I AM still here

Yes that's right, I am still here. I had a BUSY week the week before we went away. You know, packing sorting, cleaning as well as the usual weekly stuff. It's no small task packing for 6 people, with 5 lots of skis and gear all of which has to go into a small 7 seater(one seat goes down) and don't forget the dog. We even bought a roof capsule this year and it was STILL a very tight squeeze.

But packed we were and off to Vermont for Thanksgiving. We went up on Tuesday night as the kids only had a 1/2 day of school on Wednesday. We got in late, but that meant we had all of Wednesday to ourselves-to relax and take in the quiet.
And there was already lovely snow up there so the kids had a blast just playing in the yard, wandering into the woods and mucking about in the stream.

Remi even found the coldest, most sluggish snake ever.
He was alive, but moving very very slowly. They said they'd found it in the stream.

Ella was desperate to hold it as well.
Then we went down to the farm to pick up the pies that had been ordered for Thanksgiving. The kids loved watching the big draught horses in the field.
Honey had her first encounter with a horse (I know it's out of focus, but I just thought it was so cute how they sniffed each other). There are about 5 or 6 dogs on the farm, so the horses were totally not bothered by Honey, but she didn't know whether to be scared or interested.

Ella loved them and has been asking about riding lessons....
Then late Wednesday night the hordes arrived. Jon and Nicola (who own the place), Charlotte (who was over from the UK) and Paul and Cheryl and their 4 kids including this gorgeous little 4 month old who Oscar was quite happy to hold.Thanksgiving day the kids played out in the snow while grown ups peeled and prepped the food.
The kids were very proud of the big bonfire they made. This is where the Turkey was cooked...in the turkey specific dutch oven.
The turkey, however, was on the LARGE side and needed a little bit of surgery before it would even fit in the dutch oven.

It lost its wings...
The feast was still fantastic.

Friday was skiing day and off went Matt and my 4, Paul and 2 of his and Jon and Nicola. Fortunately Jon and Nicola are excellent skiers and were able to ski with the kids (picking up the pieces) and Matt and Ella (who are still real beginners) were able to have a little lesson with Nicola and take it easy. I went shopping with Charlie and picked up Matt and Ella early. They had had a lovely day together bonding and had a soak in the hot tub in the snow.

On Saturday Matt and the boys ( Ella decided she wants to do some more ski school first) went skiing again with the others and by the time I picked them up Matt said he felt as though he had got it. For those of you who remember my first disastrous skiing attempts 2 years ago, you will know that I had decided that skiing wasn't for me. But I have to say that when I went to pick them up and watched Kit (who had struggled on the first day) whizz down to meet me, and saw all their flushed faces from a day of good exercise out in the snow, I felt jealous. So I'm going to give it another go. I want to do it slowly and just a little at a time, but I want to go out and have fun with my family.

Sunday we left around lunch time and hit horrendous weather and traffic and didn't get home until 5. And we came home to warm (12 C yesterday) weather and I still can't believe it's the beginning of December. So along with unpacking, washing etc I'm trying to get organised with Christmas cards and finalising our handmade gifts to send to Australia, and trying to work out where we will put the Christmas tree this year. This year has seemed to have FLOWN by. I feel like I can't catch up with it. So excuse me, please, if I'm not around here too much, I'm just trying to keep up with life.