Colorado Ski Trip

Brian and I went on a ski trip to Colorado last week with Katie, Jonathan, and Grant.  We were gone for four days, Saturday through Tuesday, and Ava stayed with her grandma and grandpa.  I must admit, it was difficult for me to leave her for so long, but it was also nice to have a little break.

We flew in to Denver on Saturday and met up with my cousin, Cori, who lives there.  I hadn't seen her in a year and a half so it was so good to hang out with her and catch up!  She suggested an awesome Mexican restaurant called Lola for lunch and it was delicious!  A few of us started the trip off right with some cocktails and we had the best guacamole I've ever had.  My mouth is watering just thinking about it!

Then we walked around downtown Denver for a while and Cori pointed things out to us; buildings she had lived in, cool artwork, and some of her favorite things.  Here is a picture of us downtown.

The next day we went skiing!  It was Brian and I's first time and after much deliberation we decided not to take a ski class since we were only doing it one day and we didn't want to spend the whole time standing around listening to an instructor.  I think we made the right decision because we caught on very quickly and after about an hour on the bunny slopes we headed up the mountain! I didn't even fall down all day except at the bottom of the mountain on my last run of the day.  Katie and I took a wrong turn and ended up at the top of a very steep slope that was labeled green (although I'm not sure why) which is supposed to be the easiest.  Well, I never really learned how to control my speed so I ended up wiping out about three quarters of the way down because I was going way too fast!  But luckily only my pride was hurt.  Brian only fell a few times, and unfortunately might have sprained his ankle.  Overall though, we loved skiing and had a great time doing it!  Here we are at the top of the bunny slope (we got photo-bombed).

On Monday we went on a guided snowmobile tour up a mountain.  This was the event that the boys were most looking forward to.  Grant, Jonathan, and Brian drove snowmobiles and Katie and I rode along with our husbands.  At one point though, Brian and I switched and I drove for a few minutes, but I liked riding better because I could look around at the beautiful scenery.  It was a beautiful, clear day and we got to ride on some awesome trails that had just opened for the first time this year thanks to the snow that fell on Saturday.  The tight trails surrounded by snow-covered evergreens reminded me of something out of a book, it was so picturesque.  When we reached the top of the mountain we were surprised when the guide said it was 5 degrees up there because it was about 28 degrees at the bottom of the mountain.  Luckily we were so bundled up that it didn't make much difference to us.  Here is all of us at the top of the mountain.

And Brian and I on the snowmobile.

After snowmobiling we had lunch and then went to a tubing place.  It was so much fun especially because there was a conveyor belt that you stand on to take you to the top of the hill!  So easy!  I was super excited about it when I first saw the big hill from a distance.  I thought, "This looks awesome!"  Then as we were walking closer to the hill its immensity began to hit me and I started to get a little nervous.  When we got to the top I began to second guess myself, "Why did I agree to this?"  But I gathered my courage and went down the easiest part of the hill and when I reached the bottom I concluded that it was, indeed, awesome!  By the end of our hour I only wanted to go down the most steep hill because it was so much fun!  Here is a picture (although you can't really tell how tall the hill is).

On Tuesday we drove to Fort Collins to tour the New Belgium Brewery.  They make a beer that Brian loves called Fat Tire.  Much to his dismay, you can't buy their beer in Oklahoma because it has to be shipped cold and the law in Oklahoma says you can't ship in cold beer (or something like that).  The tour was really cool, we saw some huge 2-story containers mixing beer, the packaging line, and the guide was pretty funny.  The highlight, though was all the free beer we got to sample.  I lost track after number 5, I think...  We even got to choose and pour our own beer at one point, so that was fun.  Then at the end we could ride down a one-story spiral slide if we wanted to, and of course, I did!  Here is a picture of Brian and I at the brewery.

After the tour we ate lunch, got ice cream, and headed to the airport.  That was the longest flight ever (even though it only lasted an hour and a half) because I could not wait to see Ava!  We had a fun-packed trip with awesome friends and family and made lots of great memories :)