Get a Special Deal on Skiing! (Tomorrow)

It’s that time of year again! No, we’re not talking about the winter holidays. We’re talking about winter recreation, here in New Mexico.

Outsiders might know us for our warm climate, but one of the most fun things you can do around here during the winter months is go skiing at Sipapu Ski & Summer Resort. Their facilities are phenomenal. It’s also New Mexico’s fastest growing resort and home to the state’s longest ski season. There’s also lodging, a ski shop, a ski school, and of course, great food and drinks.

And of course, there’s the slopes:

Mountain Statistics

Peak Elevation:	9,255 ft.
Base Elevation:	8,200 ft.
Vertical Drop:	1,055 ft.
Skiable Acreage:	200 acres
Average Annual Snowfall:	190 inches
Longest Ski Season in NM:	Nov-April
Named Trails:	41
Terrain Parks:	3
Lifts:	5
Platter Lifts:	2
Beginner Trails:	20%
Intermediate Trails:	40%
Advanced Trails:	25%
Expert Trails:	15%

If you’re looking to hit the slopes this winter, there’s a deal for you that is redeemable TOMORROW only, for discounted season tickets. Stop by Albuquerque REI tomorrow:

Albuquerque REI Store

1550 Mercantile Ave NE

Albuquerque, NM 87107

(505) 247-1191

Sipapu Ski and Summer Resort will be offering discounted Sipapu season passes, available exclusively at REI this one day only. Premium passes include 27 free lift tickets at Angel Fire, Red River, Pajarito, Ski Apache, Monarch, Ski Cooper, Sunlight, Kendall Mountain and Brian Head!

Click here for more details on this great special!

Learning Spanish Through Game

Hispanic culture is one of the most defining aspects of living in New Mexico. But that doesn’t mean all residents know how to speak Spanish. Sure, one can certainly get by in the city without knowing Spanish but it’s always nice to be able to answer a neighbor—or a stranger—when they speak to you in their native language.

For those who grew up in an English-speaking household in Albuquerque, there are lots of options for learning Spanish, but perhaps the coolest way we’ve heard of so far is a new board game designed to teach the players the language.

SpanishSmart has launched a Kickstarter to produce this fun, innovative game—you can donate to their project on their Kickstarter page. Using local knowledge of New Mexico, the game is designed for beginners who have never learned Spanish. Here’s some more info on the game, called  ¡Viajemos por Nuevo México!:

¡Viajemos por Nuevo México!  (Let's Travel through New Mexico!) is a board game for kids 12+ and adults.  The game takes place in familiar surroundings in New Mexico, where many of you live or have visited. Even if your level is just beginner you will be able to play because the game is designed in such a way that intuitively you will figure out what most words mean.  While you are playing, you prove your knowledge of the state and improve the state of your Spanish!
 Players compete and try to be the first to arrive in the state's capital and win the game.  In the process they will encounter places where they must decide what to do in order to arrive in the state's capital faster. You can play in teams or individually.  Soon you will discover that you can use your knowledge of the state or your knowledge of Spanish to gain an advantage. Without any memorization or boring drills you will improve your Spanish one state at a time!

Serve Holiday Guests in Style

As the holidays approach, you’re probably starting to throw around ideas to make your apartment more hospitable for guests. If you’re throwing a holiday part of any kind this season, a bar cart can really take things to the next level - and it doesn’t necessarily even have to break the bank!

Primer Magazine had a great article last week guiding us through a cheap, beautiful DIY bar cart for serving holiday beverages to your guests. There are even options for customization:

There are actually three options for this project. The two shelf version shown here ($37 full price), a three shelf option ($50 full price), or two shelf with a drawer ($75 full price). Depending on how much stuff you have and how much you want to spend, you may find one of these other options suits you better. 

 This is one of the easiest DIY projects to date on Primer. We’re adding a stained wood liner to the shelves to class it up a bit, but other than that, we’re just assembling the cart as usual. 

 There are a few additions you can make as well. I used ‘s’ hooks on the handle to hold a lime press and bottle opener, and you could get a wine rack to hang underneath the shelf from Amazon for a few bucks. (If you do that, I would recommend installing it before putting the wood liner in.) You could also install a wall-mounted bottle opener to the side. The handle is a good place to hang a bar towel. 

Click here to read Primer Magazine’s complete guide!

ABQ’s Best Places to Work

Albuquerque was recently ranked the second happiest mid-size city in the U.S. by CareerBliss, and one of the main reasons for that is because locals, by and large, love their jobs.

More recently, Albuquerque Business First released its list of “Best Places to Work” finalists for the area. In partnership with Quantum Workplace, a survey was administered to about 175 local companies, and 10 small companies, 10 medium companies, and 10 large companies were chosen. Albuquerque Business First will recognize all the honorees and reveal their rankings at our Best Places to Work awards luncheon Dec. 13.

Here are some of the finalists:

Small Company (10-15 Employees) 

Charles Stephen and Company, Inc. 

Closedwon 

Document Technologies 

D.R.B. Electric, Inc. 

Excel Staffing Companies 

Griffin & Associates 

HB Construction 

Home Instead Senior Care 

 Medium Company (26-150 Employees) 

ACC Health 

Brown & Brown of New Mexico Inc. 

Encompass Home Health 

Flow Science, Inc. 

MARPAC Inc. 

Moss Adams LLP 

New Mexico Health Connections 

SDV Construction, Inc. 

Stewart Title of Albuquerque, LLC 

Turtle Mountain Brewing Company  

Large Company (151 Employees or More) 

Bank of Albuquerque 

Defined Fitness 

First Financial Credit Union 

Los Alamos National Bank 

Lovelace Westside Hospital 

Molina Healthcare of New Mexico 

Santa Ana Star Casino 

Sprint 

To Be a Blessing Health Care Services

To read full coverage of the #BestPlacesToWork contest, click here.