The life of a Truckee Ski bunny!

Lora, Ruby and I left Sacramento on Saturday morning to head up to Truckee to visit with Jack and Vanessa Childress and their two girls. We had a blast! We went sledding, played a heap of board games, went hot tubbing, and even hit the slopes above Donner Lake.

The three of us above Donner Lake! No cannibalism occurred during the taking of this picture.

The weather couldn't have been better for our adventure. We ended up skiing up the ridge behind us in the lower picture and then skiing down the N face a little to the left just out of the picture. Ruby shredded it up. She slept most of the way uphill and then on the way down she was staring at me and even smiling. I'm not kidding! Each day with her is amazing and today was no exception. It was so special looking out over the lake from way up high on the Pacific Crest Trail with my little girl.

Just a normal family portrait... right?

I wish I could say we went to the hot tub after skiing like in the movies but we actually went the day before with the Childress family. The hot tub was a kid friendly, no chlorine, salt water, 97 degree affair. So no one freak out. Ruby loved it! We spent about 20-30 minutes soaking in the sun. The pictures tell the best story.

She is so adorable.

Mom and daughter enjoying some time together.

So I'm a bit behind with the blogging... Sorry

Just a few shots from the past 3 to 4 weeks.

Grandpa Jim and "Ruby the Winner".

Multi-tasking at its finest. She's asleep and I'm rocking on the X-Box!

Josh and Ruby at the park the other day. This is the perspective of a 3 week old at the park. AHHH, what a great place to take a nap.

Just a quick pic of a new board game. It's called Tikal and it's all about the glitz and glamor that a modern day Archaeologist faces as they pillage and plunder.

My Dad enjoying some friendly gaming and Cali brew.

More Ruby Shots

So a few months ago Lora and I decided that we would have two blogs, one for our "activities and one for our child. Well, forget that. If we did that no one would read our original blog and everyone would just migrate to the Ruby page. So we will continue to just use this address and put up blog posts of our lives... the three of us having fun.

Here are a few more photos of Ruby. We have been lucky to have my mom and dad in from Mississippi here helping out a bit. Thanks mom for the delicious food.


We played A LOT of boardgames over the past five days. The combination of holding my daughter and playing boardgames made my week.

A picture of Ruby's first beer run!

A few days ago we went over to Hunter and Lori's place for a barbecue and to socialize. Below are the shots of the kids. Pretty crazy! Can't wait to have Will, Donovan, and Grayson join in for a big group photo.

The 2 new babies, Josh and Ruby. Maybe these two will get hitched one day. Josh... you better wait until you're married or else.

Ruby Frances Robinson

So I have so much to talk about but boy am I tired. Ruby and Lora have come home from the hospital today. It's been 6 days! So the facts first:
1. Born at 10:08am on the 22nd of December.
2. 24hrs of labor with no epidural!
3. Cesarian Section required due to Ruby being "sunny side up".
4. 7lbs, 5ozs.
5. Jaundiced a bit
6. A full head of hair with blue eyes.
7. Cute as all hell!

Lora is doing really well. The hard part will be keeping her from doing too much too early. You guys will have to help me with this one. You all know Lora!

So I figured the best thing for me to do right now is talk less and show more pictures so here goes.

Ruby Roars!

Ruby getting a tan. We're thinking of piercing her nose too.

Go ahead and do it... you know you want to just kiss your screen right now.

Ok, so Lora is going to kill me but here's a shot before labor really kicked in and...

One not too long afterward. She continually amazes me.

No she's not retarded. I love this one.

Geaux Tigers! This one is for her two LSU uncles.

We had Christmas today on the 27th. Her Grandpa Jim and especially Grandma Pat went crazy after meeting Ruby for the first time. Ruby is only 6 days old but she already loves being spoiled by her grandparents.

Well, this is just the first of many pictures to come. Lora and I are so proud and can't wait for all of you to meet her. Stop by for a visit or just give us a call if you live far away.

Tim

Battery Life

OK, so sometimes do you guys feel like your nothing more than a rechargeable battery? I do. My energy levels were running low... very low last week and I needed a recharge. Problem was that it started raining and snowing this past weekend. It wasn't going to be enough rain to bring much water to the dry riverbeds and since there wasn't a base of snow to support the new snow I wasn't sure what to do. I called a friend living near Lake Tahoe and he suggested we just give the snow a chance.

So I left the house at 6:00am for the drive up to Truckee and Greg's home. So I have to say right now that Lora and I knew we were lucky to live in Salt Lake City, being so close to the mountains. I love California for many reasons but the driving times to go skiing are a bit much. For most of the trip it was dumping snow which meant 30mph on the freeway all the way to Lake Tahoe.

BUT IT WAS SO WORTH IT! After skinning up a mtn near the Mt. Rose ski area I quickly realized that California has snow... really good snow. It was white-out conditions, 14 degrees, and waist deep fluffy powder! Turns out we got lucky. Greg and I made three runs down a beautiful bowl making choking turns. Faceshot after faceshot were had by both of us. It was hard to smile because I was choking but at the bottom of each run we were beaming and high-fiving.

So now I'm home, batteries recharged, ready for what life brings us. Lora is doing well, but is in a lot of discomfort. We visited the doctor yesterday and she informed us that Lora was dilated to 2cm. The baby is sitting extremely low and will probably not drop any lower... that is until D-Day. We'll keep you posted.

Tim

Thanksgiving

My step-father Norman turned 70 the day before Thanksgiving, giving the family an excuse to all get together for the long-weekend. We haven't been together in one place for years. So it was great spending the weekend together in Weaverville.

The whole gang, minus my niece Kim who couldn't get off work.

We spent the weekend eating, playing games

and general horsing around.

Point Reyes Weekend

Lora has been staying in Berkley working out of a lab at UC Berkley. She has been staying with her sister and brother-in-law, Karen and Kevin. She's getting a lot done with her plant samples that she sent herself from Australia. Of course this means that she is in the Bay area and I'm still in Sacramento. So for this weekend we decided to go camping out at Point Reyes National Park. Lora spent some time in this area quite a few years back working at a research station on the coast, but I had never been out here.

Lora hiking down to the lighthouse at Pt. Reyes. You can really see how pregnant she is right now. 35+ weeks! Not far off now!

We loaded up the van and headed west for an evening of camping, using Gumby of course! Nothing really exciting but it was really great to just get away together and hang out. We cooked some dinner and watched a movie inside the cozy van.

Sunday had us hiking down to the lighthouse where we took a short hike. Lora is so strong. She gets winded a bit quicker but she doesn't seem to let the extra load slow her down.

Just a blurry photo of Gumby and the campspot in the redwoods.

Thanksgiving up in Weaverville with Shirley and Norm. Happy Birthday Norm! Then the following weekend down to Campbell to hang out with Jim and Pat. Busy upcoming two weeks.

We get back from Australia and there's been a population explosion with our family of friends! 9 new kiddies including the two preggos and one not pictured (William).

New Orleans, Shrimp Po-Boys, and Family

Lora, Frank and I drove down to New Orleans to see my grandparents. It was good to see them since we had not seen them in over two years. Papa Frank is 94 and seems to be doing well. Mama Cherry looks like her usual self with her red hair, albeit with a little hearing loss. We had lunch at a really nice Italian restaurant with plenty of yelling across the table.

We then went down to the French Quarter for a drink at Pat O'Briens out on the sunny patio. Ahhh, Nawlins'!


Here's a photo dad shot of Lora and I in the middle of Jackson Square. We debated the significance of the horse's two front feet being off the ground. It's supposed to symbolize that he died in battle... he didn't. Geeky stuff sorry.

I'm sick now with a cold so I'm trying to just relax and get healthy before work starts back up. Today for instance I relaxed by looking at breast pumps with my lovely wife and mother. Exciting stuff!

We are in Mississippi

Well, as hard as it is for me to admit I'm currently in Mississippi visiting with my family. Lora is here too of course. It's a Louisiana thing!

The most recent family photo.

Waiting to get seated outside the Jackson Crackerbarrel. A southern tradition.

It was absolutely fantastic to see my sister, Kimberly, and her two adorable girls. Both Lora and I missed them both a ton. Boy have they grown! It was also great to meet Mark for the first time.

John seems to be doing well. It's been two and a half years since I've seen my brother. He looks great. I'm not sure we'll be able to get a round of golf in this trip but hopefully in April when we return with our new addition.

Until the next post YA'LL BE GOOD NOW!

Two blog posts in the same day? What's up with Tim and Lora?

Lora and I went to Salt Lake City to see our friends Mike and Vicki get married... in an airplane hanger. With the multi-million dollar Lear Jet I felt like I was an extra in a rap video. This was the back-up plan in case of snow. Well, it snowed. The hanger actually worked really nice. Everyone had a great time. It was super fun getting to catch up with some old friends.


While we were there Nicole took some photos of Lora all pregnant and all. I know Sylvia has been hounding us to put some photos up on our blog. Well, here you go Sylvia.


Doesn't she look great? Nicole and Paul are great photographers too. You can check out their websites at the following sites.

http://www.nicolemorgenthau.com/
http://www.richerimages.com/main.php