A Man of Grace

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Yesterday was my guy’s 30th birthday. Leading up to his day, Luke told me repeatedly that he didn’t want a party or special trip, but that spending the day skiing with me was what he wanted to do.

I felt like I probably should have made a grander effort to celebrate his birthday beyond just a normal day skiing together, but between my crazy work schedule, recent travel, hosting Thanksgiving and helping my sister prepare for the birth of her first child, I just didn’t have time to plan anything.

Well yesterday,  we drove to Heavenly for our “special” day of skiing together. It was going to be even better because Luke’s brother and sister were already up there getting a lesson. When we got to the front of the line and had our passes scanned, we were told by the ticket scanner  “all employees and dependants are restricted from skiing today because of holiday crowds.”

I couldn’t believe it. I totally knew about this restriction, but for whatever reason had convinced myself it ended on Saturday. With everything going on the past week I totally spaced on double checking if we were in fact allowed to ski or not.

Luke was clearly disapointed and I felt just terrible.

After lugging our stuff all the way back to the car, we headed home. Sitting in the passenger seat, I thought about everything Luke must have felt right then. “It’s my 30th birthday and all I wanted to do was ski. Why didn’t she plan this better? Now my birthday is ruined. Am I not important to her?”

I put so much pressure on myself to give 100% to so many things – work, holidays, family – that I ended up letting down the one person who should come above everything else in my life.

My eyes welled up with tears and right when I expected Luke to say he was angry, he took my hand and said “It’s okay babe. It’s nothing to be upset about. We’ll have plenty of time to ski together. You’ve taken on a lot lately and I’m really proud of how you’ve handled it all. Don’t worry about today at all.”

He held my hand the rest of the 45 minute drive home reassured me until me tears were dry.

In that moment, I felt incredibly blessed to be able to love this man for the rest of my life.

Happy birthday Luke. You are the most important person in my life and I cherish our love above all else. Thank you for all the times you lift me up. I love you forever and always.

I’m Back! What’s Been Happening?

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Hello dear friends. I am sorry I was away so long. The past few weeks have been a frenzy of working 24/7 to get Heavenly Mountain Resort open, traveling to Chicago for a conference, traveling to San Francisco for meetings and now hosting my in-laws for Thanksgiving.

But it’s all slowing down, and for that I’m thankful.

Right now I’m sitting in Tamarack Lodge at the top of Heavenly waiting for our big apres ski event to kick off. I could definitely think of worse places to write a blog post. Here’s a photo I snapped on my way up the Gondola.

While I was on my little break, I thought of you guys. At first I thought “I might like this not blogging thing.” Afterall, it is quite a lot to keep up a personal blog on top of Heavenly’s blog. But I found I felt quite the opposite. As things happened I kept thinking “this would be a good blog post” and “I wonder what Batty readers would say about this?”

I realized that this blog is very much apart of my life now. And then I felt warm and fuzzy. :)

So here’s a quick update on what’s been going on:

– I became a godmother! My best friend Julia gave birth to a precious baby boy named Liam. And I’m lucky enough to be his God mother. Such an honor.

– I’m about to become an aunt! My sister is due to give birth to a baby girl any moment. I can’t wait to meet the little angel.

– Luke turns 30 on Sunday! I’m making him an orange, chocolate cheesecake and his family is here to celebrate. Man I love that guy.

– Heavenly now has 64,000+ Facebook fans. My pet project. When I started last year we had 8,000.

– It looks like we’re going to get our house! The first bank accepted our offer and we’re just waiting on the other one. We could move in by Christmas.

– I have become obsessed with looking at home decor. We own nothing but our bed and have to furnish a three bedroom home soon. Send me home decor and furniture links please.

– We’re hosting our first Thanksgiving tomorrow. I had to work on Thursday, so Saturday it is. Wish us luck.

– I bowled five strikes in a row. But our team is still in last place in our bowling league. This is apparently a VERY competitive league.

– We had our first powder day. It felt soooo good to be out there again.

That’s about it. What’s new with you? How was Thanksgiving?

 

Win Some Heavenly Prizes

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One of the things keeping me so busy at work is the launch of a Facebook campaign we’re doing on Heavenly’s page. It’s called “Accessorize Your Season” and includes 120 prizes from some of our partners.

All friends (sorry, no family) can and should enter! We’re picking 10 winners a day. You can enter here. The prizes include

– 30 $250 Maui Jim gift cards
– 30 $100 Helly Hansen gift cards
– 30 Smart Wool socks
– 30 Oakley sunglasses

I just notified someone that they won a $250 Maui Jim gift card and this is the response I got back:

WOW!! :) Thank you so so much! This just made my day!! I can’t wait to come to Heavenly this winter! :) I’ve Had my Tahoe Value Pass the entire summer just waiting for the snow to come in :D !! .. A good date to receive a prize too :) – Birthday on December 9th !! ahhhh :D .. SO STOKED!

THANK YOU!!!!! I really wasn’t expecting this :)

Chalk it up to another thing I love about my job…

It’s Almost Time!

Posted in Liz's Life by

I friends. Sorry I’ve been so MIA lately. I’ve been thinking about you guys. Feeling guilty about being so neglectful.

We’re in crunch mode getting the resort ready for the start of ski season – November 18. I’ve literally been running around like a crazy person all day at work and then am so mentally exhausted when I get home that I can’t bring myself to look at a computer.

Bear with me a couple weeks until we get things up and running and until I get some ski turns in to spark some oompf into my soul. I promise I’ll come back to you renewed with lots of stories to tell.