Skiing: Day by Day

What an experience it was to teach the kids to ski. It was filled with ups and downs and so it probably deserves it's own post. Last year we took the kids skiing for one day. It was a beautiful day on the mountain. Sunshine and very little people on the bunny hill. I had such grand memories of the fun we had last year. By the end of that day last year, Maddy was going down the hill with Josh holding on to the back of her jacket and Ethan as happy whizzing down the hill as I held him between my legs.

This year we did a bit more research and found certain items that would aid us in the whole 'learning to ski' process. One was our ski harness. Hanging on to the back of Maddy's jacket didn't allow her to ski down the hill freely, so we thought this would help give her the freedom, but at the same time give us some comfort knowing she wouldn't fly down the hill out of control. While in Revelstoke Josh did a bit of Googling on how to teach kids to ski and it was recommended to use this device. It helps the learner to keep their skis in the proper snowplow. We were able to pick them up in town.

Josh and Ed getting last minute ski instruction tips.

Day 1
Armed with our gear and excited to get back on the hill we set out for our first day. Well, what a difference a year makes. And don't mean that in a positive, 'all was hunky-dory' way. Quite the opposite. Ethan is MUCH heavier this year and just skiing down with him once this year completely wiped me out. When I tried holding him between my legs he'd just flop into my arms. Not good, I asked Josh to trade with me so that he could take Ethan. At the same time, I wasn't a good enough skier to help Maddy either. We watched on YouTube how to ski backwards as they come to you until they can hold the snowplow on their own. I'm not a strong skier and thankful just to be able to ski forwards let alone backwards. I tried a couple times to ski backwards with Maddy but in the end we had to settle for using the harness even though it didn't do so much as to teaching her how to ski. There was a lot of whining and complaining that I wasn't 'doing it right' and that it was my fault when things went wrong. It. Was. So. Much. Fun. By the end of the first day, Ethan was happily skiing with Josh. He loved it went Josh bumped into the large blocks on the hill because he was skiing backwards. The boys had a great time. The girls, not so much.

Day 2
For day two I decided to just go in my boots. I thought perhaps I could help Maddy more because 1. my skis are the older style long ones and made me all clumsy and 2. because my boots gave me a blister the first day and I wasn't so keen on jumping back into them. Thinking that I could walk backwards down the hill with  Maddy, we set out to try again. Another big fail. Turns out running backwards down a hill is not so easy either. Then we tried the harness, but I was too slow running behind her too. By now Maddy was completely done with me and I have to admit, so was I. Nothing makes you feel like the 'loser mom who can't ski' when both your kids refuse to take a turn with you. I couldn't convince either of them to take a turn with me while the other had a turn with Josh because well, it sucked to be with mom. In the end I stood at the bottom of the hill as Josh took turns with both kids. Luckily Maddy, by the end of the day, was able to ski on her own without the harness so she skied with Oma following closely beside her. Ethan was still with Josh as Josh skied backwards. At the end of that day, Maddy was much happier than the first because she could go down by herself, Ethan was happy because he just loves skiing and he had Josh all to himself.

Day 3
Knowing that Maddy could ski on her own, I was looking forward to this day. I even decided to rent shorter skis so that I could help her more. What a difference! Maddy and I had a great day skiing. She learned to control her turns better and we developed a good system for getting her back on the magic carpet. (In the days before, a lot of the frustration/whining came from her not being able to climb up the slight incline onto the platform. I was all clumsy with my long skis and getting in her way, or so she told me.) By the end of this day, Ethan was doing so well that Josh was able to use the harness, but only as a safety precaution. Josh always stayed close enough to Ethan so that he didn't have to pull the slack tight. Ethan was skiing down all on his own, but Josh just wanted to be sure that Ethan had complete control. Yay, things were looking up and EVERYONE was happy as we came off the hill this time!

Day 4
This day was awesome. Maddy and I skied together again. After a while, she was ready for a new challenge so we decided to try her without the Wedgie. She did great and was super excited to be skiing all 'big girl style'. What a difference! Ethan was also able to ski without the harness on this day. Actually Ethan's skiing 'style' cracks me up. He is fearless, which in other activities or other day to day endeavors, he is not. He had no problems just heading STRAIGHT down the hill with barely a snow plow and no turns. I have to say that my heart skipped a couple of beats watching him and we had to tell him that he must add a few turns here and there. His other style was either completely relaxed, hand in mouth, LA LA LA merrily skiing along OR in perfect snowplow, arms ramrod straight out to the sides just like Josh taught him. Day 4 was a really fun day and we looked forward to our last day of the trip.

Day 5
When I got the tickets for the day, the lady told me that we could actually go up the first gondola to the mid station. She mentioned that there was another bunny hill and magic carpet up there. I excitedly told Josh because we were beginning to out grow the bunny hill and just needed a change in scenery. We decided to go up the gondola, but once we got up there we saw that the hill up there was way less of a challenge. It was super wide and quite flat. The magic carpet was more just a way to get the people from the ski lodge to the gondolas. The kids were so not impressed. We decided to try them on easiest Green run called The Last Spike. This would bring us back to the base of the mountain and back to our usual bunny hill. This run had some challenging parts because it wasn't as wide for the kids to do their turns and there were many more people whizzing by. Maddy was afraid of skiing off the cliff and so she was reluctant about trying to do her turns. At one point early on I actually contemplated climbing back up rather than continuing forward. Ethan did quite well for his first run and by some parts he was his fearless self again.  Slowly and with lots of encouragement, Maddy also made it down. I was happy to be back on our bunny hill and thought we'd just spend the rest of the day there. I was happy enough with our accomplishment of our first real run. The kids however were no longer happy on the bunny hill. So up we went for the second run. It really was better the 2nd time around. This time I went with Ethan so that Josh could give Maddy better pointers. It was crazy to see my little guy so fearless. He loved every minute of it! It was priceless to see this side of Ethan.

 Our first gondola ride up. Ready to ski!

 A group shot at the Mid Station

 With all the frustrations in the beginning, they all seemed worthwhile in the end when they felt such pride in learning something new or accomplished a new challenge. I could not believe how quickly they progressed thanks to Josh. I have to say that it was all him and I was just there to 'watch the other one' when Josh was not skiing with them. Josh is so excited that the kids love skiing and we both look forward to many more ski trips. We are so lucky to have a world class ski hill just minutes away from Oma and Opa's house. I don't think we'll ski any where else!