It Belongs to Big Bear

It was our 4th year doing the Big Bear cabin, and while the attendees may vary slightly, we've been a regular fixture since it's always been over AJ's birthday weekend and it's exactly what he wants to do.

This felt like the first year we got a little break in the sense that we got to let Sophie go rogue - didn't have to stress about her going down staircases (it's a five-story cabin) and she plays with others and they can entertain each other with their games and fun. Of course, we had to worry about all of that with Summer, and chase her around, and every year, more kids are added to the mix, and the bigger ones are getting bigger and crazier so it's in no way relaxing and we often remind each other "we're doing it for the kids!" To give you an example, Greg made eggs to have for the kids and adults for breakfast one more and he used 36. And we still had tons of eggs and people still ate other things. But that's the chaos we're faced with.

That being said, it was a super special year because of all the fresh snow and the face that we got to be there while it was snowing as well. Sophie was in Elsa heaven.

We drove up Thursday night which was right in the middle of the storm. It was a horrendous drive. AJ was fine, since he's lived in Canada and was a mountain regular for snowboarding, but I was having a panic attack and was very relieved that the girls were asleep.

We were the first ones up there and one of my favorite memories was within those first few hours, when we had the full cabin to ourselves, Summer was asleep, and AJ, Sophie and I sat on the couch watching Frozen with popcorn and the snow coming down outside. Not your typical California evening!

The Star Wars drive up

Sophie seeing the snow for the first
time since she slept on the drive up

Chris and AJ seasoning the meat for the weekend

Mah babays!

Snow fun in the morning

Bryce had a shovel and Sophie wanted
something and she was fine with a broom haha

Snow snacks

I made the mistake of turning the tub jets
on after having put in a lot of bubble bath
and Sophie practically drowned in the 
bubbles lol

Building their snowman

Chris was a great project manager

Making daddy's birthday cake

Happy Birthday AJ!

A calm evening lol

We are all so thankful for Dave and
his energy to play with and entertain
this growing group of kids

Summer became obsessed with pushing
the cooler around

Sophie's Elsa braid

The babysitters that came with were great with hair and did a braid for Sophie (which isn't super easy since her hair is pretty short) and she was just in love.

When we were down the mountain, her blue hair tie came out and she was beside herself upset saying "Oh no! My hair tie! It belongs to Big Bear!" and while I appreciate her honesty and integrity, it took awhile to calm her down.

The girls did great both up and down the mountain since we drove at good sleeping times, and AJ and I actually did a great job unloading and unpacking and laundering when we got back so we started the week off pretty fresh, so that's something I guess.

Glad we have another year of memories.