Montecito 2010

It just might be an annual thing. For the second year now, a great group of friends headed up to Sequoia National Forest for a weekend winter get-a-way at Montecito Lodge. We were five families strong this year -- Clarks, Duttons, Tootles, Stahls and us. And it was better than ever. Not only was the company fabulous, but so was the weather. And there was tons of snow (though it had been about a week since it had fallen, so it was getting a bit crunchy). Leila had been psyching herself up for the snow for two weeks and indeed, she did great! On our first outing, she charged ahead with the boys, eager to soak up the experience and dig her hands into the snow.
Below, Leila's first taste of snow...
Of course, there were plenty of whimpers, whines and meltdowns, but nothing she didn't recover from quickly enough. Every time she started to slip or sink, she quite dramatically fell apart. But within minutes, she'd be stomping ahead again, full of sass and spunk.
She called these pink mittens her "strawberry shortcake mittens..."
Posing with the lodge bears...
She proudly sported her reindeer antlers for much of our first day at the lodge.
Cutest kids on the planet? I think so.
Sunset...
Leila and Jack were cracking up with this book...
And the adults got in some archery lessons... so cool! There's something really powerful and primal about launching an arrow from a bow.
Pretty in pink... the girl spent much of the weekend decked out in pink, from head to toe. By the end of the weekend, Katia referred to her as a cute little strip of bubble gum in the snow.
A sunny snow trek...
Dance party on night 2...
Leila and Harper getting warmed up for sledding...
Leila was into the idea of sledding, but after one run down the hill with me, promptly decided that it wasn't really her thing. We went down two more times, but she much preferred the slow pace of getting pulled along flat ground.
One last snowy pic with my bubble gum snow angel...