30 Before 30 // Midway Ice Castles

#8) Visit the Ice Castles in Midway.

It's been too long since I checked another item off my 30 Before 30 bucket list (let's blame the pandemic, shall we?) but I've finally managed to do one! Earlier this week, we packed up the snow gear and headed through Provo Canyon to the eastern side of the Wasatch Mountains to visit the Ice Castles in Midway. I first heard about them a whole decade ago as a freshman in college (dang) so it took me a while, but I finally made it over there!

- It was rather cold, but very pretty.

- Autumn didn't like walking in the snow, so Doug's arms got quite the workout from carrying her around most of the time.

- The older kids loved going down the big ice slide.

- It's beautiful to see the ice light up in a rainbow of colors as evening falls.

- We just so happened to go on the coldest day of the week (high temperature in the 20s... oops) but we managed to stay pretty warm, although Autumn's hands and feet got chilly.

^^I pulled this photo from a Pinterest board and could not find original photographer.

Doug's eyelashes started accumulating frost!

The castle glows as it gets dark outside!

We rounded off our family night by popping over to Heber City to eat at the highly recommended "Dairy Keen" fast food joint. Thick milkshakes. Good social distancing measures. (The booths have tall dividers added to them for extra precaution. We got a booth in a corner of the back room of the restaurant, and it felt like we were by ourselves.) The kids loved watching the little train that travels around the restaurant on a track placed up high near the ceiling. Surprisingly, nobody fell asleep on the ride home... but that may have been due to a combination of sugar from the milkshakes, and the swelling music of John Williams from the Harry Potter soundtrack that Nicole insisted on listening to. Am I proud of her music choice? Yes. Yes, I am. Am I proud that she sings along to the various themes? Also yes. We're on book 3 in the series, currently. She claims to love Harry Potter more than anyone. Hmm.

Hooray for bucket list items and family time! And for getting away from home for a bit during a pandemic!

Snow Day

The first major snowfall of the season happened today! When it finally stopped snowing in the late afternoon, we bundled up and went out to explore the winter wonderland! Nicole was all smiles, Doug got the driveway shoveled, and I wandered around with Austin strapped to me under my coat. He snoozed the whole time, all cozy and warm. It's his favorite way to nap, actually... he took two nearly-3-hour-long naps today, both times while I was wearing him in a baby carrier!

Then it got dark, the snow started back up with a vengeance, soon it looked like the driveway hadn't been shoveled at all (aaah, winter...) and we settled in for an evening of comfort food and keeping warm by the fireplace. I had a vision pop into my head of some winter day in the future when our kids are older and we come inside from a snow day to drink hot chocolate and watch a Christmas movie by the fire and it made my heart feel so warm and full.

Family, you guys. Family.

^^^^Snow won't stop her from pushing her little stroller! Hahaha!

^^^^Under the snow, the tree in our yard is still a rainbow of color.

Annual Coleman Family Cabin Trip

The weekend before Christmas = the weekend my mom's side of the family all went up to a cabin on the outskirts of Yosemite for a few days! I haven't been able to do this tradition since I finished high school, but this year the timing was just right and we were able to get in on the fun! Nicole was a grump a lot of the time, but she was happy when we were out in the snow.

It was a weekend filled with snowfall, sledding, games, hot chocolate, movies, good food, and an epic evening of kids-versus-adults Reverse Charades (ONE person guesses while the rest of the team works together to act out the words). The kids creamed the adults, although I must say it was entertaining to see the aunts, uncles, and grandparents up there trying to act out things like "All I Want For Christmas is You" and "Ebeneezer Scrooge".

Enjoy the photo dump. My camera is mostly full of pictures of people going down our sled run, although I had some fun taking pictures of Carissa, some group shots with my sisters and mom, and (of course) lots of pictures of Nicole. But I tried to include a variety so it's not just a Nicole-fest. ;)

^^^I had to include at least one of the creeper pictures I took of Carissa ;)

^^^Mike kept getting stuck halfway down the sled run... :P

 ^^^She went down with Doug 3x and loved it each time. SO cute.

 ^^^So mad that the branch is in the shot, but oh well.

Sisterssss! It's funny how your annoying little siblings suddenly become your friends as you all get older. What happened to Carissa, the little tag-along copy-cat who had absolutely no input to provide in my boy dramas (though I told her nearly everything anyways) and tattled on me when I bugged her too much? And she'll be applying for colleges soon?!?! Ugh.

Christmas in CA

We had a great time hitting up my hometown for the holidays. Not only was Nicole perfectly angelic on the long 12-13 hour trip, she was also much more willing to play with and be held by my family members than when we came in August. It was great to see her act more like her normal, cheesy self. The hardest part of the vacation for her was the weekend we spent up at a cabin in the Shaver Lake area. I'll be making a separate post about the cabin trip though, so we'll leave it at that. (Sorry Shelby, I know you've been waiting for the pictures!)

These pictures are from Christmas morning. Nicole promptly mastered the art of tearing wrapping paper, and then got very bored of it. It's no fun to rip things when people are actually allowing you to! ;) After all, "The more forbid, the greater tastes the pie."

Also, I didn't realize how much my dad was hogging Nicole on Christmas morning until I looked at these pictures. We always call Jenna the hog, but do these pictures show a different truth?? ;) HA!

^^^ So concerned, sometimes. (Those eyebrows!)

^^^This is what happens when Dad falls asleep after presents have been opened ;)

The poor baby injured her left foot about half a week before we went to California, and so she didn't walk for my family until Christmas Eve. By Christmas, she was pretty much back to normal, and now that we're back home she's starting to learn how to run. A running toddler... what a great way to start the new year, right?

Cabin Trip pictures tomorrow, I promise.