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I had three days off from school this week due to conferences, so Papa came to town to hang out with me. (My conference was very good, by the way.) On his first full day here, we headed to Suttle Lodge for an overnight trip. On the way there we stopped at Diane’s Riding Place for a little ropin’ and ridin’:

Here’s Papa delivering a stuffy from one mailbox to another. Good job, Papa!

Strawberry, stopping for a drink:

Next, we went for a walk along the Deschutes River at Tumalo State Park:

After our hike, it was on to Suttle Lake Lodge. It was awesome.

We got up in the morning, had a banana, and went for a walk around the lake:

On the way home, we stopped at the alpaca farm:

On Saturday, we colored eggs,

and went for a walk at Shevlin Park:

The Mother insists we behave for pics. This is what we do otherwise.

On Sunday, I awoke to find that I had been visited by the Easter Bunny:

Along with some chocolate, he brought me a poster of Marco Odermatt:

I did an egg hunt in the back yard:

After helping Dad remove the studs from the truck, we headed out to the Cascade View Trails, where the Bigs went mtn. biking, and Papa and I went for a 5.5 mile walk (We walked at least four miles every day.):

The Mother finally got to try out her new (birthday gift) mountain bike:

When we got home, I set up one of my famous bars to celebrate Easter and Papa’s last night here:

For dinner, we had leg of lamb, braised leeks:

green bean salad with tahini and quinoa:

spring potato salad with green goddess dressing:

and a loaf of teff bread:

Other food we had this week, smoked salmon and goat cheese omelettes:

The May Day race was this weekend. It is a four event competition. There is a Nordic race, ski jump, and two GS races. I was up and dressed early for the Nordic race.

We alll lined up for the Nordic start. I am on the far right.

I pulled ahead quickly.

Soon I had dropped everyone.

Turns out I had the fastest time for not only my age group but I beat every boy in every age group (8 to 16 years old) there!

Instead of a trophy, I won a cool mug.

Up next, the jump. I won’t lie. I was not looking forward to this event. I ended up jumping 29 feet and being quite relieved it was done. Here I am taking off.

After the race, Dad and I had to run out and buy me a new helmet. Mine was not race sanctioned. We found this bright red one at a ski consignment shop.

It worked well and I had a good first GS race.

After the race, I planted some pansies for The Mother.

I crashed on the second GS so the ski meister award was not to be for this year. We skied some afterwards. It was pretty awesome.

Busy weekend. On Saturday, I had GS training at the mountain all morning, and then we came back down for my first soccer game of the season. It was a beautiful day.

On Sunday, we had our last Mini-World Cup race of the season and end-of-the-season awards and BBQ. Team Österreich (Matthew thinks he is giving me rabbit ears, even though he is about a foot too short – and wearing mittens!):

The race was an untimed dual slalom. We got a ton of runs and had a blast. I even got to race The Mother, though Dad had a camera malfunction, and there is no video evidence. Here I am racing some of my teammates:

After the race we had a BBQ, and then awards. I received a number of awards. First was the Arc City Award, given to the group of Mini World Cuppers that really know how to arc (see photos above):

MBSEF’s values are Commitment, Honesty, Accountability, Sportsmanship, and Excellence – CHASE. Each year, they give the CHASE Award to the skier that best embodies those values. Marti won this year, but I was one of the nominees. The Bigs were very proud of me for this, even though I didn’t even win the award!

Finally, they gave out the overall season awards. I was the 2025 U10 Mini World Cup Champion!

We tried a couple of exciting new recipes this week. Mustardy cheesy cauliflower:

And, Race-Day Muffins:

We’ve had a busy two weeks but don’t have a lot of pictures to show for it. We celebrated St Patrick’s Day with some corned beef and cabbage.

I made breakfast for dinner.

I had ski camp. There was A LOT of snow.

Some days it snowed, some it rained, and some were sunny. After all of them, I was hungry and tired. One night we went to Spork for dinner.

And then to Bonita for gelato.

It would freeze and thaw, freeze and thaw.

When it was sunny, The Mother would take pictures. She is a fair weather photographer.

Here I am at the ski lift chair at the Nordic center in November.

Here I am there today.

One of the other chairs was completely buried.

Because it was break, The Bigs tried some new recipes. Double chocolate almond cookies

Doctor’s daily bread,

and two bean chili with a sweet potato crust.

Happy Pi Day

The Mother decided we would do a ‘fun’ pi day activity. We measured the circumference and diameter of different size wheels and found the ratio of circumference to diameter was always pi.

Thankfully The Bigs also thought actual pie should be part of the celebration as well.

In preparation for my last race of the season, I waxed my skis.

The race was postponed but we enjoyed endless fresh powder so no complaints from us!

On Sunday morning, the snow report actually caused The Bigs to briefly pause and consider not going skiing!!

They decided going to Mt Bachelor probably wasn’t wise, but we did go out to Skyliner sno park and do some Nordic touring.

We skied to Tumalo Falls:

Busy week. On Monday, I helped some of The Bigs’ students test a skateboard they built for a ten year old with physical disabilities.

After Nordic on Tuesday, Dad had to go to a work function, so mom took Jameson and me out for burgers.

Dad had another work thing Friday night, so Mom and I went to Pizza Mondo for a Pork-a-palooza pizza.

Afterwards, I used my gift certificate to treat The Mother to gelato.

Before ski practice on Saturday, Jameson and I did some hiking and skiing.

Next up was the award ceremony. I added another gold medal to my collection.

It was warm – check out the snow on the outhouse roof.

A “skimeister” refers to a skier with exceptional all-around skills in various disciplines like downhill, slalom, cross-country, and jumping. If you win a 4 way race, you are named skimeister. I have another 4 way in April and I want to be the skimeister. So today – jump training.

The blinds in The Bigs’ bedroom broke. The Mother found a YouTube video on how to fix it, so she bought the parts and got started. She was very quickly thoroughly confused, so I took over. They aren’t done yet but I am optimistic.

This week, I made lamb chops and Korean salad for dinner.

Lamb was on sale this week, so we also had lamb meatballs with Indian curry sauce

and Turkish lamb wraps.

One day this week, Mom and I were early for school. So we stopped for a donut. I sure do love a good maple glazed.

This week I made up a recipe for dinner. The end result? Bell peppers stuffed with lettuce, tomatoes, bacon, and bison seasoned with salt, smoked paprika, and thyme. They were terrific.

I know my grandmothers have been wondering ‘when is he going to get a haircut?’ The wait is finally over.

Saturday it was sunny and 57 F at the mountain.

I had a GS race. I did not podium and I was not happy.

It was so hot and the race went for so long, The Mother – who we all know is the cheapest human on earth – didn’t bat an eyelash when a post race kombucha cost $10. (I’m not happy with my haircut. The front is too short and I tell The Bigs every chance I get).

The next morning the sunny skies and warm temps were gone and it was dumping yet again (good ole March) but I did not get to enjoy the powder because I had a slalom race. The night before I watched my race video, listened to Dad’s feedback, and watched Mikaela Shiffrin videos. Today, I raced for the podium and the unofficial results have me in FIRST.

I did not go home after my race. Nope. It was time for some biathlon! Jameson I did some exploring while we waited for the start.

Then we got down to business.

Not very many kids showed up so we got to ski lap after lap and shoot to our heart’s content.

No, I did not take a nap after.

I spent some time with my electronics kit this week. I made several circuits, including a Simon game:

I had an evening of climbing too:

Tuesday’s Nordic skiing was at Meissner, where we skied to the snow dragon. It was HUGE this year:

Meissner doesn’t have as much snow as Bachelor, but they have a lot of snow:

This weekend we went to the Mt. Hood Ski Bowl for the Oregon four-way race. They have a cool old-timey lodge:

Jameson and Samuel were there too:

First event was the jump. Not my favorite, but I was brave and did great:

Next up, GS:

Sunday was rainy. Very, very rainy. The day started early with a Nordic race. I won. By A LOT. I even beat all the kids in the older age group.

After the rainy Nordic race, the rain picked up to a steady downpour for two runs of slalom:

My first-place trophy for the Nordic race:

This week I made shrimp tacos for dinner.

I put Dad’s in an air-fryed bell pepper rather than a tortilla.

On Tuesday night, I was supposed to go Nordic skiing with Jameson and then to see Dogman. He got a stomach bug Monday night and couldn’t go. I went anyway. No way was I missing Dogman. We got there early so we could get a couch.

I had a delicious cheeseburger and cajun tater tots. I’d never had a tater tot before. They’re OK.

On Valentine’s Day, which is also my half birthday, I asked to go to The Great Greek to celebrate.

I had the gyro plate.

For dessert, I had chocolate-covered strawberries.

I used ChatGPT to make my Valentine’s Day cards for school. Last month we listened to “Into Thin Air” on the ride to and from the mountain – piquing my interest in Mt Everest. When it came time to make a Valentine I decided it should have Mt Everest and prayer flags, but the prayer flags should be hearts. I tried making it myself. It was coming along OK, but then Dad suggested I try ChatGPT. I just entered image with Mt. Everest with prayer flags and then when I got that, I asked it to add hearts to the prayer flag and voila:

On Saturday, I skied with my team and on Sunday I went for a tour with The Bigs. This sign was, in the fall, very high on the tree. It will soon be buried. They are calling for 28+ inches of snow in the next few days.

This week I prepared a charcuterie board for dinner. The Bigs questioned if this was really making dinner, but they sure did enjoy it. We had toasted nuts, smoked salmon, prosciutto, olive tapenade with seed crackers, crudités, and cheese.

Speaking of cheese, I discovered these marinated mozzarella balls at Costco. So good, I eat them right from the container in copious quantities.

Friday night was Desert Sky Montessori’s skate night. I had a blast.

The Mother was so happy there was a fire pit. It’s been very cold and snowy in Bend lately.

My Christmas gift from Auntie Cheryl was a USB microscope. I LOVE it and look at magnified images of all kinds of weird things. Today the subject was…a favorite of mine…a twenty dollar bill.

I had downhill training on Saturday. It was snowing. The lift broke when I was on it. The Bigs looked like glazed donuts. It was quite a day and there were no pictures because there was no way The Mother was taking her hand out of her glove!

Sunday morning was COLD…on the drive up the thermometer said 3! It was early, we had to be at the mountain for a 7:30 am cross country race start., so we were hoping it would warm up with sunrise. This was my first year doing The Great Nordeen. The Mother and I did the 18 kilometer (~10 miles) race and Dad did the 30 kilometer (18.6 miles).

Given the race length, The Mother thought she was going to have to provide encouragement to help me finish. Incorrect. I took off like someone was chasing me and never looked back. I passed adults, I tucked, I didn’t slow down until the finish … while The Mother made an all out effort to keep up!!!

The Mother almost forgot she did the race and should be in the picture too.

Here are the race results. The more observant of you will notice I’m listed as being 12. It is possible that 9 year olds were not eligible to race, but The Bigs chose not to ask. So, I raced as a 12 year old. 5th place against much older kids indicates they should let 9 year olds compete if they are The Emmett (which The Bigs knew).

Afterwards I had a celebratory kombucha and ginger molasses cookie at Thump.