along.  He took us to see many a lighthouses in our younger years.  And even with a rather annoying fear of heights, I fell in love!

Petals: Holland MI

This is going to be the start of an ongoing series of posts about gasp flowers.  As I might have mentioned in the Monterrey Gardens post I love flowers.  And I love taking pictures of them even more.  I was planning on starting this with a closer to home post, but I can't seem to find those pictures.  These is going to be a weekly series for the foreseeable future.  It should be out on Monday or Tuesday of each week (but don't quote me on this).