Kohler Family Retreat

Anna got to enjoy not only her grandparents but her uncles and cousin Aidyn at the first Kohler family retreat in lovely, snow-covered Deep Creek Lake Maryland. This trip was the result of a Christmas gift from Theresa and her brothers to their parents (Grandma said all she wanted was for "everyone to be together." She got her wish). As with any Kohler gathering, there is a bit of unintended adventure along the way.

First, it should be noted that Deep Creek Lake is in the mountains of Western Maryland which also experienced historic snowfall this year. Grandma and Grandpa are weather channel groupies (some might say obsessed) and were worried for the past two months about the weather. The rest of the family was planning to ski and hoping the snow would last. In the end, all sides had their hopes/fears realized when Grandma and Grandpa, along with Uncle Tim and Aidyn, showed up only to find the rental house inaccessible due to an unplowed, steep driveway. While Grandma became convinced that death was imminent and they would plunge off the side of the mountain, Tim managed to maneuver the vehicle down and back to the rental office. The end result was an upgrade to a "ski in ski out" brand new 5 bedroom house with a gourmet kitchen and hot tub. Very nice.

The rest of the family arrived later Friday night. Anna was quite excited about "Grandma's new house that she built." She is still no entirely clear on who's house it was and thinks that Grandma and Grandpa have two houses. Grandma and Grandpa enjoyed their luxury master suite, which included a high bed that required a run, jump, and roll manuever so that Grandma could get in. Anna slept on the futon in Grandma's sitting room, at least until she was awaken by Grandpa's snoring.

The first morning, everyone awoke to a beautiful day with the smell of bacon.....and the fire alarm. Actually, every room had a fire alarm which included a woman's voice saying "fire...leave the house immediately." Grandma is notorious for testing fire alarms. Anna ran over to Grandma and exclaimed "Grandma, the lady says there is a fire." Thanks to the high ceilings, no one could actually access the fire alarms, so we had to wait for the smoke to clear. Breakfast was served.

Anna and Aidyn had a great time playing together all weekend. How often do you get to play with Grandma and Grandpa AND someone close to your age? They played with trains, balloons, crayons, books, flashlights, and just ran around the house. Each morning as soon as Aidyn got up, Anna ran down to join him. Aidyn kept trying to give Anna a hug, especially when she had a soft shirt on. In between playing with the grandkids, Grandpa found things to fix in the house and shoveled some snow (he is not very good at vacationing and would be a real asset to Habitat for Humanity).

Anna also got to go iceskating for the first time. She was not very happy when she had to take the skates back and insisted that she needs to go to the "money store" so that she can get some money to buy some purple skates. Mom and Dad are talking to her about getting a job.

Joe served as a ski instructor for Uncle Rod and Uncle Tim who went skiing for the first time. This was a great source of amusement for Theresa. Tim picked it up quickly and was willing to try the easy slope. Rod spent two profanity-laden hours on the bunny slope before being cajoled/bullied into going down (major kudos to his girlfriend, Courtney for sticking with him during his very unpleasant hours). By day two, they were both skiing. Rod and Courtney managed to get their skiis tangled up while getting on the ski lift, resulting in falling face first in the snow and the shutdown of the lift, but otherwise it was a good outing.

The weather was great and a good time was had by all. Who knows....maybe there will be another retreat someday. Grandma is hoping it will NOT be on a snow covered mountain.