Recovering from Too much Culture

Mountain Biking in OrangeCounty

This is all the culture I need

These shots were taken on a trail called Mathis.

This picture isn't very exciting, sorry

This is a fun little lip that will allow for a little air as you jam down the hill.

Now this is culture!

Becoming more refined...

This past week we attended TWO cultural events... I think that may be the most Ryan has ever atteneded in one year! It was great! Orange County has a great performing arts center with two facilities. One is for shows and broadway type events, the other is brand new and is for musical events. We actually went to both halls this week! First we went to see the new OC Southern California Mormon Choir performance.

This is a new choir started by two brothers who are extremely musically inclined. They had try-outs through out all of southern California to get members for their choirs - the adult choir, high school age choir, youth choir, chidrens choir and sunbeems choir - plus the orchestra! It was great to see so many people displaying their talents and working to improve them. The music was all Christmas music, and it was really fun to see friends performing in such an amazing place!

Last night we went to see the Radio City Rockettes from New York! It was also a Christmas show and we really enjoyed it! There were about 12 dancing/singing numbers. The Rockettes only danced, but they had another singing and dancing group who would perform in between the Rockettes numbers to give them a chance to change outfits and get ready for the next number.

I told Ryan several weeks ago that I wanted to go see the Rockettes. He had no idea what they were but agreed to purchase the tickets. When we were at the choir performance earlier in the week he saw this picture. He said, "those girls aren't wearing any pants!" I said, "Those are the Rockettes. That is who we are going to see." He got a big smile on his face, and said, "I love you!" What a guy... Well, regardless, the show was pretty amazing, and Ryan's favorite number, ironically, was the one where the girls were wearing pants! It was really fun and now we are totally refined and enjoy attending cultural events. The next is phantom! Coming in March! YIPPEE!

Big BEAR!

We are so behind in our posts, but still wanted to post our adventures! We went to Big Bear for our 2nd anniversay, back in November. We rented a house/cabin, that was big enough for 10 people... There were 3 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms. There was a large family room and kitchen, along with a hot tub on the back yard deck, with a BBQ! We really had a great time!

This is the house. It was right at the base of snow summitt and big bear mountain. There was no snow but the weather was nice and cool. Before we got up to Big Bear we stopped at Tiff and Eric's new place in Redlands! We are so happy they are living closer to us! We still wish we saw them more though... They live in a very cute apartment and I think they like the new adventure. We also stopped through Running Springs to see Ryan's Aunt. This was right after the big fires, and Runnings Springs got burned pretty good. Luckily Ryan's Aunt's house was safe.

Well, we took our bikes thinking we could mountain bike a little, but ALL the National Parks and trails were closed because of the fire hazzard. They didn't want any new fires to start. SO, we found other things to do...

We rode the Alpine Slide! It was so fun! We took the ski lift up the hill and then got these sleds. We each sat on our own sled and then rode down the mountain in these track things - that you can see behind our heads in the picture on the left. It was really fun! We rode twice, although we probably could have gone at least 10 more times and still gone some more!

We had such a fun time! We tried to race, but I think Ryan's weight made it unfair... He always went faster.

We took our bikes out on the bike path and rode around the Big Bear Lake. The water level was very low, but we just kept thinking how much fun this lake would be in the summer! This was our first adult visit to Big Bear for the both of us... Now, we want to go back! Here are a few more pic's of our trip. We had such a fun time. The hot tub back at the house was great! We sat in it every night and enjoyed looking at the stars. We had such a fun time, and can't wait to go back!