Mammoth!

Two weeks ago, we took a vacation to Mammoth!  It was such an awesome trip.  We went with our friends, Matt and Calli Kelsay and their adorable girls, Aubrey and Kirra.  I was a little nervous about the 6 1/2 hour drive with two little kids.  I wasn't so nervous about Mason because we had snacks, DVDs and toys.  Annie was the one I was nervous about because she's only 6 months old, in a backwards facing car seat, can't give her snacks, etc.  But...the ride turned out much better than expected!  So that was good.  We made only one stop in Lone Pine and our two families got a Mexican lunch.  Chris liked the food the most, but it also hurt him the most.  More about that later...  

I said we made only one stop, but now that I'm thinking about it, that is not true.  Make that two stops.  At one point, Mason needed to go potty.  We were about 5 minutes or so from the next town so Chris decided to step on it to get to a bathroom.  Mason said he REALLY needed to go so I told him to pull over.  We carry a froggy potty around with us so it was fine.  Well, we pulled over and much to our surprise, there was a police car right behind us.  Chris thought he had pulled over to see if we were ok, but actually...Chris was going about 15 miles over the speed limit while we were racing to get to a bathroom.  The policeman had no sympathy and we got a ticket.  He was going the opposite way than us on the road and I guess monitored us somehow.  Great way to start off the trip!  Ha ha-not really.  But what were we going to do?  We forgot about it and kept going...at the speed limit.  

We got there while there was still daylight so that was nice.  The altitude there is about 7000 feet which explained my killer headache by the time we got to the condo.  Thankfully, Calli had some Ibuprofen and that got rid of it in about 20 minutes.

Once we claimed our rooms and unloaded our stuff, we bundled up in our snow gear (because it was about...maybe 20 degrees out), and took a trip to the local grocery store.  It was the absolute BUSIEST grocery store I have EVER been in.  Completely CRAZY.  I am not kidding.  I actually felt claustrophobic because of how many people there were in there.  That was kinda frustrating but we bought food for the week as quick as we could and got home to relax.  I couldn't help but notice that with all the millions of people in the store, we were some of the only ones with little kids.  I'm thinking the below freezing weather had something to do with that.  :-)


Here are a few pictures I took with my phone in the car on the way to our condo:

Mason was so cute and helped keep Annie happy.

First view of snow on the mountains!

Before we knew it, we were surrounded by thick snow everywhere!

So we got there on Monday and on Tuesday, our first full day there, we all decided to make that our day to go out and play in the snow.  Build a snow man, throw snowballs, go sledding-all of that fun stuff.  Monday afternoon, Chris' stomach was bothering him and he started feeling pretty sick.  We think that Mexican lunch may have hurt his tummy.  Once our Tuesday "go outside and have fun day" came around, he had absolutely no energy to do anything, which was so sad.  He sat on the side and watched the rest of us build a snow man and go sledding.  It was really fun, but it would have been so much better if he could have gotten in on the action.

Annie could barely move.  I'm thinkin' she wasn't that into the snow clothes.  :-)

Gettin' the tubes ready.

Poor Chris not feeling good.

Lovin' the snow!

Aubrey and Mason exploring together.

My cute family.

The one time Chris went down the hill with Mason.

Matt was a good sport and took the kids down many, many times!

Mason called these seats we made on the side "bumbos".  :-)

 Cute Kirra right after a sled ride with her dad.

 These two LOVED it!  They kept saying they wanted to go down without an adult.  :-)

Best friends.  :)

Soooo sad that sledding time was over.  :-(

Still sad we were leaving...

But doesn't he look so cute??


After our snow adventures we went home and had some lunch.  Chris took a long needed nap because he felt so sick.  He definitely had a fever that afternoon.  It was awful.
That evening Mason and Aubrey had fun playing "Ring Around the Rosie".  

This picture cracks me up because of the big guy in the background on the TV.  Hahaha!

Pure joy.  :)


So the next day, Wednesday, the plan was for Chris and Matt to go snow boarding for the day.  Chris woke up feeling super sick though.  He actually said he just wanted to go home.  But after hanging around that morning for a bit, he decided sick or not sick, he was going to go snow boarding.  So the guys took off.  Calli, the kids and I hung out at the condo for the day.  We were going to go out but we decided it was quite the process getting everyone "snow ready" so we stayed warm inside.

The 4 cute kids.

Calli brought a fun alphabet puzzle that they played with.

View from our balcony.

Lots of icicles!


Chris was feeling better that evening and we all headed out for a nice dinner in town.  We had a little trouble finding the place though.  The Kelsays were leading the way and at one point we lost them.  We drove around for a while with no luck finding them.  So we got out of the car and started walking, figuring there was a good chance we'd be having dinner with our separate families.  We went into a restaurant and asked where a burger place was because that's where we talked about going in the first place.  We were told directions and thankfully we found the Kelsays!  Calli and her girls had been sitting at the window watching for us and Matt and gone driving to search for us.  :/  So then we enjoyed a yummy burger dinner together.

Me and my kiddos at the restaurant.

Shot of the snow on some buildings while we were driving around.  Snow really makes things look pretty.

When we got home we wanted to take a family picture.  We tried hard to get Mason to smile. 

But no luck.


So then that night we hung out and Chris and the kids had some bonding time....  :)

First he balanced Kirra....  (the lighting for these didn't turn out so well.)

 Then Annie....

Then Aubrey....

And then Mason.  :-)

Then Chris read "Can't You Sleep Dotty?" to Kirra and Annie.

Before he knew it, Aubrey and Mason joined in.  So cute!


The next day was time to go home.  We woke up and packed up.  Here are a few pictures of the mountains as we left.

This is a shot of Mammoth mountain.

It was so cold and there were some crazy strong winds.  It made for some really pretty pictures.

Annie fell asleep immediately.  So sweet!

 This is a shot of Mt. Whitney...we think.  Ha!

Happy Annie in the car....

And happy Mason.  Gum and a movie on the laptop.  What could be better?

And a ring pop of course.  


We are SO glad the Kelsays had the great idea of all of us taking such an awesome trip!  It was so fun....and so cold!  :-)  I think the coldest it got was -2.  Yikes!  It was a really cool experience-definitely the most snow I have ever been in.  Mason had SO much fun.  We'll definitely be taking another snow trip some time.  :-)