Christmas Skiing

Christmas 2012 at Alpine Meadows.  The crew included, going left to right, JT, Wes, Erin, Dan, Evans, Dieter, Ben, Megan, Josh, Roz and Dan.  Happy holidays!  And below is a clip of the boys skiing down.

And the first photo is from the 23rd, white out conditions don't really tell the whole story...  Just ask the boys about the "horrifyingly windy" ride up Roundhouse before they closed the chair.

But, that much snow leads to amazing days like the one below...

celebratings December

Celebrating December: Christmas trees, Santa Claus, Hanukkah, dreidels, family, candy canes...  Today, is a day, when I have stopped, hugged my children and taken a deep breath to appreciate all of these festive moments.  My heart goes out to those families effected in Connecticut.  So when the kids wont listen, argue with you about cleaning up the legos or require you to ask them 8 times to put on their shoes, I'm still thankful to kiss them goodnight at the end of the day.  Celebrating today and thankfully tomorrow and lighting a candle for those who are not as fortunate.

Doing school work

A few photos from yesterday's homework session.  Josh has been working on his lessons too, even though he's not technically in school, because obviously he wants to be like Ben.  And the costumes require zero explanation, right?

Elf Spoting

The Christmas decorations are out and there's an elf in the house!  (There's also a shadow ninja, but that doesn't really register in the constant parade of costumes).

InnSide Nevada City photos

Ben in Booktown Books

So my Outside Inn blog project, InnSide Nevada City takes me to all sorts of places around our community, and sometimes my research assistant love their assignments.  Here are a few shots of the boys that appeared in various blog posts.

Josh in Lazy Dog Chocolateria

Ben and Josh in The Artist Workshop

And since I'm never in any of the photos, I can tell you that I struggled with my assignment at Nevada City Winery and my the photo of Affogato for Treats, local ice cream shop.  This job is hard....  (laughing).

Project Life

There's a trend in scrapbooking called Project Life and while I'd love to get organized and document the daily agendas of our family, the reality is such that I don't and probably wont... I tend to take photos at events or Outside Inn blog agendas and I don't scrapbook (and I don't plan on starting despite my robust card making agenda), but yesterday I decided to capture a few moments in our day.  

Josh and I made beer bread and broccoli soup.  He is an excellent helper in the kitchen.  I did so much baking and cooking when the boys were little that I forget how much I enjoy their active roles in the ktichen.  (It helps that we made the meal at 10am, when neither of us were starving or cranky).

A photo of our cooking... yum!!!!

And who can resist this studious young man?  He's doing so well with his math (which is what he's working on in this photo).  Since Dan does almost all of his school work with him, it's not often that I actually sit down with him (obviously I was still having a hard time giving him my undivided attention considering I took his photo).  

So there you go, a slice of life from November 7th, Thiem household, Nevada City.

Leaves

The tree in my mom's yard (that we got married under) is in its full fall splendor, so after trying to organize a photo opp with a photographer friend and having scheduling issues, we decided to try to take the family photo ourselves (with the help of my mom).  I must say that I personally like the out takes of the boys with the leaves better, but good to have at least a couple photos of all 4 of us together.

South Yuba Trail

Family adventure down on the South Yuba Trail.  Josh decided to chant "I'm a strong hikka dude" and when they started to fade we sang songs, played games and built imaginary castles.  I'm pretty impressed they were able to hike for an hour and a half, woo hoo!  

Bierwagen's Pumpkin Patch

A trip to the local Bierwagen's Pumpkin Patch.  

Fall Color, Part 2

Fall in Tahoe

Some photos down by the Truckee River and along the shore of Lake Tahoe.

Sugar Skull Class

Since Halloween sorta absorbs the month of October in our house (we can thank the Queen of Halloween for that), the boys were interested in taking a sugar skull class at the local Neva Co Artisan Boutique.  Here are a couple of photos of the boys, for more photos check out the Outside Inn blog post I wrote about the class.

Arata's Pumpkin Farm

A few photos from our trip to Arata's Pumpkin Farm in Half Moon Bay.  The maze was not easy and while I'd love to say that after we tried every twist and turn that we managed to make it out at the correct finish, but the truth is Josh ran out of steam, so the two of us went out the emergency exit and while waiting for Dan and Ben, my dad suggested that Josh go in the exit and then we lost him.  We spent a solid 10 minutes running through the maze calling his name (because Dan and Ben had also opted for an emergency exit and were not on the same path as Josh).  In the end Dan went to the look out spot, found Josh and directed him towards an emergency exit.  So crisis resolved.  We rewarded ourselves for all the hard work with lunch at Duarte's and a bag of artichoke bread.  I posted a few other photos here. 

Celtic Festival

We went to the Celtic Festival at the Nevada County Fairgrounds.  Highlights include:

• Sausage rolls
• listening to music
• meeting Mary, Queen of Scots
• watching a bow and arrow 
• face painting
• playing on a pirate ship
• watching a fire breathing dragon sculpture
• ice cream
• watching a sheep dog demonstration
• learning about period costumes and armour

Ben, the Cub Scout

I have other fun photos from this month to share, but they keep slipping on the to do list, so in the mean time here's Ben... and his Den Leader is Dan!  I think the boys are going to have a lot of fun.