Matthew awards

At the end of the week the ski school has a big awards ceremony for all the kids. They have a little plaza in town where they built a stage for it. The instructors are all there and even Bobo the penguin makes a surprise visit. Matthew loves getting a medal!

Christmas Eve/ Jenny's bday

Christmas Eve the Weberbauer (where we stay) does this huge (really long) dinner. But before they even start, the family who owns the place does these Christmas readings with carols. It is really nice, but hard on the kids! So we have a huge dinner and then Jenny gets to open her presents and we eat cake. Really, all we do in Austria is ski, play games, and EAT. This year the kids were better. The older they get the easier they are (thank goodness for dvd players!)

Christmas in Austria

Being in Austria on Christmas is fun. Santa brings a couple of things but mostly waits till we are home in Germany. So they wear matching PJs to bed, wake up to a couple presents, get a huge German breakfast, then head off to ski!

Matthew ski lessons

Matthew really impressed us all this year. He made it out on the mountain on his second day and really loved it. When we picked him up he sai

d it was his favorite thing ever. We always knew he'd like it- he is obsessed with going fast and you can go pretty fast sking! He did really well going around flags and he was already trying to do jumps on a run with bumps! Hopefully we can go next year so he can stay with it- he is just crazy enough to be really good!

Andrew ski school

This year Andrew got to do lunch time lessons again. Last year he didn't do too much, but this year he did great. His Nana brought he and Owen up everyday (she watched the kids while we were out having fun- what would we do without Nana?) Owen tried sking one day but didn't make it on skies again. Andrew is a great listener so he did everything his instructor taught him (make a pizza and hands on knees). By the end of the week he was even doing little turns down the ski school slope. This year he had so much fun- he really felt like a big kid doing the lessons. All his teachers loved him (no surprise). You can tell from the pictures how much he loved it!

Sheffau

Sking in Austria is so much fun. Matt's family has done it every year since they moved to

Germany and we love it! We spend a week there over Christmas and snowboard/ski as much as possible. The snow was pretty good this year, but there were a few foggy days. Overall it was a fantastic week to be there. Here are some of our scenery pictures from the top of the mountain.

Santa!

At the ward Christmas party the kids got to see Santa. They were more than happy to tell him what they wanted and eat his candy canes!