Last week, we went on a family ski trip to Utah with Mike's cousins. The first night was a little rocky (Mazzy told me in perfect english that she wanted to go home) but otherwise we had a blast.
We spent three days skiing (while Mazzy was well taken care of by our non-skiing cousin, Robyn) and two days doing various snow activities, including building the world class snowman pictured above (with Tostitos for eyes; improvisation is everything).
Most of the snow activities went well with the exception of a failed toddler skiing attempt which went down exactly as you would expect.
Why we took a two year old skiing is beyond me. I guess I had brief visions of Mazzy, a young Winter Olympic hopeful, telling a 75-year-old Bob Costes how her mother plopped her in skis at the young age of two and she'd been downhill racing ever since.
I should have aborted the mission the second we put her ski boot on in the shop.
"I don't like it."
"Yes, I know. Everybody hates ski boots."
"I don't like it."
Somehow, we managed to get both boots on without a major meltdown. Must have been my "suffering in the name of fun" pep talk.
I stood Mazzy up and she stood there like her feet were Krazy-glued to the ground.
I carried her to the slopes while Mike somehow carried three pairs of skis. (My husband can be very impressive when he wants to be.)
Once on the base of the bunny slope, we attached Mazzy's skis, watched her immediately criss-cross them over each other and then FREAK THE FUCK OUT.
It was all in classic terrible-twos-fashion except for the fact that FREAKING THE FUCK OUT in this instance was totally understandable since we had just tethered her legs to two long slippery sticks, effectively rendering them useless and confusing the crap out of her.
I picked a weeping Mazzy back up and carried her off the slope.
Did I mention how much heavier a toddler is with boots and skis weighing them down?
We then unattached the skis, carried everything back to the ski shop, returned her gear, went back to the car and drove back to the condo.
The entire exercise took about 45 minutes.
No gold medals for us.
Unless they start a Winter Toddler Carrying Compeition. I will go pro in no time.
Another possibility is bringing "sleigh driving" to the Olympics. Or maybe in the X games or something? Check out Mazzy in training below.
75-year old Bob Costes is gonna be so proud.
LOL. Yeah – we totally waited until our kids were closer to 4 and too heavy to carry so they had no choice but to ski down.
I say bravo for even attempting it. I doubt I can even get a boot on Monkey without him freaking out.
We went on a snowboarding trip with friends over New Year’s. Our one-and-year-half year old hated it. The boots were a complete miss, but eventually we got that bit sorted. We rented a small sleigh, but he threw a complete fit when I tried to sit him on it. After an hour of cooling down in the lodge, I decided it was time for round two at the kiddie area, complete with slides — his favorite. This lasted about two minutes before he kept saying, “cold, cold, it hurts!”. I finally had pity on him and threw in the towel.
In my pre-kid life, I was a ski instructor. Trust me, she only freaked out because you were there. In two years of being consigned to the two and three year olds, we never had that happen if the parents weren’t there. If the parents were sneaking around trying to get a peek, and the kid saw them…all bets were off. Parents who try to teach the kids themselves are really not doing themselves any favors. Even after coaching freestyle for three years and skiing for 25, I wouldn’t let my kid’s first experience be with me teaching them. So sorry that was your first experience with it. I hope you keep up with it. I can’t wait to be able to ski with mine!!
I wouldn’t have been able to even get the boot on!
Sounds EXACTLY like our experience over the holidays in Telluride with our 2 year old. I mean, EXACTLY!!
See, I hate skiing but Vivian is completely fearless, which would mean that on the off-chance we ever taker her skiing, the exact opposite scenario would occur – she’d be the one coercing me onto the bunny slope while I, in turn, had a weeping Terrible Two’s-style public meltdown.
It’s OK. I have other gifts. Just none that require a great deal of grace or athletic ability.
Actually, you get a gold medal for recognizing yoiur daughter’s dismay and getting her the hell out of there instead of continuing to force her into something that made her MISERABLE.
When I was 8 and my brothers were 11 and 14 my mother married a man with a 4 year old daughter. Our first family trip with my new little sister was to Colorado to go skiing. My brothers and I had been skiing since we were very young, probably around the 2-4 range. We still laugh about how my little sister determined to prove her place in our new family took to the slopes and immediately fell to the icy ground and screamed “Help me, HELP ME! Some body PLEASE HELP ME!!!” Over and over. We tried to help her but she was freaking out so much she would bring everyone down around her. Eventually ski patrol showed up worried that she was really hurt. Nope, just her pride. Poor thing! It still makes me so sad. Skiing is hard for the little guys!
Oh, Ilana. I feel you.
My son and his best friend happily started lessons when they were four; so when my girl was turning four she was so excited to begin lessons with her best little friend who was three (a full year younger).
We got everyone all geared up (yeah fun) and shuffled the gang to the bottom of the ski school at which point my daughter dropped to her knees and began begging me not to have to go:
PLEASE MOMMY DON’T MAKE ME I PROMISE I’LL BE A GOOD GIRL LET ME WAIT UNTIL I’M FIVE PLEASE MOMMY PLEASE I’LL BE GOOD!!!
…like I was some kind of crazed Ski Mom on a reality show who was going to force her baby to shred the top of the mountain. It took a while to get her to calm the fuck down. Then the two of us went back to the cabin and watched Sesame Street and drank hot chocolate.
I may have put some Baileys in mine.
Yes, Elmo has witnessed many of my finest parenting moments….
We’ll probably try again next year. Can kids carry their own skis at three? (She’s gonna hate me.)
After we got Mazzy’s boots on, she started yelling for something to eat so I showed her the options in the ski shop for fear of an additional meltdown.
She insisted on getting a raw fruit and nut bar. I think she thought it was chocolate. After taking a bite, she spit it back out in my hand. There was even a dramatic retching sound. I forgot about that part of the excursion.
Mazzy always behaves better when I’m not around. Or so I’m told.
I think Mazzy is too young for ski school (she’s an early two) but I’ll take your advice next year! I was a ski school kid myself.
Yes, the idea was to give her a new experience so she understood the concept of vacation. Not to torture her in freezing cold weather against her will. Lesson learned.
I love your visuals, but I must say even funnier are the mental pictures I envisioned of you lugging her with skis and all!!
I have trouble with my son and his regular load of stuff around the neighborhood sometimes (I’m the parent who chooses to forego the stroller more often than not, only to regret it when I’m lugging my own said load, arms flailing, around town).
You deserve the medal for trying : )
Fantastic sleigh! And that is one LARGE horse. She looks like a natural up there. I think skiing may have to bow to horseriding.
I agree, that horse is HUGE! I put both of my girls in lessons when they were 5&7. The little one wanted to ski, the other board so they weren’t together. They were both the cutest things ever, but hated the lessons. The younger one has tried sking once since and has no desire to do it again while the older one has gone snow boarding a couple of times and likes the actual boarding okay but says snow is wer and cold. Go figure. I guess they are California girls through and through!
We did the exact same thing with our 2 year old the week after Christmas …. complete with visions of his superior skiing skills. The only exception, we made the bad decision to buy lift tickets first. So,after lots of crying, $110 in lift tickets, and $20 at the snack bar we left 45 minutes after arriving.
You made me laugh really loud! We went skiing last month for a week and shared the childcare between three of us, taking turns to have a half day at the chalet – Baby Badger was way too young to try at 18 months old. She loved being pulled around on the sledge but point blank refused to take a step on snow…
Ok, sitting on that big ole horse kind of made me suck in my breath. That’s a Big Ole Horse!
skiing. I’ve done it precisely 3times in my life. Can’t imagine I’d attempt it w/ the boys.
Awww… that’s sadly sweet. I hope they didn’t need to airlift her!
Once when I was about six, my dad and I were stuck in a chairlift for over 3 hours. Patrol people were skiing down asking each chair if they were okay and my dad joked that I had to go to the bathroom.
When we finally got to the top, they put everyone in this one room wooden cabin to warm up. I remember the door barging in and ski patrol screaming— “Where’s the little girl that has to go to the bathroom??!” Then they strapped me into one of those harness canoe things, took me down to the nearest ski condo village, banged on someone’s door and demanded they let me use their bathroom.
I was MORTIFIED.
I can totally understand how skiing could feel like a punishment. Nothing like children to remind you that it’s a lot of prep to stand in the cold all day. Not exactly a modern day good time.
Next time I’ll have a photographer follow me around to record my misfortunes.
I’m a no-stroller kind of girl too. I also like to leave the diaper bag at home. It gets me in all sorts of trouble.
We actually have pictures of her horseriding over the summer. Well, pony riding to be more accurate. She loved it. Not scared in the least.
Skiing is a pain in the ass- there is no doubt about it. But I’ve been doing it since I was three so it’s whole other ball game when you are actually good at it. Mike and I are at the same level so it’s a really fun thing for us to do together.
I hope Mazzy makes it through the suffering and learns to enjoy it too!
We actually didn’t buy lift tickets that day because we weren’t going to take her on a lift. Just pull her up and down the bunny slope. Of course, that didn’t happen either, but at least I did something right!
Mazzy went on the same trip last year (no skiing attempts) and she got freaked out when we put her in the snow too. This year she was really excited to build a snowman. But she refused to make a snow angel even though she does them all the time on our living room floor.
Mazzy is fearless. And to a certain extent, so am I.
thank you for making me feel much less bad about having never taken my kids skiing.
I have two words for you: SKI SCHOOL.
Wow… Kudos for trying!! I have a friend that teaches at the ski school for kids at Brighton Ski Resort in Salt Lake. You should look into something like that for next time… 🙂 She has already warned me that once my daughter turns 2, she’s taking her up the slopes.
Well, at least she was introduced to it, which may help a little next year. She will know what to expect. We don’t ski but we do water ski (those boots suck too). For us, slowing introducing them to it and waiting until the kids were five to truly give it a try helped a lot.
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