Winter?

The first snow fell last Thursday here in Idaho. It’s hard to believe that fall went by so fast, but I guess winter is already pretty much here. We’ve decided that we’re going to do more to embrace winter this year, so on Saturday we went to a “ski swap” where they sell used equipment. It turned out to be great! We got everything we need to go cross-country skiing, and new coats!

We were looking in the men’s section and Katie pulled out a coat that she really liked. It had bright primary colors, and because I tend to be a little conservative about clothing I was hesitant to try it on. It was an extra-large, which isn’t usually my size, but it looked like it would probably fit. I wanted to look at a few more and then try them all on at once. Katie liked this one so much that she held onto it while we walked around. I picked out a couple of other coats I liked. One of them was extra large, too, and when I tried it on it was definitely too big. Finally I tried on the one Katie liked and found out it was actually too small! It wouldn’t even zip in the middle. Apparently it had gotten misplaced in the men’s section. It seemed more like a women’s medium or small, which was perfect, it fits Katie great! We got it for her and found out when we got home that it was actually a “kid’s extra-large.” Which is a weird size, it seems like extra-large children should just wear adult sizes. The coat we got me ended up being pretty conservative, but I really like it.

Right after the ski swap, we swung by a garage sale we had heard about. It’s pretty late in the year for garage sales and we kind of expected not to find anything at all, but we got incredibly lucky, they had 4 old cameras! I think that’s the most we’ve ever found in one place. We’ll post more about those later, it was really great to find them, they were all models we hadn't come across yet.

After that, we decided to break in our new coats right away and go for a hike. We also wanted to show off our awesome new backpack! Ryan and Jill at Valentich bags custom made it especially for us. It’s definitely the coolest backpack I’ve ever had. The inside has all kinds of pockets and it’s really well made and colorful. The back is really sturdy too, it’s a perfect hiking bag – not too bulky or heavy, but plenty of space. We’ll take more pictures of the inside later and we’ll definitely be taking it whenever we go hiking or cross-country skiing this winter!

Anybody else skiing or doing other winter activities this season? When I was a kid I used to go snow camping... but it wasn't my favorite thing. I'm not sure if it was my sleeping bag or what, but mostly I remember being damp all the time and getting a headache from campfire smoke/not getting enough sleep.

- Ben.