Whistler for Spring Break - Part 3

Lily was still a little unsure about ski school.  She is loud and crazy but super nervous in new situations with people she doesn't know.
The first day, when I picked her up, her teacher told me that they had 9 kids and 7 of them didn't speak English!  I am not sure how he made it through the day but I understood Lily's frustration from the day because she couldn't even communicate with 7 of the kids in her class.  The second day she was moved to a higher level halfway through and spent half the day doing exactly what she did the day before.  I am not sure if this was bad communication between us and the teacher or she was just put somewhere because we were a little late.  Either way, she just wanted to ski with Daddy the rest of the trip.  Ski school can be great but in my opinion it is really just day care most of the day and they take them out to learn for little spurts at a time.  It was good for her to spend a couple of days being instructed by someone other than her Daddy though.  I think Lily would have done better in private lessons, which are more expensive of course if you have just 1 kid taking them.  If you have a few kids who are close to the same level, this might be a good option because for the same price you can have up to 4 people in the private lesson and it turns out to be less than putting each one in ski school.

Thursday morning we dropped the guys off, like we did every morning, and then took a walk through the woods back to the condo.

I like to meet the skiers on the mountain, if I can, at least once during the trip because I love seeing the mountain and getting to see Luke ski a little.  Since Lily just wanted to ski a little in the afternoon, we decided to take the gondola up to meet them for lunch and then Brett would ski with her in the afternoon.  We packed up all her ski stuff and headed to town.

Gondola ride  :)

We enjoyed lunch together and then headed out for some photo ops with the beautiful mountain and Olympic rings.

Practicing for when he wins his Olympic metal in skiing.  :)

The rings needed a little sass.  :)

I love to get a good family picture during our trips and I have taken a picture of Brett and Luke every year since Luke started skiing.  I love that they share a passion for skiing and get to spend so much time together on these trips.

On a side note: When you buy a gondola ticket, you also get to ride the Peak to Peak gondola which travels between the 2 mountains.  We have done this a few times and it is absolutely beautiful!  They even have a few gondolas with glass floors.  If you head up Whistler mountain, you should do the Peak to Peak and take in all the beauty of the mountains.  Here's a view of the valley between the mountains that we took 5 years ago.

We discovered that there are some magic carpets that are open for anyone to use right by the ski school on Whistler.  Brett skied down while we rode the gondola to meet him.  Lily had fun watching him ski under us and kept saying, "Daddy is the best skier ever!  I can't wait for him to teach me to ski!"  She sure loves her Daddy!  :)

Watching her Daddy

Beautiful!

We met at the gondola stop and they headed up to the magic carpets.  Brett changed into his tennis shoes so he could stay with her a little better and she wouldn't rely on him holding her.

Something you should know about Lily - she is very particular about how things fit.  She does not like things tight so tight ski boots made her miserable.  She threw a fit about them every time we put them on and screamed about how she didn't want to ski.  Then, once we convinced her to just try for a little and she got them on and went out, she had a blast.

He sent her down the first run and she squealed all the way down!  Can you see her mouth open squealing?!

Brett initially ran down behind her in case she needed help but she didn't need help.  I would help her get back to the carpet and then he would her get started at the top and stayed in case she needed him.  She acted like she was a pro and had fun skiing, turning all the way down.  She did much better than either of us expected.

She had so much fun!  Waving at her Momma as she skied past.

I stood outside for hours in the cold as it snowed on me but I would have stayed there all day!  She went up and down at least 30 times and LOVED every minute of it.  She loved the one on one attention and praises from her Daddy too.  I think it really built up her confidence.

They closed the carpets at 4 so we headed down to give her a chance to ski with Brett on a longer run.

We got down the mountain and met back up with Luke, who had been skiing with Poppa, Uncle Trent and Aunt Carrie.  They went up the lift that I told you about a couple of days ago, where you can ski down closer to our condo, and I walked over to watch my girl ski.

This little lift stays open until 5 and once she gained the confidence she needed to know she could do it, she didn't want to stop.  They skied until this lift closed - they actually got on at 5 as it was closing and made one last run.  :)

I was completely soaked by the snow and frozen from being outside for 4 hours but I love watching this little man in his element.

Lily did this when she finally got all her ski gear off.  :)

Me too girl, me too!

I am so glad that she had a great day skiing with her Daddy!  Tomorrow I am going to concentrate a little more on Luke and talk about our last day skiing.