Bikes Away

When the wind/cold/snow/hail is away, the bikes will play! We took advantage of one of the last car-free weekends at Grand Teton NP last weekend. Basically, the main road is plowed, but closed to cars, so you can bike/walk/skate all over the road next to stunning mountains. (Similar to our last Teton-bike trip, but snowier.) We couldn't have asked for better weather!

We needed to recharge with lunch about a mile from the Jenny Lake turnoff. There was still a lot of snow, and we actually saw several bikers park their bike, unstrap cross-country skis from their back, and take off blazing their own ski trail. Overachievers!

After lunch, we pressed on to Jenny Lake to meet up with our adventurous friends, the Reichelts (from such adventures as Hiawatha and Salmon). They had an hour head start on us, but had figured out how to slide in the snow on their shoes and hike through the knee-deep snow down to the creek. 

The lakefront wasn't quite open yet, but the creek leading to it was still very picturesque. Can you spot Owen in the middle of this pic?

Once we had played in the creek and snow enough to sufficiently get our shoes wet, we decided to head back to the cars. It ended up being about a 12-mile round trip. The kids did really well, but we were all a little saddle-sore afterwards.

Our favorite Jackson brewery was calling our name. After some refreshments, we enjoyed the putt-putt golf and cornhole they had set up outside, and then ventured to another scenic playground before the car ride home. The sun felt so good!

One thing our long bike trip taught us was that we all should have been on bigger bikes. Hadley shifted up to Owen's, Owen inherited mine, and I got a much overdue new ride! Everyone was excited for their "new" bike.

The sun returned for the weekend, and the grown-ups enjoyed a peaceful bike ride close to home while the kids were in school. Looks like spring is here!!

To continue on our biking expeditions this weekend, we planned out a route from our house to a city park ~5 miles away. There was a little bit of everything on the way: major highway crossings, sidewalks near busy roads, stoplights, river crossings, rail crossing, quiet bike path, greenbelt, tunnels, hills, wind, sun, and another park stop halfway.

When we arrived at the park, we played a few holes of disc golf, because it was that kind of day. Owen's actually getting to be a decent frisbee golfer; Hadley's throws go about 10 feet max. Still fun!

Then we stopped by a local BBQ's 5th anniversary picnic right next to the park where they had pulled pork and hot dogs. Yum!

Refueling makes all the difference! We decided to start back home, but we headed south on the other side of the river to see some different scenery. The river was high with snow melt and the falls were even more powerful than usual.

We made another park stop about halfway back at the kids' favorite park. It didn't have water flowing through it yet, so it looked pretty different. Nothing left but to power through the last 3 miles uphill and into the wind. We definitely have well-seasoned bike troopers! They may tell you that they never want to bike again, but give it a week or two and they'll be back. They always come back.

I'll leave you with one more sign of spring:

(This kid likes to mow and do dishes nearly as much as he likes to shovel the sidewalk! Who doesn't?)

Forces of Nature

Mother Nature has been exercising her fickle tendencies this month. After a week of extremely windy days, we had an intense hail storm, which is very unusual here. It was loud, rapping on the windows so violently that Hadley burst into tears, and we thought a window might break. After the dramatic storm passed, we went out to survey the damage. There was so much of it piled up against the west side of the house!

They were large, marble-size hail (maybe even bigger before melting!), and they left a few holes in our house siding, fence, and shed. We also found out that our siding has been discontinued, so that'll be fun to work out with insurance, getting in line with the other 20,000+ homeowners that experienced damage to their property here.

A couple of days later, we got a pretty good snow (this was after some melting), just to remind us of the holes exposed in our house.

And just when we started to despair about the appearance of spring, we gradually got warmer and sunnier days! It was even nice enough to visit the zoo, which is open again for the season. That tiger is starting to look small after all these years!

 And, hallelujah! A warm, sunny day on a weekend = yard/garden work!

Dinosaurs and Eggs

Easter weekend was windy and cold, but we started it off with a neighborhood flashlight egg hunt in the dark anyway. It was a different twist on the typical hunt, and the kids enjoyed it. After about 15 minutes, they had scoured every inch of the field and we hurried back to a warm house to see what they'd found.

Come Easter morning, the kids awoke to find that the Easter bunny had visited during the night and filled their baskets with goodies, even for Owen, the skeptic. Unfortunately, I did not get a picture of them in their Easter finest, but take my word that they looked great!

That afternoon we braved the wind and met some friends at a park for another hunt. Owen had a squatting hop technique that was super-efficient. So much so that he had to share some of his treasures with the littler kids.

Another month, another field trip for Hadley's class. This time we walked to the Museum of Idaho to see their Dinosaurs in Motion exhibit. Thankfully, the exhibit encouraged the kids to pull, push, and poke at the dinosaurs because it featured simple machines to move the metal skeletons.

Owen started an indoor flag-football season this month. He ran for 2 long touchdowns, blocked for teammates, and made several flag-pulls on defense. He's lined up in the back, usually as a running back or line backer, and they get to use the whole field and scoreboard. He was in his happy place, despite a pale pink team shirt! 

Proud parents' moment: the kids' first washing dishes/loading dishwasher experience. Yay!