A Mr. K kind of day

Yesterday Leif took off from work. We dropped Ellie off with a babysitter and headed to Big Sky to go skiing. We got frequent skier cards this year and yesterday was the last of the ski free days. The snow coverage was pretty rotten - lots of rocks sticking through, and there wasn't much terrain open, but we had a great time anyway. Leif was kind enough to ski with me for most of the day, until I told him to go ski something a little more challenging than Mr. K. And yes, I did spend the entire time skiing that one green run. It had good coverage and gave me the opportunity to remember how to ski. The last time I skied was two years ago, and since then I've had a baby and haven't been particularly active. I was taking it easy and yet I'm still incredibly sore today. My legs hurt like crazy, but it's a good kind of hurt - it's that hurt that says I got to go skiing yesterday for the first time in a long time. Woohoo!

As we were parking at the resort yesterday, we noticed a group of protesters and I found out that this round of the Free Trade Agreement talks between South Korea and the US were taking place at the Big Sky resort. Apparently they came to Big Sky in part because it's a difficult place for a large number of protesters to assemble and because it's an uncomfortable place for them to protest outside. Did I mention that it was really warm yesterday (almost 40 degrees)? I didn't get to see any famous people from the talks, but there were an unusually large number of Koreans on the slopes.

Apparently Ellie was fine being at a babysitter's house for 6 hours yesterday. It's the first time we've left her with a paid sitter, not a friend or family member. She was sleeping when we dropped her off, and sleeping when we picked her up, but she managed to drink two bottles in the time we were gone, so I assume she woke up and played between the two naps. It was so nice to have someone watch Ellie so we had the freedom to get out and do something together.

Leif saw on the news that there's an El Nino forming, which means a warm, dry winter for Montana. That means we won't have much snow. In fact, our snow in the valley is almost all gone already, just from the past couple warm days we've had. It's sad, but maybe I'd prefer more snow during a year that Ellie will actually get to play in it anyway.