Mt. Charleston

I think we came up with a new tradition for Christmas.  It had small roots back in Tucson (when we brought some snow back in a cooler from the mountain and built a small snowman), but this year might take the cake (since I have a truck).  We decided to go up to Mt. Charleston to go sledding with our neighbors, the Leavett’s.  They own a cabin up Mt. Charleston, so we decided to take a quick drive up there and go sledding and then get some snow to bring back.  In the past week, it had snowed almost every day up there.  When we got there, we saw first hand how much snow truly had fallen.  In this picture, you can see how the snow slid off the roof and piled up on the side.  We grabbed all their snow gear from the cabin and marched off to find a good sledding hill.  It was tough going.  We kept stepping through the top layer of snow and sinking in to our waist.  We finally found a fun hill and made progress packing down a path for all of us to climb up.  Gabrielle was the crazy one to start things off, of course.  We had a great time.  After that, we were able to accomplish the second purpose of our trek up the mt.  We completely filled the back of my truck with snow.  We had some help, though.  There was a back hoe there trying to clear the roads.  Jim talked the driver into giving us a load from his bucket.  After that, since he did the bulk of the work for us, the rest was easy to pile up as much snow as the truck could carry.  We drove it back down the valley with plenty of fun stares as we drove past the cars on the highway.  When we got to the house, I just backed up the truck into the middle of the street and got to work with Jim unloading the snow into the middle of the street.  The temperature was almost perfect.  It made the snow great for snowballs and almost right for making our snowman.  I couldn’t believe what happened next, though.  It was as though our entire street came out to enjoy the magic.  The next thing I know, all the kids are having a snowball fight and everyone else is pitching in to make a snowman.  It was definitely a highlight.  We all had to get group pictures to celebrate the event.  People got the biggest kick out of having a snowman right there in the middle of the street when they would drive by.  It was Madison’s idea to have a reflector put in place of the mouth so cars couldn’t miss it.  Leave it up to her to come up with something like that.  Later in the evening, I would come out and neighbors would still be coming out to check up on it and to get more pictures taken.  Too funny.  Heather had stayed home with Drake and had slaved away in the kitchen for our Christmas eve dinner.  The timing was perfect.  We came in from the fun outside to a delicious feast.  I have had some great Christmases in my life, but this one ranks right up at the top.