Superheroes, Snowcoaches and Snowmobiles

 We had another crazy week and weekend with lots of friends and fun.  I had plans a few nights this week but judging by the photos in my photo stream, they had a great time with Daddy:

The weekend started out with a friends Superhero/princess party.  

 Where Matthew got some pop rocks which he found intriguing:

 Then on Sunday we got out early and headed down to West Yellowstone.  As part of a kids program they were offering free snowcoach rides.  It was a gorgeous morning as we left:

 And a gorgeous day in West Yellowstone, though much colder than our adventure last weekend.  I've been pseudo-planning a bigger winter trip into Yellowstone so we can ski around Old Faithful and the geyser basins, but it requires snowcoach travel so I thought this would be a good chance to see how feasible it was for taking the kids on a trip.  Catherine had a good time:

 While Matthew bounced around in the back seat with some of his friends.  The kids got to ride without seatbelts or carseats which they thought was awesome.  The trip was just a sampler and truthfully, I'm not certain how well James and I would do on a longer trip.  We were seated at the back of the coach and it felt like we were fishtailing and whipping back and forth the entire time.  We went about 7 miles in along the Madison River and saw lots of bison and elk:

Afterwards they had snowmobile rides around the Visitor Center parking lot.  It was perfect timing because as we headed down we saw quite a few snowmobiles and he noted "when I get bigger I will ride one of those."  

 Even though the event was billed as for 6 year olds and up, the guys running it were really good.  They kept wanting to get Catherine on one, but we settled for just having her sit on one.  Maybe next year we'll see her roaming around the track:

Matthew idolizes our 9 year old neighbor so as she climbed the 15 foot snowpile, Matthew tried to follow her.  My shy, cautious boy is slowly becoming an adrenaline junkie!

After a quick picnic lunch we went for a short cross-country ski trip.  Of course Ellie and Boo had to join us:

 We skiied in the park and were hoping to make it down to the Madison River but just after James and I switched hauling the kids we had run out of time and needed to be heading back to town for Superbowl.  This is James making his 30-point turn to turn around.

 And back on the trail:

 Being pulled by daddy is apparently hard work!

 Every time we head to Big Sky or West Yellowstone I'm on the lookout for bighorn sheep.  There are standard signs warning about them throughout the canyon and two seasonal signs warning about animals on the roadway but I've never seen them, until this weekend.

 Someone slept through all the excitement.

We made it home at about 3:15pm which was good because we had company coming for the Superbowl at 4pm.  We had a great time with good food, friends and a house full of a dozen kids and just a few more adults to maintain some semblance of sanity!