My brother-in-law, Tom (the one who writes the ultra funny Christmas letters) apparently has too much time on his hands. He has built the most amazing snow and ice slide in his front yard I have ever seen in Utah. I mean, it’s not like we have mountains of snow like Denver or Alaska. But he’s managed to scrounge and scavenge the extra snow from gutters and neighbors to build an awesome luge in his front yard in South Jordan. They were even on the news! Fox 13 news came out and ran a little story about their huge slide, and the sports guy even went down it (that clip ran on Monday night).
I’ve been trying to get my kids over there to slide, since it’s been so cold and the slide’s not been melting. Yesterday the temps rose above freezing (or rather, hovered around freezing), and I knew our time was running out. We had actually planned to go over there Monday night, but then with Jenna’s unfortunate accident, we haven’t really been going anywhere. So, last night, I bundled the kids up, Ryan came home a bit early from work to stay with Jenna, and I took 4 of the kids over to try out the slippery slopes.
I should have tried harder to get there earlier. When I pulled up, I saw Tom manning his spot as sled stabilizer, and about 15 kids in line on the steps of the slide. Yes, they have 8 kids of their own, but I only recognized about 4 of them, so the others must have been friends and neighbors. While we were there, their son’s 2nd grade teacher came by to slide, and more neighbors and friends. Tom must be out there every night supervising this thing!
It was AMAZING! It starts out right in front of their front porch, and you climb up the stair (made of ice) and see the lovely bas relief sculptures of a monster and Davy Jones. It’s a bit scary, since it’s about 8 or 9 feet up. You sit on a sled, and then Tom gives you a big push. I screamed the whole way. There’s a huge drop right at the first to give you speed, then you go grooving down the yard, bank left at the light pole, and then coast down the side walk almost to the neighbor’s driveway. We were there for only an hour, as their family had somewhere to go last night, and we couldn’t take up all their time, but the kids each did 12-15 runs. I went once, and John was too scared, but I did get him to just get on the sled and go on the flat part. If you live nearby, you should check it out. It’s a few blocks north of Jordan River Temple, right off of 1300 West on Palmer Park lane. I don’t know how much longer it will be up, though. Once you get on the news, then the city takes notice that you’ve got snow covering the sidewalk, and they give you a little warning notice telling you to clean it up or face a ticket. On the way home, my kids were SO excited to build our own snow slide (we’ve got the back yard for it, after all), and were planning and plotting (“If only we had a blizzard tonight and it dumped 3 feet of snow, then we could build our own slide tomorrow!”) and hoping, but alas, alack, we have only a few little clumps of snow–not even enough for a 1/2 decent snowman.
I am so jeolous! That is really amazing!
this is awesome! as one who is actually privy to all the feet of snow and woulnd’t have to go far to make our own luge i feel ashamed. too cool.