Steamboat Springs!

I would like to start this post off by first saying how incredibly proud of I am of my wonderful husband for his service to our country.  As of Thursday afternoon, the 16th, Matt is on terminal leave and has been honorably discharged from the Army.  It's something that's been a long time coming and that we've talked about for months and months now.  The entire time that we've been together Matt has been in the Army and we've had our share of ups and downs mostly in part to the Army.  So, here we are roughly three years later and a month shy of a year back from his last deployment, entering into a brand new chapter of our life.  The future really is wide open for us right now and that is both exciting and a bit frightening...luckily we're in this together. :)

So, since this was such a momentous occasion, we went on a mini vacation to Steamboat Springs (aka Ski Town USA) to celebrate!!  Neither of us had been to Steamboat before so we were both excited to check out a new town.  The town actually got its name due to the fact that one of the hot springs makes a chugging sound, much like a steamboat, and trappers and traders actually thought a steamboat was coming down the river.  When they realized that it was merely the hot spring and not a boat, they referred to the town as Steamboat Springs.  Steamboat is a little over four hours northwest of us so we hit the road before the sun came up on Friday in order to get a decent day of skiing in.

We rented a town home for the weekend and spent Friday skiing.  This was only my third time skiing so I'm still a little slow and apprehensive on the slopes but I did start tackling some of the blue runs.  Matt was kind enough to stick with me on the easy runs even though he's a far more advanced skier than I.  Friday night we went out in downtown for dinner and some drinks.

Saturday morning we were up and at em early as we were going dog sledding!  I think it's safe to say this was the part of the trip we were the most excited for.  The company is called Grizzle-T Dog Sledding and they've been in operation since the 90s.  They have about 130 dogs, each with a name and the staff knows all the names, and teach you how to drive the sled before leading you on a 12.5 mile run.  Matt started driving for the first half and then we switched.  We drove through some gorgeous scenery and had an amazing time...boy do those dogs love running and they are SO strong!!  We've already decided we need to go dog sledding again next year. :)

Here are some pictures from the trip, many more are posted on Facebook: