Dad's Skis

There was not a great deal of interest in skiing when I was a youngster as there were no commercial ski hills. We were fortunate to have a creative father who surprised us one winter. Flour used to come in bags of various sizes but sometimes flour came in barrels. These barrels were made of thin hardwood and stood about four and a half feet tall.

Dad has a work bench in our garage and for a period of time he made it out of bounds for we children. We never questioned this as Dad had special projects before and we knew he was up to something but we never knew what. After about a week of this secret project he promised to tell us after church on Sunday. We arrived home to have our Sunday meal but were anxious to see his surprise.

After dinner he told us all to get dressed warmly and come out. Mom was included and we were laughing to see her in slacks.When we came out he walked us to the garage and there was a pair of skis for each of us. Dad cut the hardwood staves to look like skis and sanded the bottoms to a smooth texture. He cut inner tubes to make foot holders and a strap on each to hold our feet in place.

We were so surprised and tried on our skis. There was a high hill down by the big pond and we all trudged off to try our new found toys. We must have looked funny as we made a small parade with Mom, Dad and 8 kids with skis over shoulder marching through the snow.

As we neared the hill we all ran to see who would be the first to mark the new fallen snow. As we stood at the top of the hill we decided that Mom would go first. She was embarrassed but was a good sport and placed her feet on the skis. Her feet flew up in the air and she fell backwards and the skis flew down the hill without Mom. We all laughed and scrambled to try to make it down to the bottom without falling.

What a day,others came and joined in and we shared our skis and everyone had a great adventure with barrel stave skis. Dad started something as other fathers were called upon to repeat his feat and make skis for their kids. For a while we were the barrel stave ski capitol of Cape Breton. This was not the only day that Dad surprised us but it was one of the best.

At supper that evening all the talk was about Mom's skiing ability and all the fun we had. This was one time when a big family really pays dividends.