Today Lily and the girls had the best time snorkeling near their resort at El Nido! Here are some pictures:
Here are some more pictures from their fun day today:
Back in Utah it was a very exciting day for us because Chris and I took all the kids skiing and this is the first time Ammon and Clarissa ever skied. Jen stayed home and bonded with Basil 🙂
Everyone were such champs. Clarissa, Ammon and Gigi all did lessons with an instructor on the bunny hill. I hung out with them some to get video and see them, and also got a few runs of my own up the mountain. Chris and Caelan also spent time on the bunny hill. Then we all had a delicious lunch. After lunch the kids wanted to keep skiing. After observing Ammon and Clarissa for a bit, I was convinced they were ready for the lift (Gigi and Caelen had already done it before). So I took Clarissa two times, Gigi two times, and Ammon and Caelen two times (Caelen also joined with Clarissa once). Everyone did such a great job and made it down the mountain with no problem. I was so proud of everyone!
Clarissa and Gigi with their awesome instructor Maggie 
This picture cracks me up.
It’s incredible to track Ammon and Clarissa’s progress throughout the day. I put these videos in order so you can see how they progressed, from barely being able to stay upright on their skies to bombing down the mountain by the end fo the day. I’m so proud of them!
In the video below, Ammon is so excited to tell me about the progress he had made!
Lunch at the lodge was delicious!
After lunch we hit the slopes again. We spent time on the bunny hill until I felt Ammon and Clarissa were ready, and then we all spent time on the slopes. Here is footage from our time on the bunny hill:
And here are videos from us going on the lift. This is Clarissa’s first lift ride and run down the mountain!! She went down the whole thing without falling once except for at the very end. She did so well!!!
Here’s is Gigi’s first run of the day down the mountain!
Here’s Ammon’s first chair ride and run down the mountain ever! Caelan was with us also, and he did great!
I was so proud of all of them. Gigi also progressed so much since last time, and Caelan was doing great on the snowboard, and I think snowboarding is much harder to learn at first than skiing.
It was such an incredible day. I felt true happiness skiing with all the kids, participating in Ammon and Clarissa’s first ski day, and seeing them all have such an incredible time and progress so much. It was a 2023 highlight for me.
Speaking of 2023, Jen bought a delicious French pie to celebrate New Years’ Eve. We took turns sharing a high, a low, and a high from 2023. The kids mostly all shared things from today or this week, which the adults thought was funny (a little recency bias). My highs for this year were running half-marathons and having my job situation work out, and my low was my challenges with mental health. It was so so fun to spend New Years’ Eve with the Deans and I’m so glad they chose to spend it with me! I had such rich conversation with Jen and Chris after the kids went down also. We talked about self care during challenging times and Jen had great insight that she has picked up in her demanding work with refugees. What a wonderful famly they are!
