Random Roundup of Spring Break

We're back from our Spring Break trip to Lake Tahoe, and skiing (and snowboarding) at the Heavenly resort there.  That was one day; our bodies and budget gave out before a second day.  I would ski again, but at the rate of one lesson a year, I'll be retirement age before I get good enough to go down a real hill.

Virginia City: great Old West town, ultra-kitschy, and of course no restaurants without a casino attached.  The one we ate lunch at was the closest to a family-friendly place, but when the inevitable trip to the bathroom occurred the sign said to go through the connecting door to the back of the casino.  So I took Tertia past blinking lights, whirling slot machines and (I think) the famous Suicide Table to the Ladies' room.  Now, Tertia has above all other things a phobia of automatic flushing toilets, so her first act in any public restroom is to check the toilets to see if they have the dreaded blinking sensor.  She saw they were "regular" toilets and said, "Whew! Regular toilets!  I'm so happy.  Mommy, this is just like church!"  "No, dear, this is most definitely NOT like church."

The pastor of the Presbyterian Church in South Lake Tahoe -- looks exactly like my mental conception of Fflewdur Fflam from the Prydain chronicles.

Speaking of Presbyterians... did you know there was a Presbyterian bucket list?  In Virginia City the 1st Presbyterian Church had a sign on it to indicate it was 301st on the list of American Presbyterian and Reformed historic sites.  I need to look up this list sometime.

We went ice skating on Wednesday and Thursday -- at least, we all went Wednesday and the girls and Steve went Thursday.  There was a problem with the skates -- the cheap blue plastic ones pinched Secundus' feet so badly he has huge blisters.  He did well skating though.  I had forgotten how hard ice is when you fall on it.  Ow, my poor knee.  Quarta is loving ice skating and wanting to go again soon, and Grandma Deb can skate backwards.

We all have disreputable-looking sunburns from our day on the slopes.  Steve's forehead is an angry red but the rest of his face is fine.  Primigenitus looks like he has a very red 5 o'clock shadow, Secundus has a red unibrow and mustache, Quarta has a falcon-like v-shaped pattern on her forehead where her goggles left off.  I have a little v between my eyes.

The girls and I went swimming in the snow Saturday night (I did one lap in the heated pool and then moved to the hot tub -- it was fun to hear the snowflakes sizzling as the melted into the water).  Going back to the room was not as bad as I thought it would be, and we went swimming/ hot tubbing for the next several nights even when the temperatures were in the 30s and 40s.

Vacation audiobooks were limited: we haven't quite finished Loamhedge, by Brian Jacques and a full cast.  But that has inspired a reading contest between Primigenitus and Quarta: read all the Redwall books in chronological order according to this list.  Primigenitus, who is nostalgic for the reading lists of his vanishing childhood, must read them all; Quarta can skip the ones she's already read.  I also read aloud several chapters of The History of the Ancient World by Susan Wise Bauer, which is really good and we ordered it from Amazon because it was on hold for someone else at the library.

Various family members watched quite a few movies while hanging out at the condo -- Prince Caspian, Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Enchanted (twice!), The Princess and the Frog, He Walked by Night, Harry Potter (various numbers), and Rio (the one with the blue parrots).  Tertia always dances to the closing credits.

I fell back on my vacation knitting standard: my ballband dishcloth variation.  I finished 4 dishcloths and nothing else this vacation.  And my Aunt Carol sent a big stack of fabric that I will have to add to my stash account, which will probably tip it into the red.

When the boys packed up the dirty clothes on the floor of their room they gathered in at least three baby socks, none of them matching, that must have been left there by a previous occupant.  We discovered them today while doing laundry.  It's really funny because I found another baby sock (not matching any of the other three) when I did my last check before leaving yesterday morning.  I can just picture the little toddler throwing socks all over the floor of the room.