​Emma and I went back to the same dress store to find another prom dress for this year. She saw one online but when we went to the store they didn’t have the dress. After rummaging through all the dresses in her size I found the perfect dress. It turns out it was the same dress she had seen online but in a different color. | Madeline had fun taking care of Emma’s Sam Wise Potato project. | Emma and I visited CSU to tour the campus and the cross-country team. | It’s always amazing to me how some holiday cards arrive at the end of January. Those barely made the wall before I took them all down. | Madeline had fun at her first Activity Day girls’ activity. | Emma’s room is always a mess and we usually just shut the door. One evening while Emma was out of town Mike decided to help her and clean up her room. | Mike took Madeline to the field by the elementary school to go sledding after a big snowstorm. She had so much fun. | Madeline and I had fun putting together her Valentines box this year. We made a hot air balloon. Then she put together her Valentines for her classmates with a little help from Mike. | Madeline loved getting her Valentine card and $5 from Grandma this year. This year she could read the card and after she said, “That was so sweet.” | I finally caught up with Peter's Mission album. He is going to love it! | Madeline and I went to Scheels one night and played video games and rollerball and had the best time. | Emma voted for the first time. | Madeline did her diorama project on Jellyfish, and I was able to go into the classroom and see her project. | Mike took Madeline and Easton to John Venezia park to play and have fun on the wheel of humanity. | We love talking with Peter on Sunday evenings and love it when Andrew pops on the conversation too. It’s fun to have the family all together for just a little bit every week. | I started working on Emma’s t-shirt quilt and laid out the first draft of the different rows of the quilt.

​I love running with the Striders in the winter months because it gives me a reason to keep running when it is cold outside. We did several standard winter runs this month including hill repeats and tempo runs at Bear Creek Park, intervals on the CC track, tempo runs and mile repeats on the Santa Fe trail, and some fartlek’s around Prospect Lake. I even managed to sneak in a longer run on the Santa Fe trail from Woodmen with the Kokopelli run club while Emma did her long run with her clubmates. While I ran mostly outside with maybe one run on the treadmill, I managed to keep up with my 45-day weight lifting program and biking on the Peloton. Mike and I managed to sneak way up to Denver to bike during a warmer day on the Bear Creek Trail loop, which is a 30-mile loop.  

​The UW track meet was especially fun, and I am so grateful to have been able to go out and run at such a fast meet. This year I really enjoyed the trip. This is mostly due to the fact that the people I went with were absolutely amazing. It was mostly Coronado people, plus a few others and me. I roomed with Jade and Keegan which was just so fun! When we got to Washington we took the tram to the main part of the UW campus where we stopped by our hotel and eventually went on a run. That night we also got to go watch all the college athletes at the UW collegiate meet. This was cool because I got to see old teammates, and the BYU XC and track team. We then went to Chipotle and eventually back to the hotel. On the following night I ran the 3k which was more stressful than it was last year. I still think I did pretty good considering the competition. I really enjoyed running the 3k and couldn’t wait to race the 1600 the following day. Because my time was right on the cusp of the fastest group I was placed in the second to last group. This meant that I had to lead. Although I ended up getting passed within the last 300 meters, I learned a powerful lesson in strategy from leading. Overall, I am happy with my race considering I was going for time. 

​We hit it hard this morning and got first tracks on what we think is the best combination of runs. Silver Queen lift to Keystone to Upper Park to Lower Twister to the bottom. There were practically no lines at the Silver Queen lift all day. We usually try to avoid going all the way to the bottom of the mountain but today there were no lines, so we did this combination of runs several times. This combo run went from black to blue to green. It was absolutely epic! We did hit the Paradise Bowl later but found the snow to be just ok and headed back over to our favorite run combo. Besides, the Paradise lift ended up being sort of crowded. Overall, we had another awesome day on the mountain!!

We woke up to snowy conditions and low visibility on the mountain. It made for harder than normal skiing and skiing blind for most of the morning. Our legs got worked. Then the sun came out for a bit and the fog cleared for a better afternoon of skiing. We had to take a midafternoon break with Madeline. She and I headed to the Paradise Warming House and got a few treats. We got some chocolate to share and some sour patch watermelon candies. Those treats perked her right up! The last run of the day with the girls was the best. We headed back up to the Paradise bowl but then took a sharp left after the first bowl section and headed on Yellow Brick Road over to Upper Park. We cruised the entire way down and the snow was actually better on this part of the mountain. Mike and I loved it so much that we headed up to do it again while Abby took Madeline back to the condo. Instead of skiing back to the Paradise bowl we headed down on Upper Keystone from Silver Queen Road. That small black section had the best powder of the day. We were able to drop right into Yellow Brick Road and head down Upper Park again. We were so happy we found such an amazing from the top to take the girls on tomorrow. We wish Emma could’ve been with us this trip, but she stayed home to race in an indoor track meet.