This year Thanksgiving was hosted at the Lumley Mountain Lodge, which is always crowd pleaser. It is such ablessing having my parents live in a vacation destination like Santa Fe. Makes for magical holidays. Even though my parentshave only lived in New Mexico for 9 years, it really does feel like home. This is proof thathome really is all about family.
Drew andI drove with Johnny dog in the car (even all the dogs make it home for Lumley holidaycelebrations)! Even though it's a long drive I love it because it gives me good time to reflect and reminisce about the passing years. We got to stop inLubbock and spend the night with Mal Pal and I got to relive my college years for a brief few hours- I enjoyed my night in Lubbock listening to a local band in the Depot D
istrict.
We made it to Santa Fe before noon and hopped into my parents car for a quick sk
i trip up to Wolf Creek. Santa Ski usually doesn't open the week of Thanksgiving which always forces us to visit Pagosa, we do
n't complain though, we love rocking the steeps up in Wolf Creek. We made it to Pa
gosa Springs i
n time for dinner and a hot tub run at our hotel. We were up and adam the next morning eating a hardy breakfast at our hotel and then we were off
to rock the steeps! The day was perfe
ct- sunny
and clear with excellent snow conditions. I had the best day of snowboarding I've ever had and even tried some new runs. My favorite run of the day was Ka the Snake, which is a mini half pipe run through the trees = awesomeness!
We then piled into the car and drove straight toBuffalo Thunder Casino and Res
ort to meet Haley and Bretton and celebrate their two year wedding anniversary. My parents treated the family to a fine dining experience at the Red Sage. It was a perfect way to celebrate Haley and Bretton's marriage. The night was fi
lled with laughter, amazing food, and watching a lady win $600 on a Sex and the City slot machine. We weren't as lucky on the slots, but we are winners when it comes to having an amazing family...which is so much more valuable then a measly $600.
The next day Drew treated himself and me to a massage at BODY. It was such what I needed after a day on the slops and winding down from school and master's work. He sure does take care of me. We ate at our favorite places in town and retreated back to Glorieta for some more hot tubing time.
The next few days were full of cooking, grocery store run, cleaning, grocery store run,
more cooking, and again a grocery store run. We coul
dn't quite stay away from the grocery store and no matter how many lists we made...we still somehow didn't get everything off our list. We even took a grocery store run for milk and butter on Thanksgiving day. I guess you could say we were all having a "Classic Susan" day. The day before Thanksgiving we went into the wilderness as a family to select the perfect Christmas tree. This is the first time we have gotten a permit to go out and actually cut down our own Christmas tree. After navigating through four-w
heeling terrain and a hot cider stop- we found the perfect Christmas tree. However, we couldn't cut it down because the permit wasn't activated until the next day. We marked the tree and sent the boys out on Thanksgiving day to retrieve the tree and have it waiting to be decorated with sentimental ordainments and love the night of Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving was de
licious, but like anything big event the preparation is partly what makes it special. We ate until we were stuffed and took a turkey snooze. We of course had left overs and then decorated the house for Christmas.
That night Haley, Bretton, and Mom were among the crazies who ventured out into the night to snatch up and capitalize on Black Friday steals and deals. Drew, Dad, and I st
ayed at home and slept which apparently classified us as fuddy duddies...which we were all ok with. The next day we celebrated Christmas by exchanging gifts, the lighting of the plaza downtown, and an excellent gourmet pizza at Roof Top Pizza.
All in all it was a majestic trip filled with family, food, and love. My family has so much to be thankful for and I can only hope to have such an amazing and close family with my children one day.
I don't care how poor a man is; if he has family, he's rich. ~Dan Wilcox and Thad Mumford
This quote is so true, my family is has found riches that can not be measured!
Happy Thanksgiving!
