How To: Obergurgl

Q: What do you give the man who has everything?

2020 A: A meeting with his first granddaughter and a brownie.

And then proceed to go on the best ski trip ever known to parents of young children. 

Any ideal ski trip starts on the train:

Three backpacks and four huge bags because little Biggs weren't carrying their own bags.

while doing this:

But sometimes your train is canceled 20 minutes before departure and the floor of another train heading the same direction will do.

Current bag count: 13-14: five backpacks, three small rollies, two big rollies, one snack bag, and one empty bag to put jackets/hats into

And maybe your husband has a deadline so he'll fashion a standing desk to work on a Saturday.

I was planning on giving-up complaining about AI for Lent but instead I went for abstaining from Youtube. Sorry not sorry. 

The hotel will have amazing amenities:

like a Hugie Hole in your apartment

or go-carts 

 or parcours

or ponies

or waterslides

or maybe just silly little jacuzzis that fill with sulfur smelling water when you press a button. 

There will be bro-time:

Walking-up to Neuschwanstein while eating quarkball donuts (Silver lining of the week before the pandemic in Germany, we could get in without a reserving in advance because all the Asian tourists cancelled.)

or zooming down night sledding

Needless to say, our trip to Obergurgl, Austria would not be Coco approved. This year, Papa gets a birthday dedicated blog post. Is that a downgrade from six years ago? You be the judge.

This year's ski trip was a continuation of the shift from the little kid phase of ski trips that "needed" to include hotels with a waterslide. The focuses are now snow "sureness", walkability to the ski school, and bacon availability at breakfast. Our resident trip planner has identified a few interest areas of high elevation to check out for future ski visits. Paul still thirsts for adventure and works it in where he can whilst I only travel for people I love and/or skiing. 

This year we're getting our priorities straight - planning the ski trip first and then doing our taxes. Families with more than two kids need to be extra early or you'll be paying for two rooms instead of one suite type set-up. Although two bathrooms are still very, very desirable. We got lucky this year not getting a Norovirus type illness but were less fortunate here, here, and here.

The town of Obergurgl, just up from Solden, is at an elevation of over 1900 m / 6000 ft. As such it is about as "snow sure" as you can get in Europe. Most hotels operate on a Saturday to Saturday reservation schedule between Christmas and late February. Many ski schools will do a test to determine the kids' ski levels on the first day and then they'll be in a group for the rest of the week.

Last year we made the mistake of sending our skiers into the test "cold". As such, one skier did not end up in the preferred ski group. This year, I pushed for the kids to ski with us the first day, Sunday, and then start ski lessons on Monday. I told Paul that I could likely teach the kids how to ski better than teenage, Dutch ski instructors. 

I mean, I can still ski backwards.

However, Paul was correct in his hesitations. The first day the kids looked like this. 

By the end of the week the boys could more or less keep up with us:

Carmen still lags behind but she's the happiest little straggler.

Just follow the singing and you'll find her.

Most days the kids still wanted to keep skiing after their all-day lesson. We only had an hour until the mountain closed, but because we never waited in a line more than a couple minutes, we could get at least a run in. But sometimes they wanted to hit the town.

On the last day I was in bed with the flu but Hugo wanted to keep going so Paul let him take the gondola and then a run by himself. #Europeankid

In general, the kids would rather ski with us than in the lesson. But it's really nice to have time as a couple and/or with adults we love and miss.

Happy seventh anniversary Tío Jorge and Tante Claudia!

No friends kids on powder days.

Thankfully we found that walking five-ten minutes to ski school from the hotel is manageable. However, the key is having ski lockers next to the ski school drop. Ideally we should rent our gear from the ski shop at the mountain because they often include lockers as part of the rental. #protip 

Next year we're trying our hand at a hotel with just breakfast instead of half-pension unless another family wants to join-in January 30 - February 6 2027. We attempted one dinner out with our crew before sledding and confirmed that if you're rolling this deep, you need a half-pension with dinner starting no later than 18:30 PM.

It was so nice to get a two-for-one out of this trip - seeing dear friends and skiing. And, hopefully they'll still like us even after I gave Claudia the flu. Was it worth it? These people say yes.

Happy Birthday Papa! Thanks again for sponsoring our first ski trip as a family of five and the many, many Beckley trips before it. I only wish that you'd kept the awesome gear to pass down.

Book Report: The Devil Never Sleeps

 What kind of weirdo reads books like this sort of for fun?

The same one who volunteers to take a two-year old on a 3 km/2.2 mile definitely-wouldn't-fly-in-the-USA night sledding track.

Good judgement is overridden by toddler snuggle/giggles.

Try to resist as I might, my ADHD often leads me down research rabbit holes. The recent Brown University shooting that involved students, although indirectly, who had already previously survived other earlier shootings was too horrifying to ignore. While gathering information, I stumbled upon an Atlantic article by Juliette Kayyen which a foot note about The Devil Never Sleeps. As my devoted blog readers know, I dabble in prepping so my curiosity was piqued. 

The basic premise of the book is that disasters are the norm not the exception. We can't just rely on Bad Bunny's masterful Super Bowl Performance to remind us that Puerto Rico, not unlike many places in the world, is woefully underprepared for the next disaster. The true audience of the book should be people in leadership positions of governments and institutions. However, clearly the leaders of the free world are not taking this message to heart. Neither are everyday people working to make ends. And so #momcivicduty and #paulworkspaigepreps

While it sounds negative to say, "There will always be disasters," a version of which I recently wrote in my application for another Mutter-Kind-Kur. The other side, "It's going to be ok" just isn't true. In disaster management, as in life, we're going for "less bad" after the unthinkable happens. This book isn't a downer. On the contrary, it's an interesting read from a perspective that we normally don't hear. Let me know if you give it a listen or read.

Book Report: How Not to Hate Your Husband After Kids

Germany isn't big on Valentine's Day which is great for me, because a crafting project would likely put me over the edge. Not just because I have the flu.

That's two break-through cases for me in four years for those keeping score at home.

But also, as the title of this book might suggest, PB^2  is a bit of a low point.  

Funny enough, I didn't start reading this book at the low point. Totally unrelated, things just devolved because AI. Nevertheless, I am very serious about the old "until death do us part". And so, I soldier on with some very practical encouragement from Jancee Dunn.  

The author does a much better job of putting to words the social phenomenon that I've been seeing play out around me. Women in my generation are bringing home the bacon and cooking it, so to speak. They've been told they can do anything, and so they are doing it. Heterosexual men, by and large, are a generation behind. They think as long as they are earning a paycheck whilst not being alcoholics nor beating their wives then they are nailing it. Meanwhile, heterosexual women everywhere are like, "Why don't I have a partner?"

Neither the book, nor I will go deep into how we got here as a society. But I will tell you what I'm doing to turn it around. I'm serious about teaching Crosby to cook. Here he is cooking chili for a dear friend who just had knee surgery. 

Here he is putting anything goes muffins in the oven. 

Generally we only cook during school breaks. However, there have been so many random school strikes recently, that apparently only our school participates in, that we've had some extra time on our hands. Crosby is very addicted motivated by video game time so he developed this very elaborate system to track his "payment".

I don't really know the hieroglyphics but the basic gist is he gets 10 minutes of playtime for:

- Picking up Carmen from preschool (He takes public transportation there and back. Stateside readers are crying tears of jealousy or anxiety.)

- "Babysitting" Hugo and Carmen. For example, he took Hugo sledding in Mauerpark for an hour.

- Writing down a recipe in his recipe book (I went on a little excursion to Dussmann to pick one out last fall break.) 

- Grocery shopping for the ingredients 

- Being a sous chef 

- Cooking all by himself (then he also gets 5 Euros)

He "hates" cooking. But, that's also part of being human - doing things you don't like not on an ideal schedule. While I've enjoyed the help, I think cooking has been a big confidence boost for him. The last couple weeks he's been helping me with our new Sunday tradition of "Park Soup." We load up an Insta-pot or two of soup, let it cook during church, and eat it at the park across from the Sunday School with whoever wants to join. Show me a 12 year-old who feeds 10-15 people on a Sunday:

Ok, that time I sent him out to the farmers market to buy ingredients for three seperate meals was physically too much to carry.

The littles are still in the sous chef territory. 

2 Kilos (4.5 pounds) Brussel sprouts prepped for Thanksgiving. Check.

This year, the three will be responsible for Christmas Eve dinner. The old Beckley family tradition is waffles with strawberries and whipped cream and a side of bacon or sausate. The new tradition is that Christmas is not brought to you by mom anymore. Crosby learned how to make an advent wreath at the florist by our house. 

And there will be multiple practice rounds between now and then.

Because as I was recently reminded at Berlin Projekt's Pop-Up Prayer room, I'm not loosing hope that this year (which starts in March) will be different.

"Behold, I make all things new."

Keep striving my heterosexual lady friends. And gay friends - thanks for blazing the trail to better gender equity. Love you all.