Weekly Newsletter: December 4th-10th, 2023

This was a festive week! 🎄 🎅 First, we checked out a beautifully lit, enormous tree on our way to see Elf the Musical. Then, we baked a bunch of Christmas cookies to help keep us fueled for our epic powder days at Snowbird Ski Resort.

Check out our new posts and videos 🆕 🎥 📝

Two-Week Road Trip Through Oregon with Friends: Part 3

We continued our trip from the Oregon coast inland to Crater Lake National Park. This is part 3 of the multi-part series.

Keith and LindseyLindsey Huster

Elf the Musical 🧝 🎵

A highlight of this week was seeing Elf the Musical at the Hale Centre Theatre in Sandy, UT. 2023 marks the 20th anniversary of Will Ferrel's classic movie, Elf. So, earlier in the week, we made it a point to rewatch this classic film so that we would be prepared to fully experience the live-action performance. There are so many great parts and one-liners in this movie! 🤣

Elf the Musical was an amazing experience! Everything from the actors to the costumes and the set design was on point. We were amazed at all of the engineering required to bring the many scenes to life throughout the musical. There were times when entire sets were raised from below, slid out from underneath the audience, and even lowered from the ceiling.

Draper Tree of Life 🌳 🎄

We quickly stopped at the Tree of Life located in Draper, UT on our way to see Elf the Musical. The tree is located near the center of Draper City Park. We can't even imagine how long it must have taken to fully light this tree! 🤯 Nearly every branch of the tree is covered in warm-white LED bulbs. Larger flashing bulbs are sprinkled throughout to give the tree a sense of a "heartbeat."

Christmas cookie bake 🎅 🍪

Lindsey's family has a Christmas tradition of hosting a family cookie bake each year. Since we are unable to attend, we decided to have our own cookie bake to feel more like we are still part of this family tradition. Lindsey took the lead in picking out the recipes and deciding which cookies we would be making. She picked an assortment of healthy(ish) and not-so-healthy cookies for us to enjoy.

Lindsey started the festivities by making some snowmen out of pretzels and chocolate. They were delicious but they didn't necessarily look like snowmen. Some of Lindsey's family referred to them as "ghosts" or "cowboys." 🤣 Keith then worked on a batch of healthy(ish) paleo lemon bars. The lemon bars were delicious even if they didn't have the traditional lemon custard topping.

Next up, Lindsey began working on some gingerbread men. These are a staple of Christmas cookies so of course we had to make some. The initial batch was a little rough due to the dough being rolled out too thin. However, the second batch turned out just right and they were delicious! Along with the gingerbread men, Lindsey made some beautiful iced sugar cookies. Not only did they look amazing, but they were also our favorite cookie from the cookie bake.

Epic powder days at Snowbird ⛷️ 🏔️

Even though Utah is getting a slow start to the ski season, we have been blessed by back-to-back weekends of deep powder at Snowbird. The skiing has been incredible even with the limited terrain available right now. I can't recall the last time we were able to ski in 2+ feet (0.6 meters) of powder this early in a ski season since moving to Utah.

While we were skiing, Snowbird announced through the Snowbird app that they had opened Peruvian Gulch. However, the only way for us to quickly access that side of the mountain was to hike up from the top of the Little Cloud lift. This meant that we would need to hike up over 100 vertical feet (30 vertical meters) while carrying our skis and gear. This was Lindsey's first experience ski-hiking and she said that it would be her last. 🥵 👎 Let's just say that this hike kicked Lindsey's butt... she crashed out hard when we got home. 😴

The opening of Peruvian Gulch now brings us up to two of the three major resort areas being open; Gad Valley, Peruvian Gulch, and Mineral Basin. There are still large sections of Gad Valley (e.g. the terrain accessible from the Gad 2 lift) and Peruvian Gulch (e.g. Snowbird's famous Cirque) that will hopefully open sometime soon. 🤞

Tour Divide training update 🚵‍♂️ 🌙

This week gave Keith a chance to experience what it would be like to take on a long-distance ride after two back-to-back days of skiing. This was a great training experience for the Tour Divide since he will need to ride long distances after many consecutive physically strenuous days.

Keith started the week with his usual midweek efforts on Zwift. He took on one of the Zwift Climb Portals at the new 125% difficulty (i.e. expert) level. This boost in difficulty should help Keith to be prepared for the difficult climbs along the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route.

These efforts were followed by two consecutive days of skiing at Snowbird on Saturday and Sunday. Shortly after returning home from skiing on Sunday, Keith went out for a 50+ mile (80+ kilometer) ride in the frigid cold! 🥶 🤪

In total this week, Keith rode a little over 124 miles (200 kilometers) with over 4,300 feet (1,310 meters) of climbing. Not too bad for a busy workweek and two days of skiing.

Upcoming posts and videos 👷‍ 👷‍♀️️

We have several exciting plans for the remainder of the year that we can't wait to share with you. We are also slowly working on some of the promised blog posts. We will get those out as soon as possible.

We will be making a limited number of ski videos this year. We have decided to take a step back from focusing on YouTube content and instead put more energy into our blog. Stay tuned for our first skiing video of the year! It is almost ready to be shared with all of you. ⛷️ 🚠

We hope that you are enjoying our newsletters. Do you have any big plans for the upcoming holiday season? Let us know in the comments section below.👇 💬