Skiing with Spike, day 2

The second day was a much cold and snowier.  In the morning, Kyle and Emily took a group lesson and had a blast while Jeff and I got some good skiing in together and with Spike.  The lesson was great for the kids and gave them even more confidence and skill skiing. 

After their lesson, we took the gondola ride up for lunch mid-mountain.  We had some cold and worn out kiddos.

Happy girls

During / after lunch, there was the Duke v. Butler basketball game showing so Jeff and the kids stayed to watch the game while I got some skiing in since I was going to take the kids back to our place for a nap and Jeff was going to continue skiing.  As you will see, that didn't quite happen... I hit some trails with Spike and Adele.  Duke beat Butler.  The kids got a second wind so I took the kids down the mountain on the gondola while Jeff got a few more high runs in and met us at the bottom to do a green run with the kids.

Our gondola ride down.  I have a great picture of Kristin and my Dad on a gondola in GAP (Garmisch), Germany that looks a little something like these, except we weren't skiing so didn't have the ski gear on. 

Following are a lot of videos from the kids first time skiing down a green run.  Up to this point, their lessons had only taken them on magic carpets on bunny hills.  This was the Sesame Street run that had a chair lift to the top of the run. So it was also their first time on a chair lift.  So there is no thoughts of bias, I was skiing with Kyle and Jeff with Emily.  I happened to have had my phone out to take videos of Kyle skiing.

Jeff, Kyle & Emily at the top of Sesame Street

The four of us at the top of Sesame Street

Emily pole skiing with Daddy

Emily skiing with Daddy, Part 1

Emily skiing with Daddy, Part 2

Kyle pole skiing with Mommy

After one or two runs holding our poles, the kids were more confident and let go to ski on their own a bit.  When Emily initially let go, she shouted down to me, "Mommy, look at me!!!!" and she proceeded to speed down the hill, but realized she was going to fast and went straight into a huge pile of powder to the side.  Thinking we were going to be done skiing after that, Jeff was shocked when he skied over to her and she pops her head up out of the powder and giddily proclaims, "Can we do that again?!!!"  And we did ski more.  In fact, we skied Sesame Street until the lift closed. 

Here are a few videos I have of Kyle skiing down Sesame Street without holding onto my pole.

And this is basically from the top of Sesame Street to the bottom on our last run since the lift was closing. Please excuse the 3 part video and slight overlaps. It is one video on my phone but couldn't be emailed as 1 because of its size.
PART 1

PART 2

PART 3

It was a great weekend of skiing. Kyle and Emily have said that skiing is their most favorite "something fun".  It was a bummer that it was a going away party for Spike because we don't want her to move, but we were thrilled to be able to go skiing with her at one of her favorite fun spots in California.

One of the rainbows visible of the double rainbow we saw on the drive home.