I took this picture during Memorial Day weekend in 2011. We were visiting the Chattanooga National Cemetery as part of our Civil War study. Andrew’s Raiders are buried here.

As Clark and Cole were playing out in this field I asked them both to turn and look at the flag. Clark saw the flag flying low in remembrance and immediately struck this pose without prompting.

Today, we remember.

During the first week of May we visited the Lincoln Home National Historic Site in Springfield, IL to see the commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the funeral procession just as it proceeded through Springfield and past Lincoln’s home in the center of town.

As I write this post, I am watching one of the very rare “heavy” snows that we get in Middle Tennessee. And heavy snow means something slightly different to the folks north of TN. The WISH Team recently enjoyed a first-time experience in the snow.

As part of our celebration of Christmas each year, we give the kids the gift of an experience. For Christmas 2014, we gave the kids a day of skiing and earlier this week they redeemed that gift.

I didn’t think too much about learning to ski until our instructor began to show us how to lock into our skis. As soon as I stood up in the boots which were now locked into the skis, I realized how awkward it was to move around on skis.

Thankfully, we had a very patient instructor and it wasn’t long before we were beginning to move on the skis in a way that somewhat resembled what I would refer to as skiing.

Clark was almost immediately comfortable with the whole process and even received some complements from the instructor. Of course, he used that as an opportunity to challenge his Dad. He’s only 10 years old, but someone has already taught him how to goad his competition. On this day, he saw me as his competition and before we had even made our first run down the tiny trainer hill, he was challenging me to a race. I didn’t want him to know it but I was thinking, “Race? I can hardly move!” Thankfully, we were soon able to move (a little) thanks to experienced instructors.

Chloe, Anna and Cole were eager to really get moving and decided to head over to the tubing lanes and see what all the fuss was about. Clark and I decided to take a step up and try out the Broadway which was the next step up from the little trainer hill that had already bruised my tail.

The reaction from Chloe and Cole at the tubing lanes was fast and furious. Wow! We don’t see Anna’s reaction in this picture but I can attest from the texts she sent me while Clark and I were skiing that she too would rate it a Wow!

Cole was especially excited with tubing as he had not had much fun on the skis. The snow tubing lanes are long, steep and fast and Anna, Chloe and Cole enjoyed quite a few runs before Clark and I joined them.

While the other three were getting their slide on, Clark and I were becoming expert skiers. At least as long as “expert” means we maintained our balance as we experienced a controlled fall down a long slick hill. I was impressed with how closely Clark listened and learned during the instruction period. He made good corrections based on what he was told and improved quickly both in confidence and demonstrated ability.

It took me a little longer to process the instruction from my head to my feet but I too eventually began to understand the types of corrections and slight foot movements that were necessary to remain upright, stop and turn to the left and right. The turning became very important as we made our way down our first real hill because another lane of more experienced skiers crossed our beginner hill and it was important to avoid those faster skiers if they crossed as we were zooming down.

Here are a few more pics from our day: