Good Stuff in Jackson Hole

The annual ski trip to Jackson Hole with the cousins resumed this year, unfortunately without Beckett and Catherine due to Beckett's second hospitalization of the season.

Kelly skied for the first time this week. The first day was a test of my physical strength, dragging Kelly along between my legs as he found his balance on his tiny 80 cm boards, pulling him up from frequent crashes and hoisting him onto the lift. He improved everyday, thanks to Uncle Pat's training harness, and by the end of the week was turning a little and stopping, sometimes.

The seven of us took a break from skiing on Wednesday and visited the Elk refuge, taking a jarring, horse drawn wagon ride out into the middle of the 5,500 head heard. The kids enjoyed the bumpy parts of the ride, when we rolled off the dirt path into the meadow, and the first 75 seconds of elk watching.

Thursday, we took the tram to the top of the mountain and treated the big kids to waffles smeared with jam, Nutella and brown sugar butter for lunch, the specialty of the rustic Corbit's cabin. The sunny ride up in the new tram had given us awesome views of the Jackson valley and the mountain range on the other side of the Hole. With waffles from the top of the world filling our guts, we headed down the tram in an unexpected snow storm for another afternoon doing laps on the bunny hill.

Kelly had a breakthrough day on his skies, day 3, making his first real turns and generally keeping pace with Cole and Nora. Kelly had a few falls toward the end of afternoon and wouldn't move a mussel to attempt to right himself. He just lay limp in the snow precisely in the same position he fell. The little kid skiing schedule dictated that Kelly skip naps the entire week and the littlest of the big kids seemed to be waring down. He was still having fun, though, and showed no volitle fits of frustration as had happened in day one and two. Halfway down the last run of the day, Kelly looked skyward and started singing nonsense. I barked to look where he was going or to turn, but didn't seem to hear my commands and continued his giggling singing song. I dragged Kelly up a few short flights of stairs and he staggered into the ski locker area. After I helped him strip off his Sponge Bob helmet and goggles, Kelly dropped to his knees and mumbled, "Everything's blue. Why is everything blue, dad?" His Nutella waffle power had run down to emty, so we refeuled, as we did most days apre ski, in the Teton Club's great room with a petite cup of hot (Kelly prefers his hot coco one degree above room temp) coco. Good stuff, really.

Rhys, somewhat ignored and saddled most of the week with a sitter while big people skied, got every one's attention the morning of our departure by spewing a frothy puddle of acrid OJ and lumpy oatmeal on the breakfast table. Bad-bellied, big boy seemed better but fussier than normal as we hurried to pack, muscled our way through the mob of huffy vacationers heading home at the JHole airport, and waited in line after line.

Well, two hours after leaving the comforts of the Teton Club, we finally navigated the gauntlet of incompetent airline employees, TSA check points, and sank into seats 18 E & D (middle and window) on our oversold flight. Kelly and Rhys did a great job for the first half of of the 65 minute flight snacking on goldfish, sipping flavored water from sippy cups, paging through the in-flight magazine and generally handling the rigors and stresses of the morning with more poise and ease than their exhausted pop and our most of our fellow travelers.

Rhys climbed up on my lap and cuddled up for a cat nap on my shoulder. An announcement from the cockpit informing us we would be landing in twenty minutes ended his ten minute snooze. Rhys lifted his sleepy head and looked me square in the eye and burped. After a three count delay, two dollops of regurgitated, pureed gold fish crackers escaped Rhys' maw, sticking on his blanky draped over his chest and, luckily, missed me. As I tended to the minor mess with a handy wet wipe, I was jolted by a slurry of well chewed bagel and cream cheese briefly marinated in orange Vitamin Water and stomach acid. The point blank blast of rank gut juice soaked me from my shirt collar to mid-thigh. I was able to soak up and block a portion of Rhys' surprise puke attack with his blanky, but we were both quite stinky and sodden.

At this point, Rhys was wailing with tears streaming and vomit dripping from his pudgy chin, Kelly was shrieking between dry heaves (Kelly is sensitive to foul fragrances) and I was stuck in the middle seat managing the mayhem, blocked in by our row mate, a young musclebound guy hinding behind his fly-like, fancy, fashionable (ladies?) sunglasses. This poor guy lost the seat lottery in a big way that day. As folks filed off the plane, I overheard a boy six or seven rows infront of us ask, "Mom, what's that stinky smell?"

"Someone got sick. Just breath through your mouth, Jimmy," she replied.

Good stuff, good stuff.

Adventures with Daddy

I cannot stand being in the house for more than ten minutes with the boys. Booboo is still stuck in the period of life I've dubbed the "head injury phase". The poor kid thumps his crown into walls and cabinets - just walks headlong into the middle of them - with startling, screaming regularity. Kelly seems more explosive and possessive inside, protecting his cars and other dodads from his grabby little, big bro. It's just better, no walls, no toys, if we grab our outdoor gear and go. Daddy Adventures are the best.

I've really enjoyed taking team Goodwillie's front court out on weekend adventures. These outings usually begin spontaneously and without much of a plan on my part, we just strap in and go, usually west. We visited the bison heard up the hill in Genissee. We've gone sledding in Evergreen. We've enjoyed bike rides on frozen mornings with mittens and full on winter gear.

My favorite recent outing was a two hour urban nature walk along the South Platte River. After I peeled Kelly away from his trace watching big kids ripping it up at the skate park, I towed the crew in the red wagon down to the river side bike path. We noticed kits of pigeons roosting in formation on the sunny side of the old train bridge. We discovered dozens of conical cliff swallow nests tucked under the highway overpasses.

After wandering and walking for twenty minutes, we disembarked from the wagon and I helped Rhys lumber down the off camber path to a water level observation point on a kayak launching pad. We watched Mallard couples float past, moving with the rivers gentle current and fishing for their breakfast. We watched plants clinging to the river bottom, through the silty water, sway rhythmically in the current. We watched turbulence from the flowing, unrelenting river form swirling eddies on the surface.

Then, we played the sink or float game. Rocks sink, sticks float. Goose turds and cigarette butts float, too. Its hard to supervise every pick up, sorry. I foiled BooBoo plan to determine if a broken bottle would sink or float and he never completely fell in the water while hurling debris into the water - two points for dad! They wore themselves out hucking pebbles, sicks, clods of mud, and miscellaneous other items in to the river, yelling "sink!" or "float!" after every toss.

Beckett was back in the hospital this week with respiratory issues. The RSV he battled last month has made him more susceptible lung infections. He was sent home on oxygen after two days at Rose. He was never as sick this time around and has been his cheerful, smiling young self throughout his sickness.

Rhys had his mullet trimmed at the beginning of the month. Photos of his first hair cut provided, thanks to Pris. And in other hair news, the boys and I are in a moustache growing contest. Stay tuned for the final contest photos at the end of March!