Adventures

Tory said he wanted to ski the terrain park. I didn’t think he’d hit any of the tricks… pardon the poor camera work, I wasn’t prepared to keep up apparently.

We headed down to Moab for an extended weekend of riding, which included a day on Slickrock trail. Tory wanted to give it a try too, and ended up riding the entire practice loop. He had to walk much of it, of course, but rode a whole lot more than we expected. Here’s a little […]

Quick weekend trip to the Uintas with the DeFords, Lesters, and Mark & Seneca.

Camping and biking in Brian Head! Neither Kari nor I had ever been to Brian Head, so we headed down there with the Lesters and our bikes to explore the acclaimed mountain bike trails and get the kids outside. The biking was actually very good, although it was extremely volcanically dusty and hard on the […]

My first job as a kid was a paper route. The thing I got up so early in the morning for? A 1/10 scale RC car called The Frog, by Tamiya. A couple of friends and I saved up for months to buy these cars (Eric had The Hornet, and Steve had The Ultima) and […]

For the most part, it’s been a pretty disappointing winter. You know this is so when people start talking about spring skiing when winter never really started. Anywhoo, it has been warm enough to think about going to the park. We met up with Heather, Josh, and Serisa at Willow Creek park for some park […]

We haven’t got a lot of snow yet this season, but I don’t mind as it gives us all a chance to get our legs back under us riding the groomed runs. Here’s a few pics and videos of this early season.

Fall means canyoneering around here, so we headed down to the North Wash area of Southern Utah. It’s located between Hanksville and Lake Powell – essentially BFE. Heather, Josh, and Sirisa, as well as Babbie, Brad, Tai, and Aspen showed up too – But the first morning was just us. We took the kids through […]

This image was included in the previous post, but it’s so special to me that it deserves it’s very own post. After we had a lunch and cocoa break I asked Tory where he wanted to ski. He said wanted to try 9990*. I asked him quite a few times if he was sure – […]

Hard to believe it’s April 10 and we’re still getting mid winter quality snow. Even though we’re wishing spring would come, these extra powder days at the end of the season are a great opportunity for Tory to get better and more comfortable in the deeper stuff. Earlier in the year he wouldn’t have been […]

We try to get Tory out 2 to 3 times a week skiing – at least once during the week and the weekends. Saturdays have been the best this winter when he gets to ski with his bud Evan.

On Saturday Kari participated in the annual Wasatch Powderkeg race at Brighton. It’s an uphill/downhill type race in the Wasatch backcountry – 6 miles of climbing and skiing. Babbie and Brad participated as well – everyone was a little tired but had a good time. The kiddos and I were there to watch them finish.

Keeping with the tradition of nudging Tegan into things a little too early, we took her up for her first ski in mid January. Luckily the Canyons now has a magic carpet in the beginners area (used to be a t-bar) to make things easier. She wasn’t sure at first, but after a couple of […]

Saturday’s are days when Tory and I get to ski together, and today was a little extra treat, a random encounter with another dad, Gary, and his daughter Ana – a little older, and slightly better skier.

Fall means Canyoneering in Utah, at least in our house, and while we’re still very limited in what we can do with the kids, it’s still important to get them down there and exposed. Babi and Brad, Tai and Aspen came down for a couple of days as well, and all the kids had a […]

While we’ve done a lot of car camping this year, there’s always something a little different about packing it in. We did it once last year, and while it didn’t turn out to be the greatest of trips, we thought we’d try it again. The kids are another year older, and another year independent-er. This […]

Right after Grandma Pat and Grandpa Gary left Tracy and Marcus showed up. Literally. Same day. Again, not a whole lot of pictures were taken, but I did get a few of the day we spend hiking Bald Mountain in the Uintas. It was really fun having so much family around for a few weeks, […]

When Kari and I were living in Maine those many years ago we learned to whitewater kayak and have done it off and on since. In the last few years it’s been more off than on, so we’ve been very excited to meet some people recently who also love to paddle. They also have kids […]

We make it up to the Uintas quite a bit every summer, this year a little later than usual due to our extended winter/lack of spring. We spent just one night and then hiked the next day. These hikes are still short, but I’m guessing in the next few years they’ll stretch out longer with […]

I wasn’t able to make this one, but Kari and the kids went down to Red Butte Garden in Salt Lake to celebrate Jarrett and Mel’s anniversary. Red Butte is, of course, where they were married and Mel’s parents, Jim and Olive were also there. Looks like they had a lot of fun, it’s really […]

On day two of our recent trip to the desert we decided to explore Little Wild Horse canyon just southwest of Goblin Valley. It’s a non technical slot canyon that has a little bit of everything, except the drops and swims. I’m tempted to call this Tory’s first real canyon as he hiked nearly all […]

Two previous trips were canceled by weather this spring, but we finally snuck out for a weekend in the desert. The Goblin Valley area is relatively close, and even though it’s quite busy these days it’s still a fun romp around the hoodoos. My very first southern Utah experience was here so it was great […]

Our house butts up against the Glenwild open space area with hills and trails. This means it’s perfect for a day of sledding!

We started out by skiing with Tory between our legs, then graduated to using a harness with tethers, and now he’s moved beyond the tethers and is skiing solo. It’s been fun watching the progressions, and we can hardly wait until the day he can keep up with us. Ok, Tegan, you’re next!

What better to do on a cold Saturday than pack the kids up and go for a mass transit adventure? The goal was simple: Walk to the bus, take it to the Canyons, ride the People Mover up to Kindersport, and then head back. While the goal was eventually accomplished, the panache with which it […]

We’ve done quite a bit of camping with the kids, but up to now it’s been of the car-based variety. We decided to change that in August with an overnight in the Uintas. Tory and I slept in bivy’s, and after waking to a drizzle and cold kids, we were forced out too early. It […]

Kari took the kids to Cold Stone Creamery the other night while I was out.  

I know I’ve posted this image already here: Yuba Reservoir Boat Trip, but I want to remember Tory’s first nights under the stars as an event on its own. This is only important because I’m eager to return to our backcountry ways, and this is a step closer.

We headed south to Yuba State Park for a weekend of camping, beaching, and boating. Four families and one dog spent three days in the heat, eating drinking, surfing, swimming, laughing, and playing. It was a great time, and thanks go out to Pete and Kelly for inviting us all along. Click the image above […]

We always go to the Uintas to camp, because it’s relatively close, and so very woodsy-mountainsy. But we like to explore new places too, so we treked on up near Powder Mountain to a place that looked pretty good on the map. The bummer part is that lots of other people had that same crazy […]

While we didn’t expect it to happen quite this soon, Tory got his first set of stitches last Wednesday, the result of him apparently falling and smacking his face on the side of his bed. I say ‘apparently’ because neither Kari nor I were there to see the initial impact. Later that day he pointed […]

We’d planned on heading down to Fruita for the weekend, but the forecast was dire. The prospect of spending the weekend ducking the rain with the kids was enough to keep us in closer range to home, so we headed up to the Mirror Lake area of the Uinta’s with Michelle, Sam and Sophia for […]

We considered flying back to Minnesota this year but opted for 2 days (each way) of torture in the car instead! We saved a bit of money this way, and also learned what high level, concentrated stress feels like. Actually it really wasn’t too terrible, we got a portable dvd player for Tory and Tegan […]

So I know there was a recent post about Tory skiing for the first time – and there’s no doubt that he was on a pair of skis that day, and gravity was doing its thing – but today the little man hit the big time and rode his first chair lift. As you can […]

One of the nicer things about living in Park City is that there are so many people around who love to do the same things we do. And we’re doubly fortunate to have friends like this who also have kids. Pete and Kelley offered to spring for a condo at Powder Mountain last Monday night, […]

Tory gets on a pair of skis for the first time today and ‘rides’ a little powder. Looks like he’s enjoying himself to boot. Ok kid, it only gets better from here.

While not quite as debonair as Puss in Boots, Tory wears his first pair of ski boots. It took a while to get to this point, as we’ve had the boots (and skis) around for a month or so with no sign of him wanting to put them on. But thankfully Auntie Mel has super […]

The second of our twice annual treks back to the homeland landed on Thanksgiving this year, which is a perfect time to be in Minnesota. Though repeatedly warned of the bitter temps, the weather was a balmy 30 degrees most of the time, and we got outside quite a bit. The airplane ride there was […]

I realize its been a while since the site has been updated, but I have a real, live excuse. Ever since I killed my camera, I’ve had a hard time finding a reason to post. Not that this is a photo blog, or that nothing interesting has happened in Tory’s life recently, but I’m a […]