Dirt Don't Hurt When You're in a Yurt

It's that time of year again!!!  Time for half of Golden to pack up our cars and sleeping bags and recongregate in the mountains for our annual Memorial Day weekend at the YMCA Snow Mountain Ranch yurt village. 

We engaged in many of the same activities as last year.  We hung out around the fire pit and, depending on age and time of day, sipped hot coffee, roasted s'mores, or toasted beers.  

We continued the tradition of family kickball.  This year's theme was "Spa Ball."  All adults had to wear spa/pedicure foam flip flops, the pitcher had to wear a pink, waffle-print robe, and the winning team got to paint the losing team's nails.  Surprisingly, the middle school boys were all-in on painting their nails.  However, they were notably less enthusiastic when they realized one of the middle school girls had knocked over the only bottle of nail polish remover...

We did summer tubing.  It was a lot colder this year, but the kids were still all-in for getting sprayed while sliding down a wet, turf covered hill.

The kids congregated in the pavilion for "candy bar bingo."  With full-size candy bars as the prize, you couldn't keep Jill away!

We did a bunch of other random, fun stuff, like kickball in the rec center, pizza parties on the pavillian, fishing excursions, and big buffet dinners in the convention room.

We also celebrated Jill's birthday!  She wasn't happy about her actual birthday occurring while we were at the yurts, so we kept it simple and promised her that she could have a better party once we got home.

Birthday girl!

Making a wish over her camping cake.

Mmm, camping cake is good.

Even though her real party would take place later, we still tried to make the day feel special.  Jill got to choose a couple of friends to come along to the candy store, where they stocked up as much sugar as they could possibly fit into their bags.

Then we had "breakfast for lunch" - which meant more syrup and sugar.

And then, the waitress gave her two sugary doughnuts as a special treat.  This girl sure is sweet!

We spent our final night at the yurts doing karaoke.  Everyone had fun with it, adults and kids alike.  There were some serenades, some dance routines, some rock'n'roll, and even some rapping.

Cheers to our annual yurt crew 2024!  Can't wait to do it again next year!