My Birthday!!!
I think Anne and I have dubbed it the best birthday ever (and it wasn't even Anne's birthday!). If it's not the best ever it certainly ranks amongst the top five....
I turned 31 on the 13th of March. The day that Shea woke me up with little homemade gifts scrunched in tissue paper. I read the cards that had been sent from home and that I'd saved 'til that morning to open.
Anne (the delightful gal who introduced Shea and I..see blog posts of two and a bit years ago....) and Shea cooked me breakfast and even did the dishes (I was floored that Shea even knew where the dish soap was).
We spent the morning ski-jouring. It was my first time and I must admit I was quite nervous...
jittery nervous really.....
Ski-jouring is when you wrap a harness round your body, strap a huge bungee cord-like thing to the harness and then connect a crazily excited dog to the other end. The idea is that the two of you will go skiing together; the dog running while you ski behind. Shea likens it to skiing with a rocket pack on your back! I liken it to skiing but with a speed and overwhelming sense of unpredictability not usually part of my skiing routine. I was so tense I was clenching muscles I wasn't really sure I could clench.
Let's look at the picture above here as an example...this dog got so wound up when we stopped to wait for the others to catch up that he would pull me right over. Skiing we were fine as he could just run his little heart out...somehow or other I ended up with the fastest dog. Birthday treat perhaps.
So here, picture above, Shea wanted us to ski up to a cliff for the gorgeous view...I'm obviously very in control...I just didn't feel like seeing the view you know? And the vice like grip I have on the tree? Oh, I was just having a rest, you know...posing for the photo....
the manic look in the dogs eye? Well...I'm just happy I didn't see that as I was skiing...
Looking relaxed here. Anne was up for a week as she is also a teacher and had the same Spring Break we had. It's the first time since that fateful trip of a few years ago that the three of us have spent time together....Mum is ever so grateful to Anne for introducing me to my dashing Canadian Mountain Man.
This is another of Anne's pictures. In the distance you see Mounatin Man and myself romantically ski-jouring side by side; totally unplanned on my part - I really went wherever my dog wanted to go; how Shea and Anne managed to film movies and take photos while ski-jouring I will never know.
I did love the day though, it's such a rush to ski like that; you have a speed you don't normally attain through your own efforts and the dogs have this energy that makes you love the experience - clenched muscles or not.
Leaving the dogs, having fed them frozen fish pieces that we hacked with an axe off a solid pile of frozen fish, we headed home to prepare for the evenings birthday festivities.
We had a few friends round for dinner which made for a warm night of laughter, wine and BBQ Bison meat.
This here (to the right) is a "Shot-ski." Something Shea has been jabbering about for months now and finally made. He found an old ski and routered three holes in it that would snugly fit three shot glasses. We then filled said shot glasses with orange juice and, simultaneously, drank the shot. Anne and I, not usually giddy girls, somehow managed to giggle during the crucial drinking part of our first attempt at the operation and ended up with Anne almost choking and myself with juice in my eye.
With practice we got better.
After dinner, Shea rallied the troupes and we went out the back to our local sledding hill (again, see previous post). Shea, in a thoughtful Mountain Man moment, had lined the sledding slope with tiki torches and lit a fire to warm us after our exertions. He also provided the company with glow sticks to wear so we wouldn't run into others on the slope. By the dreamy looks that some of the other female guests were shining his way, I feel I may need to watch my back... this Mountain Man of mine is quite a good package.
We sledded and laughed and ran into tree's and just had a ball. Obviously too much fun to take any pictures. You have only my word on this part of the Best-Birthday-Ever recount. It was marvelous. People slowly drifted off as the night wore on, until it was down to four of us, Shea, myself, Anne and Kieran; Shea's childhood mate. As we stood at the top of the sled hill for the final run of the night, out of nowhere, having hidden themselves away all year, the Aurora Borealis emerged in slow shimmering light and danced a show for us across the sky.
It was almost a bit much!
It was a great day.
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