Spring Has Sprung!

Due to the mild winter we experienced this year, the trees started blooming in late February.  By mid-March the daffodils were out in full force.  Spring is here!

A group of daffodils in my front yard.

More lovely flowers.

Our pear tree is blooming nicely.  After several dreary winter months, it is great to see some color.

Bear wants me to put down the camera and play frisbee.

"C'mon, I'm too cute to resist!"

A Memorial to Delores

Roger's mom, Delores passed away suddenly two weeks ago.  It has been a great sadness to all who knew and loved her.  This is a woman who raised eight kids, half of them as a single parent, and worked many physically exhausting jobs in order to support her family.  She planted a large garden every year, and worked long hours in the kitchen canning and freezing the garden's bounty so her family would have food to eat.  There was nothing she couldn't do.

All were welcome in her kitchen.  Throughout the years she happily accepted her children's spouses, girlfriends, boyfriends, grandchildren, and their friends that came to visit.  She had many friends in her hometown and they knew they could stop by at any time for some food, advice, or a quick card game.

Delores loved nothing more than having her children and grandchildren visit.

Delores loved her children so much she would give the shirt off her back to help them.

Delores also loved to play cards.  Every visit to her home always included a rousing game of pinnochle or golf.  I think she's up in heaven right now, whuppin' God in a card game!

Delores was a wonderful, generous mother to all.  I will miss her greatly.

Skiers Say "Woo-Hoo!"

Ok, there's a story behind the title of this blog post.  Every Monday night, I go to spinning class at my gym.  My spinning instructor is a very enthusiastic women, who loves to yell "woo-hoo!" at various times during class.   She is also a runner, and entertains us by telling stories from the races she runs.  Not too long ago, she shared an observation with the class - that in races, runners don't say "woo-hoo."  (She discovered it is not considered proper running etiquette to be woo-hooing as you are passing someone).  She asked another woman in our class who is an avid bicyle rider if bikers "woo-hoo."  No, we were told, bikers do not say "woo-hoo" (apparently for the same reason as runners).

"Well" I piped up -"Skiers say 'woo-hoo', especially if its a powder day!"

The next weekend, I went up skiing with my best ski-buddy Kim.  I told her the story from my spinning class.  After that, every time we stopped, or finished a good run, I let out a loud "woo-hoo!"  And then I'd turn to Kim and remark: "skiers say woo-hoo!"

Meadows base area was all decked out with colorful flags for the day.  The flags made a nice contrast with the white, snow-flocked trees.

There'd been a small dump of snow the night before that coated all the trees.  Then the sun came out.  The snow sparkled in the sunshine, making everything look especially beautiful.  And the powder was a lot of fun to make tracks through (woo-hoo!!)

Some nice guy saw me with my camera trying to take some photos and offered to get a photo of Kim and I.  This one turned out really nice.  We saw the guy later in the lift line, and I told him "there's our photographer!"

We got off of the lift, and saw a ton of people standing around looking up towards a rock outcrop.  Turns out there was a snowboarder up on top of the rock, getting ready to jump off.  You can barely see his blue jacket in this photo.  So we stuck around to watch the show.

I happened to catch the guy in mid-air as he launched himself off the rock.  He landed safely in the soft snow below, and immediately climbed back up to try it again.  Woo-hoo!!!

After lunch, the fog rolled in and took away our nice sunny day.  But the scenery was still nice - the snow covered trees by one of the trail signs made for a good photo op.

It was a good day on the slopes - sharing sunshine, powder, and killer runs with a good friend.  It doesn't get any better than that --- WOO-HOO!!!!

(Oh - did I mention that skiers say "woo-hoo?)   :)

Skiing With the Brothers

In early January, my youngest brother Mark came out to Oregon to ski!  My brother Dale had convinced him that he really needed to experience skiing in the Oregon Cascades.  So Mark flew into Portland, and we got up early the next morning to drive through freezing rain to reach Bend.  Once we arrived in Bend, we picked up Dale and headed for Mt. Bachelor.

Here's the group on our second day of skiing.  From the left:  Mark, Dale and Dale's son Max.

The weather was a little disappointing.  It was the first week of January, and the temperature was 44 degrees!  Not exactly what you'd expect in the middle of winter.  Both days we skied the fog rolled in and out - visibility was tough at times.  But at least Mark did get some glimpses of the beautiful mountains around Bachelor.

But the warm weather made the snow very skiable.  Here's Mark, pondering his next run.

Bet you didn't know Dale knew ski ballet!  (Or is it a graceful recovery from a near fall?!)

I put on my tele skis for awhile on the second day.  But it didn't take long for my legs to poop out, and I was back on my alpine boards.

Later that afternoon, the fog parted and we were treated to a great view of Broken Top mtn.

Dale and Max are having a good time on the slopes!

Chairlift group photo op.  Who are those people behind the goggles?

The fog lifted and the mountains came out to play.  Here's the view of the Three Sisters and Broken Top mountain from the top of the Skyliner Chair.  What an outstanding view!

Close up of South and Middle Sister.  South Sister looks so different with snow!  Can't believe Dale and I climbed it only three months ago.

Mark is done for the day.  He looks like he had a good time!  OK Mark, you need to make this an annual event and come back next year!

Christmas '09

Christmas '09 was a different kind of a Christmas than in years past.  Cody, who is working in Montana, could not come home for Christmas this year.  We couldn't bear the thought of poor Cody up in Montana all by himself on Christmas Day, so we decided to bring Christmas to him.  On Christmas Eve day, Roger, Denise, Bear and I loaded up into my little Subaru and hit the road for Montana!

We arrived in late afternoon, with enough time to eat a little supper, and run off to Mass.  Since Cody did not have the time (or the $$) to get a Christmas tree, he improvised with some lights.  It turned out pretty good!  It gave us a place to put our presents.

Roger and Cody, all dressed up and ready for church.

Ditto for Roger and Denise.

Some people just don't like having their picture taken!

My kids, being funny for the camera.

I did end up getting one nice photo of my kids and I.

We waited until Christmas morning to unwrap our gifts.  Let the unwrapping begin!

Denise discovers she's gotten a new bag for her snowboard.

Oooh, la, la!  Roger's gift came in a Victoria's Secret bag!  However, it was just Denise being clever, and the gift inside didn't come from that store.

Cody is happy to get the dvd of one of his favorite TV shows.

Santa also managed to find Cody's apartment.  Denise is digging through her stocking.

After the festivities were over, we sat down for a game of Scrabble.  Denise and Roger ponder how to make a word with the letter "x."

Cody and Denise in deep concentration over the Scrabble board.

I don't have any outdoor scenic photos of Montana because it was too darn cold!  The low temperature got down to 2 degrees!  The high temp didn't get much higher than the teens.  With the wind blowing (it never stops) it was really, really cold.  I could stand to be outside for about 10 minutes --- long enough to walk the dog to get him to do his business.

But it was good to see Cody.  And it was good to have the family together for the Christmas holiday.  After all, Christmas is about being with your loved ones.

It's Good in the Hood!

I'd been itching to get up on the mountain since mid-November, when the snow started falling.  After a couple of failed weekend attempts, due to bad weather (high winds), I was dying to get my skiing fix.  Last Friday, the planets aligned and I got my chance! 

Friday was a sunny, clear, cold day.  It had been really cold in Portland, so I was worried that it might be a cold day for skiing up on the mountain.  But I packed my warmest gear, and a thermos of hot tea, and hit the road!  I made good time getting up to the mountain.  The views at White River Sno-Park were so nice, that I took the time to stop and to take a couple of photos.  The photo above is of Mt. Hood and the snow-covered White River.

Here's a close up of Mt. Hood.  It's nice to see the mountain with some snow, but it still needs a little bit more.

I pulled into Mt. Hood Meadows parking lot, and there was hardly anyone there.  I donned all my gear, grabbed my telemark skis, and hit the lifts.  Although the temperature was cold, the sunshine helped give the allusion of warmth and I wasn't freezing.  Trying to do tele-turns helped warm me up quick!

On a sunny day, Meadows has the best views from its higher lifts.  Above is an example of the great views.  You can see Mt. Jefferson and some of the other Cascade peaks against the sky.

They had the Cascade lift open.  It is the higest lift at Meadows, and it is often closed in the winter due to high winds and low visibility.  I felt like it was my lucky day -- no crowds, bluebird day, and the Cascade was open!

Here's what the main run down from the Cascade lift looks like.  Some nice moderate cruiser runs.  Meadows had many of the runs nicely groomed.  If it's a powder day, I stay off the groom, but since it was my first day out this season, and the off-piste was pretty icy, I stayed on the groomers all day.

Sadly, Heather Canyon was not open.  I didn't look like they had enough snow yet, and what was there looked pretty icy.  I'll ski Heather on a powder day, but when the snow is Cascade concrete I stay away!

Here's a view down into Heather Canyon.  It is a beautiful  (but steep!) place to ski into.

I skied down Shooting Star Ridge, which is an excellent cruising run.  It is a very good place to practice tele-turns (and parallel turns too).  About this time, my legs were complaining.  It was time to head back to my car for lunch, and change into my alpine skis.  After telemarking all morning, alpine skiing seemed like a piece of cake!

I had so much fun on Friday, but boy did I feel it on Saturday!  However, my friend Kim wanted to take her kids up on Sunday and invited me to come along.  I'm never one to miss an opportunity to ski, so I downed some Motrin and was back on the slopes Sunday morning.  The mountain had received an inch of so of snow overnight (although the snow phone claimed it was 4 inches!).  The trees were all snow-covered and looked beautiful.

Here's my good friend and long-time ski buddy Kim.  She was bundled up because the wind was blowing hard and it was really, really cold!  It was colder on Sunday than it was Friday.  The white cloud that is over the top of Mt. Hood is due to blowing snow on the upper reaches of the mountain.

I'm so bundled up, I'm almost unrecognizable!  Boy it was a cold day!

Here's a cool view of the snow blowing over the top of the mountain.  

The day before, three climbers got lost up on Mt. Hood, and throughout the day Sunday we watched a couple of helicopters and an airplane circling the mountain searching for the climbers.  One climber's body was found, but the other two have not been located yet.   What a tragedy.

Even with the somber news of the climbers, I still enjoyed my ski weekend on the Hood.  I had two bluebird days, and skied until my legs said "enough!"  It was a good way to begin the year.  Here's hoping for another good ski season.