I Love Skiing

Three words I never expected to write in sequence: I. Love. Skiing. 

As you may recall, Blair decided--on a whim--to take us skiing. Our private ski lesson was this morning at 8 am. "Ralph" was replaced with "Jim," an infinitely patient and capable instructor. The lift didn't open until 9 so our timing was perfect--we got in and got our equipment and had our practice session before any real crowds showed up. 

This was a good thing as "I love skiing" does not necessarily equate to "I am good at skiing." In fact, no one watching me today likely said, "There goes a woman who is enjoying herself on the slopes." They more likely said, "Let's wait until that flailing psycho woman finishes her run before we head down."

Dena & Instructor JimI don't care. I had a ball. I learned to walk and turn and wedge and I only fell twice. Well, three times if you count my first time getting off the lift chair. That was the only truly humiliating moment of the day. Blair and I had finished our practice session and headed to the easiest-yet-still-intimidating-to-us slope. We got separated and when I didn't see him at the bottom, I decided to try the lift chairs on my own. 

I got on okay, enjoyed the ride up, watched carefully as the person in front of me planted their ski's, stood, and pushed off. I planted my ski's, prepared to push off and--holy hell--I can't stand up!

It appears Dena is enjoying her time on the lift, UNTIL...Not sure what I did wrong, but it was like coming up from a full crouch, which I wasn't expecting. I half fell, half dove to the side to avoid being knocked unconscious by the lift chair. Not one of my more graceful moments.

Blair and I finally reconnected after a few more runs and as you can see from the photo, being in a lift chair behind him didn't stop me from yelling at him. (He had his safety bar up as he was turning around to take a picture of me. Can you say heart attack on the slopes?)

...you see I'm actually yelling at Blair to put his safety bar down!We never made it off the easy slope which was fine by both of us. I got to the point where I felt comfortable getting some speed going, but then on my last run I cut off a small child who fortunately was a much better skier than me and was able to recover but I decided maybe it was time to call it quits. 

The only thing I didn't enjoy about skiing was hauling all the equipment around. I'll taking running over skiing any day for being able to slip on some shoes and head out the door. 

I'm curious to see what we feel like tomorrow. I didn't feel like I was working too hard on the slopes, although we both came back to the condo, settled with our books in front of the fire and were both asleep within 20 minutes. 

Also--check out the cute lilac skiing outfit, compliments of my wonderful Sole Sister Cindy Barbour. Thank you, SS. I was warm and toasty all day. 

And check out Blair's styling jacket. His NEW jacket because you know what? Men don't share clothes. 

If I ever go skiing again, I'm sure I'll have to learn it all over but it was fun to step outside the comfort zone and try something new. Thanks sweetie, and I'm sorry I yelled at you. (But next time, put your bar DOWN.)

Cheers,

Dena