a quiet christmas

This was a quieter Christmas than usual for us.  H had taken the week off to go skiing, as he's done in the past, but was sidelined by a monster head cold starting Sunday night.  I managed to pick up a little piece of that cold and by the time Christmas rolled around - complete with a lovely snowstorm - neither of us was in the mood to go skiing.  And you know we must be feeling poorly if we don't go skiing with new snow!  Instead, as the snow fell in the mountains and in the valley, we curled up on the couch with the increasingly frail B, watching The Christmas Story, eating fancy cheeses and opening the presents sent to us from our families back east.  (Thank you for the books and socks and snacks and gift certificates, everyone!)

The Christmas storm turned out to be a pretty good one, all things considered.  Alta reported a 19" storm total; Solitude got 13"; and Brian Head, down south a ways, scored the jackpot with 34"!!!  That storm has moved out now and left some cold air in its wake, ahead of the next system due to move in this weekend.  The Friday mid-morning mid-mountain temperature at Alta was 5 F, with the high not expected to go over 16 F; the weekend is forecast to be about the same, with wind chills well into the negative numbers, and with the possibility of up to a foot of new snow by Monday.

At this point, I'm not making any predictions about the skiing for the weekend.  We'd obviously like to get out there but we're going to take it as it comes, factoring health (or lack thereof) and cold temperatures - and the reality that the resorts are going to be crazy-crowded with holiday-goers - into it.  Regardless, we hope you all had very happy and healthy holidays yourselves!