March 03, 2003
Ski Trip, Part III—Jonathan Meets Cousins and “Builds” a Snowman
On the evening of the day of his ski lesson, my cousin Carol and her family (husband Brian, kids Trevor (10), Maddie (8), and Nathan (7)) very kindly drove from their home in Idaho Falls to our condo in Park City to have dinner with us. I had never seen Carol with all three children, and Dale and I both were so pleasantly astonished at the evening—they were in our small condo for nearly four hours, after a long drive and skiing on the way, and everyone was perfectly behaved. With three kids so close in age, most families would have raised voices, fights over toys, tears over something, etc. But there wasn’t even a hint of it, and they were all very sweet to Jonathan. Particularly Trevor, for whom Jonathan developed a great attachment; the next day when they all went to lunch together, Jonathan held Trevor’s hand the whole time walking around the Main Street, and he even wanted Trevor to do a widdle with him (at which point Trevor finally balked, but according to Mom in the politest way possible, primarily with a look of faint panic in his eyes).
Now every day Jonathan wants to know when his cousins are going to come visit us in our house, or when we are going to visit them. Guess I shall have to check in to flights to Idaho Falls! Carol pegged Jonathan that evening, too, and predicted his future lies in commentating—he was so excited to have so many friends round the coffee table that he just kept observing what everyone was doing . . . “He’s drinking his milk. She just had a cracker. That’s my water.” 
By the time they left, around 10 p.m. (no hope of getting Jonathan off to bed before then, and it would have felt mean to even try), he was so tired that he just crawled up on the couch and watched everyone, eyes glued to his cousins. It was a wonderful evening, and I only wish it was easier to repeat! (For those who don’t know, it’s probably a 3-4 day drive between Austin and Idaho Falls.)
Dale and Andy also built a snowman for little Jonathan to put the finishing touches on (would have taken too long to do the whole thing with him), and Jonathan loved it. It was just his size! 
Photographer’s credit goes to Andy for the pictures I’ve included in my recent blog entries regarding our ski trip. Ta very much. (For those who must know, he got a Fuji S602 Zoom digital camera in the duty-free shop on the way here, and it is a very fine camera.)