We put the beach urchins on skis at an early age. X-C skis, that is. I stopped doing downhill after I was about 25 or so.

So, one of the beach urchins began her ski career a few months before her third birthday. We went to the [beloved] Moldy Old cFam cabin at Hoton Lake one weekend and skied at our fave X-C Ski Ranch HQ. We rented her the teensiest-tinesiest cutest little pair of red skis for the weekend. I wish I had a pic but I did not have an iPhone in those days. She went Great Guns all day Saturday, burning up the trails and having a great time.

This was early enough in our parenting journey that we were naive enough to think that she would absolutely want to ski every day after that for the rest of her life. Or not. Sunday morning we headed up to the Ski Ranch to ski a bit more before we had to head back down the I75 SUV Speedway. This beach urchin did NOT want to ski. Not at all. I gave the GG and others permission to ski without me. Then I made a fatal parenting mistake. I said something like, “We’ll just go and ski on the Little Kid Loop.” Little Kid Loop? Bad idea. Full-blown 2-year-old tantrum ensued. I picked up my child, skis and all, walked into the Ski Ranch, and turned the skis in. I was cheerful when I said something like, “I guess we are DONE!” Bob (the owner) was at the counter and since he had a few young children of his own, you know he laughed.

That kid *was* done for that year but (of course) she wasn’t done forever. By the time she was 13 or so she was leaving me in the dust on skis. As an adult she doesn’t get out skiing as much as she might want to but tonight she is hanging out at Hoton Lake after skiing under the brilliant sunshine and summer-like blue skies that we sometimes get here in February (when we aren’t being dumped on by Old Man Winter). A promise for a warmer season but who knows how long it’ll take to get there. Mr. Groundhog was certainly wrong this year when he promised an early spring.

This is a pic the beach urchin texted me earlier today. I didn’t exactly ask permission but I said I would use it and she was okay with that.

We’ll talk about volcanoes another time 🐽

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 28th, 2019 at 6:39 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.