After the holidays, we had a few calm days in Pittsburgh, then Paul granted my wish of heading back to visit my parents and make the run north to snowmobile. At least once a year I try to make it back to Northern Wisconsin and/or Upper Michigan for a weekend of snow and winter activities. We live in Pittsburgh, and the winters here just aren't the same. In Pittsburgh we get a little snow, but the next day it is on its way out and melting. I only recall the opportunity to go tubing on the snow once or twice since living here. The snow melts too quickly to enjoy it or take up winter hobbies. Wisconsin doesn't have that problem.  Northeast Wisconsin gets snow, but it is rare for the trails to open long enough to get good snowmobiling over the past few years - so for best luck with snowmobiling you have to head north.

We went all the way up to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to find snow and enjoy the cold. I found ridiculously cheap flights so I took the opportunity to run home to Green Bay and I brought our au pair, Sophia, with us to spend time with our family and get to see snow country. Again, we woke up during the middle of the night and got on the plane around 5AM, and we were to Green Bay by 9AM. We jumped in Dad's truck and hit the road north!  We made good time despite the stormy weather, and luckily beat Haus (one of Joel's buddies) who was coming over from Minnesota!

The weather for the weekend was predicted to be wicked cold - severe freezing temps. There was only one day that was predicted to be above zero, and with wind chills we were closer to -20 Fahrenheit. Despite the weather, I desperately wanted to get outside, on the trails and put some miles on the sled.  We played around the yard in the snow with the boys and then bundled up and took off for a ride or two. We couldn't go too far, because if we were to break down, the freezing temperatures made it pretty dangerous to take too much of a chance of getting stuck outside.

We did however make a run into Houghton to celebrate my mom's retirement! Haus determined that it was his way of throwing my mom a retirement party, at the KBC!  The KBC is the heart of Houghton, in my humble opinion, and I just love being downtown reliving memories of my brother's college days visiting everyone in Michigan Tech. It is such a special place, and we celebrated by having a great time at my mom's KBC retirement party. My kids were crawling on the floor and the staff there gave them racecars to play with - small town love - nothing better.  On the way home we found out that toddlers cannot be trusted to sit alone on snowmobiles and not press the buttons just begging to be pushed... Ohhhh man, that was a source of laugher for the remainder of the evening.

The weekend went by quickly, burying sleds, eating homemade pancakes and venison. Soon we hauled out our stuff by snowmobile and started on our road trip south without much room to spare in the truck. It was such a fun trip! I hope I can sneak in a trip to the upper Michigan regularly - it's good for the soul!

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