Stuck on a mountain on Christmas Eve

So it’s Christmas Eve and we are currently stuck on a mountain with no running water …but before I get back to our current situation I need to rewind back a few days … 

Dec 20 : we drive up Sasquatch mountain and the road is pretty decent. We settle into the AirBnB house and it’s a great layout : 3 bedrooms, a nice kitchen, living room and a rec room. 

We celebrate my Dad’s 72nd birthday with steak and cake. We forgot a candle so quickly substituted with a mushroom and a flame app (haha!)

Dec 21: oh my word. It is COLD. It’s -20 and with the wind chill it is -30. I wear everything I own (like that episode of Friends where Joey wears everything Chandler owns) and I can’t feel my nose, my fingers or my toes. The kids last 2 laps before they are literally crying icicles. But there is 50cm of fresh powder and our lust for powder lines and our tolerance of -30 is teetering back and forth. Powder wins out and we keep on riding after taking the kids inside. We risked hypothermia but the powder was so good. It was worth it. 

Dec 22: Still -30 with windchill. Still thawing from yesterday so we don’t venture outside for more than a short walk just to confirm that it is still hypothermic. And yes. Still insanely cold. 

So cold that after our walk outside we found out there was no water. The reservoir that provides water for Sasquatch is frozen. At least there is snow that we can melt and we still have heat. 

Dec 23: it snowed a ton overnight and first chair waits for no one - not even your own children. We left the kids sleeping and my sister, Simon and I had the most amazing powder runs we have ever had. We are are snow  connoisseurs. Some people really know their wines or coffee and we really know our snow. We are snow snobs and this was the good stuff. So light and fluffy- like okanagan champagne powder. It was puking snow all morning- every run felt like first tracks. Divine.

In the afternoon we decided to be better parents and take the kids out. 

The emergency reservoir is now hooked up so there’s temporarily water but it’s not treated so we still have to boil it. But we can shower and flush the toilet! Hallelujah!

Dec 24: That is today and that is where everything went sideways. It has been snowing heavily but the temperature has warmed up it’s been sleeting/freezing rain since dawn. 

12:00 am -The emergency water is now used up and there is no more water again. Back to collecting snow and meting it. 

4:30am - Uh-oh. The snow from the side of the house slid down and snapped the windshield wiper blades. 

8:30am - Attempt to fix wiper blades with zip-ties and prayers 

9:00am - Sasquatch mountain announces due to extreme weather conditions it is closed for today and tomorrow. No one should be trying to drive up here. And there is still no water. 

11:00am - freezing pouring rain - check out of AirBnB

11:02am - parents vehicle gets stuck just 100 feet out of the driveway. 10 inch icy ruts covered in slush with atmospheric rivers running through makes the mountain road impossible to navigate.

11:45 am - parents vehicle unstuck. AirBnB host graciously allows us back to the house eventhough we have checked out. Play games while we develop a game plan. 

1:10pm - stare out the window and wonder if the plow truck is ever coming (it never goes) 

2:09 pm - reconnaissance mission. Oh it’s bad. Maintenance guy says “hard no” on trying to make it down the mountain today. 

2:25 pm - officially not leaving the mountain today. Head back to the AirBnB house. Unpack just the essential items we can find to just make it for the night. Fall out of the truck because it’s so icy.

3:20 -realize it’s way past lunch - make French toast for because we can’t find anything else yet.

4:00 pm - still no water. Mom decides to cook and bake snow - it’s a great recipe, you really should try it sometime 😆

7:00 pm - Christmas dinner of random leftovers and if covid has taught us anything, it is that we can pivot and attend Christmas Eve service virtually online. Such a lovely time of singing and reflecting on Jesus’ miraculous birth. 

9:00 pm - Kids ask to sleep under the Christmas tree. Wish granted.

5:30 am- water is restored, it’s a Christmas miracle on Christmas morning. 

6:00 am - stand in awe of the kids under the glow of the. Christmas tree. They are the best. They really are.

6:36 am - set off for Grandma and Grandpa’s farm in the okanagan with zip-ties holding our windshield wipers together. Let’s see how this goes…

This is definitely not the way we had planned Christmas Eve and Christmas morning would go but it’s surely is one we will never forget. Merry Christmas!

*** to be continued ***

Oh boy, it's good to be 9.

 This awesome kid is 9 as of today. 

He is my playful, fun-loving, always on-to-go boy. He is outgoing, silly and feels all his emotions intensely. He cracks us up with his ridiculous dance moves, comes up with the hilarious puns and makes us laugh with his really terrible accents. He is also very self-motivated and will dedicate himself to learning everything there is to know about whatever that interest is. He is proof that you can really learn anything on YouTube. I don't know how many kids teach themselves how to play hockey by watching videos but he found $6 rollerblades at Value Village and now he can't wait till SuperDad comes home everyday so they can play ball hockey together. 

He's a pretty amazing kid and being the youngest in our family doesn't hold him back at all. He's braver than Mama when it comes to mountain biking. On skis, he's happy to wind through the glades on blue and black runs with us. He ran his first 10 km Sun Run this year and finished it in 1:06. He carried his own backpack and trekked to the top of Panorama Ridge. He biked 30km in the Tour de Victoria and finished it in 1:45. He is energetic and competitive and I am sure soon we won't be able to keep up with him. 

Since the first week of back to school is crazy for Mama, we celebrated his birthday at the end of summer with a bunch of amazing things. A week of Whitecaps soccer camp with one of his best friends where there was a visit from Michael Baldisimo and Spike. Plus, he got picked for good sportsmanship and won a signed Whitecaps ball on the last day of camp.

After 5 awesome days of Whitecaps camp, we had a soccer birthday party with 3 of his good friends from his soccer team.  Pretty happy that my Pinterest attempt at soccer cupcakes didn’t completely fail. Plus, that leftover turf we kept from redoing our lawn a couple years ago actually came in handy to display the cupcakes. I knew there was reason to keep random scraps of artificial grass in the basement. 

After dinner we got on the skytrain and went to BC Place and hoped to watch the Whitecaps crush Nashville.

Unfortunately, the Whitecaps did not get the memo that the birthday boy wanted to see the Whitecaps win but at least Spike came by with a birthday card and got his name up on the big screen. SuperDad spent our life savings on cotton candy, mini donuts and lemonade so the kids were hyper and didn't seem to care that the score was a disappointing 0-3.

Everyone must know that this dude is a hockey fanatic now because he was showered with hockey fandom from family and friends - a cap of his fav player (Connor McDavid), hockey cards, a team Canada jersey, a Canucks jersey and tickets to a hockey game next month. This kid was jumping up and down in excitement.

Yep, it's good to be 9. Happy birthday to our spunky, hilarious, determined little dude. Keep rocking and making everyone around you remember to live earnestly and laugh a lot along the way.