Mt. Hood snowboarding trip

Timberline, Mt. Hood

One of the best things for me to "de-stress" is snowboard!! The mountains always calm me down and make me feel at piece. We (me, Jaime, Bon, Brent, and Aaron) were able to go to Timberline, Mt. Hood in Oregon for the weekend and we couldn't have asked for better conditions! The week before they got a couple of inches of new snow each day. Then on Saturday it was clear blue skies....every snowboarder or skiers dream day. Fresh powder and the most amazing views from over 8,000 feet. The upper lift (Palmer express) was open and the view from the top is worth the lift ticket alone.

We found some amazing back country spots that were the most fun snowboarding I've ever done. huge jumps and cornices to jump off of and deep deep light powder. We even found a natural 1/2 pipe.

After a full 7 hour day of snowboarding (with only one 15 min break to scarf down some food) we headed back to Gresham to our hotel. We all spent a good hour or so soaking our sore muscles in the hot tub and then ate lots and lots of pizza.

View of Mt. Hood from the parking lot on a perfect blue bird day.

Brent, Me, Jaime and Bon

Aaron, Brent, me and Jaime

Bon and I got lost in the back-country and had to hike out in this deep powder for about 45 minutes.
This is WHY we were in the back-country! Amazing jumps and cornices.

Some nice people built us a sweet jump. How nice of them!

Aaron hitting one of the jumps. His hair is out of control. Nice aviators.

Jaime going off one of the jumps.

Me coming down Palmer snowfield. I had just sprayed Aaron with a wall of snow. I hope that was your waterproof camera.....

Palmer snowfield with Mt. Hood in the background.

Jaime and I at the top of Palmer Express! What an amazing view. 8,540 feet above sea-level.

Bon and I at the top of Palmer about to go for a run.

Jaime and I about to head down the mountain.

New Bike

I got myself a new dirtbike on Friday!! It's a 2007 CRF150RB, which is a race bike so it's very fast. This makes dirtbike #3, but don't worry, I'm selling my other two. Now that I have this one, there's no need for the others. It's perfect! I've had my eye on this bike since about 2008 but had to wait for the price to come down so I could actually afford one.

Jaime and I took it out on Saturday to Ravensdale and I was surprisingly really nervous about riding it. I've ridden many different dirtbikes, but never a "race" bike that is geared this way. You barely twist the throttle and the front end just comes up. And its like that in EVERY gear.

As soon as we got on the trails and I got familiar with the bike, it was amazing! I wish I hadn't waited so long to get this bike.

Anybody looking to buy a dirtbike? We've got quite a few for sale.

Powder Day at Crystal

We had planned to go to Mt. Hood this particular weekend, but rain forecasted in Oregon kept us local. On Saturday, Aaron, Brent, Andra and I headed up to Crystal Mountain and oh what a great day it was! The entire upper mountain had been closed the whole previous day which meant lots of untouched powder for us! The sun even came out for a portion of the day and that was just icing on the cake.

Aaron, me and Andra riding up the lift for our first run!

Andra and I at the top with Mt. Rainier peeking through in the background.

I was taking a little break and I'm not sure what Andra is doing to my board. Cuddling??

Brent, Andra and I excited to be in the mountains and enjoying the sun.

Me, Brent, and Aaron about to go for a run.

Aaron trying to take a picture and me trying to ruin it by throwing a snowball at his camera. He had to duck immediately after the picture took. ha ha. (Don't worry, his camera is waterproof)

Andra, me, and Brent taking a little break on the mountain.

Me waiting at the bottom for the boys.

Andra enjoying the falling snow.

Getting all bundled up and I think I scared that little girl in the background.

Me in the lodge with some hot cocoa and twix. You'd be surprised to know how good this is. Try it!

I absolutely LOVE days like this!

Grandma Rhoda memorial service

A couple weekends ago there was a memorial service held for Grandma Rhoda in Factoria. Many of our cousins and other family members from all over the country were able to make the trip out to Seattle. It was honestly one of the best weekends I've had in a long time. It was so good to see my cousins and to hang out and catch up with them. It had been probably close to 10 years since that many of us were able to all be together.

The memorial service was very emotional but absolutely wonderful. The entire chapel was filled with people that loved Grandma. I was even able to learn some things about her that I never knew.

Family photo after service 1/9/10

When I was growing up, we went to my Grandmas just about every Sunday evening and much more often in the summer. One of my favorite things we did there was have huge bon fires in her huge backyard! This weekend, the weather cooperated for us and allowed us to have two bon-fires.

The weekend went by way too fast. We cried, we laughed (until we cried), and just had a great time spending time together and remembering the wonderful life of Grandma Rhoda.

Jaime and I outside Grandma's house

1/9/10

Grandma Rhoda 1/4/23 - 1/4/10

After a couple days where it looked like her health was improving, Rhoda got her birthday wish and passed away during the early morning hours of January 4th on her 87th birthday. We will miss you and we love you, Grandma Rhoda.

I'm glad she got to spend her birthday with Grandpa!

Rhoda 1951

Grandma and I at my wedding reception 2004

Family gathering - December 2008 (Grandma sitting front row)

Rhoda Soren Hinckley was born Jan. 4, 1923 in Salt Lake City, UT, and died in Bellevue, WA on Jan. 4, 2010 after a very brief illness. The sixth child of Alvin and Lilly Barney Soren, she was raised in Salt Lake City where she excelled in school and developed a lifelong love of music. An excellent violin and piano player, she graduated from the University of Utah in 1944 with a BA in music education. She played violin in the Utah Symphony until 1947 when she married (Parnell) King Hinckley in the Salt Lake LDS Temple and moved to Pittsburgh, PA where (Marjorie ’49, and Mark ‘50) were born. The family moved to Concord, CA in 1951 where two more children (Holly ’53 and Neil ’55) were born. Their last move was to Bellevue, WA in 1965 where Rhoda lived until her death.

Rhoda served in many callings in the LDS Church and taught piano and violin lessons from her home to hundreds of students for more than 50 years. She played violin in the Diablo Valley Light Opera Company (Concord, CA), was a charter member of the Bellevue Philharmonic Orchestra and a member of the Washington State Music Teachers Association. She will be greatly missed by her family and friends. She was preceded in death by her husband King (2000), and grandson Louis Somrak (2003), and is survived by her four children Marjorie (Frank) McEntire, Mark (Pam) Hinckley, Holly (Tom) Somrak, Neil (Annette) Hinckley, eighteen grandchildren, and eight great grandchildren. A memorial service will be held Saturday Jan. 9th at 10 a.m. in the Bellevue Factoria LDS chapel, 4200 124th Ave. SE in Bellevue. In lieu of flowers, Rhoda wishes you to give the gift of music to someone you love.

2009 comes to an end

I have been fortunate enough to have the last 2 weeks off of work for Christmas. It has been unbelievably nice to sleep in, not have a daily schedule to stick to, and actually get some house work done! One of the best things about not working during the week was being able to go up snowboarding midweek and avoid the crowds. Bon and I decided to go have a "girls only" boarding day at Stevens Pass. The conditions weren't ideal, but we still had a great time. Its been years since we'd gone together.

Taking a break on the backside of Stevens Pass.

View from the lift on the backside.

Self portrait on the lift.

Bon and I at the top

I would've taken more pictures but my batteries died early in the day.

Christmas was great this year! It was our 6th Christmas together as a married couple and we were yet again able to attend both of our families functions. On Christmas Eve we had our annual Hinckley Family dinner at my parents house. Then we went over to Jaime's Aunt's house for his families huge get-together which included singing Christmas carols, the very popular white elephant gift exchange, reading of the Christmas story, and festive snacks. We had a great time and it was fun to be able to catch up with family that we don't get to see very often.

Christmas morning we went to my parents first to open presents with my siblings and then drove to Puyallup to Jaime's families Christmas morning brunch. Here is our niece Clare with Maxx (Todd's dog) wearing their matching antlers.

All other pictures taken this day are on Jaime's mom's camera and I haven't got a hold of them yet. After hanging out at Nicole's for a while, we met back up with my siblings and decided to go see "Sherlock Holmes." It was a good movie, but it was not the best idea to go see it on Christmas and its opening day. The theater was absolutely packed! I didn't realize how many people do this as a Christmas Day tradition.

The next day was clear and sunny! Perfect day for dirtbiking. A bunch of us went out to Ravensdale to spend the day riding. Once we got up to the track, we discovered that it was incredibly windy. The sustained winds were strong enough that they created a constant loud whistling from blowing through the power line towers. The gusts were strong enough to blow your bike over. It was pretty crazy. Even in the trails branches were falling all around us.

Jaime and Todd crossing the tracks while I look out for trains.

Dustin going up a crazy steep hill climb. Sadly, nobody was able to make it to the top.

Me hiding in a little dig out in the side of the hill up at the track. It was the only place to get out of the wind.

New Year Eve was lots of fun! I can't believe another decade has come and gone. It is amazing to think how fast the last ten years went by. We had a get-together at our house and got to spend quality time with friends and family. The leftover fireworks from the 4th of July sure came in handy! It was fun to watch all the guys became 7 year old boys again....up until they thought it was funny to aim all the fireworks at the girls. But no one got hurt and we all had a good time.

Andra and Dustin

Kevin, Aaron and Jaime

Alex and Bon.

Alex and Bon enjoying the bonfire.

Me and Bon by the bonfire.

The street light was really bright......

Happy New Year!! We're looking forward to what 2010 has in store for us.

Snoqualmie Falls

We had some very cold weather for a week or so that made for some amazing conditions at Snoqualmie Falls. Andra and I decided to go up there last weekend to see for ourselves. Once we looked down from the lookout deck, we immediately decided to go all the way down to the water to get a better look.

It was pretty interesting once we got out on the rocks. They were all covered in about a quarter inch of frozen mist making them very slippery.

Here's the view once we got down to the water.

Close up of the massive icicles.

Twins at the falls.

Me and the falls

The river was so cold it was freezing around the edges.

It was quite a sight to see Snoqualmie Falls all frozen like that and I'm very glad I got to witness it. It'll probably a long time before that happens again.