april already?

time is flying by over here... unemployment is treating me well :) i'm so grateful for the time i got to spend with all of our winter visitors (jenna, ryan, steve, sonia, cheryl, jk & girlfirend, seebock & co., jenna again :), gary, scott). 'miracle march' has brought us more snow in the past month than we've had all season- somewhere around 14 feet. It's really not that much especially by our house. we get snow, then the next day it warms up and the sun melts most of it. case & point...
april 1st

 april 2nd

we've been really lucky with colins travel schedule the past few months. he's had one trip to san francisco and been home for almost 3 months :) hooray! birthday snowboarding 3.16.12

 
we also went to a charity gala event that benefiting the shane mcconkey foundation. invite only. we're kind of a big deal. (ORRR we just happened to know the right person) either way, i felt pretty cool.

it was moulin rouge themed. we looked GOOOOOD. and those are fake cigarettes. which are equally disgusting as real ones. and finally, the night would not be complete without many glasses of wine and a burlesque show. AHHHHH....

they brought this guy out first. the crown had mixed emotions. then they brought out the ladies.

snow pretty...

sorry for slacking. i don't know what happened to february! there were some warm days with sunset walks on the beach...

afternoon lunches on the deck (chewie is very tolerant of belle)...









then Jenna and Kimmy came to visit...

 we made Kimmy go for a hike. she was less than thrilled.

and of coarse no girls weekend is complete without a trip to the winery!

 after a few tastings Jenna and i entered into some intense board games.

 i won.

after Kimmy left Jenna and I snowboarded 6 days straight. still no new snow at this point, so the conditions we just ok. we made the best of it. at least it was warm! we ditched the helmets for fear of overheating and experimented with a little gondola yoga :)

 and ended jennas visit with a little gambling on the mechanical ponies. she won!

next up: Gary's visit

 i made some flare for gary's ski pole (www.poleflare.com coming soon)

and finally we enter march with a crap ton of snow. i believe the totals were somewhere around 4 feet

 just lovin it!

 can i please go swimming??

Train tunnel hike...

Donner Lake is about 10 minutes away from our house. We bring the dogs swimming there pretty often, & have always seen these train tunnels up on the mountain. (see the lake on the far left & the straight boxy tunnel on right?)

Last weekend Colin found out they removed the tracks & trains don't run through there, so it's turned into a graffiti museum that anyone can hike through... And with the dogs in tow- we made our way up there.

The first tunnel was a little (okay, a lot) sketchy. Dark & very icy! We couldnt even walk in the center of the tunnel. There were mini lakes 3 feet deep Filled with chunky ice water. I learned my boots are NOT water proof :/ brrrr

There are a series of 6 or 7 tunnels that spam the entire length of Donner Lake- probably 5-6 miles if I had to guess. We made it through 3. After the first one, the rest were just dark & a little icy.

And once again, we found some views that don't suck