Belated Valentines!

Here in the King family we do things different.  Holidays are nice and everything but pretty pricey at times.  Holidays are a good chance to relax and have a little fun in the spirit of whatever holiday it is, but does it have to be when the nation has it?  Our answer is No!  Sommer and I decided to do "Belated Holidays" (copyright 2010).  We celebrate most holidays a week late in order to save a little money and have a little extra fun, such was the case with this Valentines Day.

We woke up early...by we I guess I mean Sommer woke up early or at least earlier than me and made some shweet breakfast.  We both got our snowboard gear ready and headed to the hills.  We got to go to the Canyons on a perfect day, not just because it was Belated Valentines Day but because it was snowing a bunch!

Side note...We were talking about how dumb our kids are going to look in school when they don't hand out Valentines Day cards on Valentines Day.  Oh well, that's their problem!

So we got to the Canyons and loaded up on their little open air gondola that takes you from parking up to the base of the mountain.  That was pretty fun and different but it made parking a lot easier since it was a huge lot at the very bottom of their mountain.  Once we made it to the resort we got to take an actual gondola up the mountain.  As we got to the top we began to realize how BIG the Canyons actually is.  We had heard that it was the biggest resort in Utah but hadn't thought about what that actually meant.  I think there are 5 different mountains that you can ski on.  We ended up riding each mountain and experiencing the entire resort.  We spent all day boarding and had a blast!  Only a few minor owies were incurred, all on my part.  We arrived at the Canyons just after opening (about 9am) and left at closing (4pm).  We were beat, or at least I was!

Here is the trail map.  The Canyons is just huuuge

Here are a bunch of fun pics we took!

On our drive to the Canyons.  We took the Jeep because we were planning to get another piece of furniture on the way home.  By the way, check out Sommer's site.  She's been designing some new fun stuff!

Sommer's all about the Thug life, so then I made her take a happy picture.

Here we are on our way up the gondola.  It was real fun and got pretty high up in the air as it crossed a couple deep canyons between two mountains.  We were packed in with 6 other people and they all got to witness Sommer having me put her gloves on.  They all felt sorry for me...not really.

Take your pick of which one you like, I didn't know so I put all 3 on.  This is at the top of the canyons.  We had to take 2 gondolas and 3 lifts to make it to the highest point.  

So this is one accident I had... At the Canyons there are a lot of houses on the actual mountain.  So there are roads going to them and it weaves through and around the actual ski runs.  Bridges and tunnels were made to accommodate the cars.  One spot they made a giant wall so people wouldn't accidentally ride into a road.  Well this wall was at least 35 feet tall and it was sloped.  All i saw was HUGE QUARTER PIPE.  I got loads of speed and went for it.  This wall was not meant to be a quarter pipe and I soon learned why.  It slopes up at a dramatic rate, too hard and abrupt to be a good quarter pipe.  So with all the speed I had I made it to the top of the wall...just not standing.  The angle took out my knee and I slid to the top.  Once at the bottom I sat for a while til Sommer caught up and I soaked up the "are you hurts".  Here we are 5 minutes after all that.  Luckily it wasn't bad enough to keep me off my board for more than that!

Some of the scenery.  Sommer likes these white (seemingly brown in the pic) trees.  Not the pines.  Remember these trees because it will come up later....

Here we are at lunch!

Here is Sommer learnin to butter, or manual.

We found some nearly untouched back country and had some good fun through the trees.  We sniped us some good pow.  This is Sommer.

Below is me!

Guess what!  We're married!  This was while I was on the ground after THE WALL.  Injury = kiss...i should get hurt more often, or at least start faking them.

More back country shtuff, thats me by the way.  In my new coat with my new pants and my sweet goggles that Sommer found for me.  That's a whole different story (the goggles being lost) that I will leave for Sommer to tell.  I think she will make it a lot more fun sounding, she has a good imagination!

Even down in Park City it was snowing where we parked!  Here we are leaving at the end of the day, 4pm.

End of Snowboarding

...

Start of craftiness!  yay!

So after a fun day of boarding I took Sommer to a place called Color Me Mine.  This is a store I have never had any real desire to go to...ever.  Here is a link to their site.  It is a crafty store.  I knew Sommer would love it.  You buy a ceramic mug or something and paint it, they then glaze it and there you go!  We got a pitcher and painted it.  It was a lot of fun for her.  I tried to help but she would only let me do the base coats...something I couldnt screw up on.  Its like coloring inside the lines but easier!!

So the trees i had you remember...they are on the pitcher!  Sommer liked them a lot.

We had fun, she had more fun.  I was patient and helped clean up n get more paint and stuff.  Yay for belated holidays!