Christmas Eve with the Adlers

Bryan and Jill Adler, our mentor-friends here, whom I have mentioned before, invited people over to their house for a Christmas Open House before the Christmas Eve service at Heart of the Springs (HOTS), their church. We had a blast! Jill made a TON of food-- pumpkin bundt cake, amazingly delicious English toffee, cranberry punch, cranberry scones, taquitos (Bryan "made" those), fudge, and probably some goodies I am forgetting. We hung out and played a few games... like Jacob's new "Toy Story alien" game, and Ella's "peanut butter and jelly" card game. Great times!

Snowshoeing in Breckenridge

On December 22nd, we had the privilege of meeting some friends from CA (Matt and Amanda!) at a halfway point between Matt's parents' house in Grand Junction, CO, and our place in Black Forest. Breckenridge has great skiing and boarding, and numerous trails for those of us with snowshoes! Matt generously lent everyone a pair from his family's collection, and after meeting at a coffee shop for our morning lattes, we were off! After a short detour down a "no outlet" road (thanks to GPS), we found the trailhead. Snowshoeing is not much harder than walking, and feels almost like wearing flippers, only the flap is behind you, and it's far less cumbersome to walk. We strapped our shoes in, two straps over top, one behind the heel. The ball of your foot rests on a little platform that pivots within the frame, and the platform has metal spikes on the bottom. Traction was great! The scenery was absolutely amazing. We had a blast!!


My new fascination with Picasa, my picture program, is collages! Enjoy the collage and some more pictures.