 Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Yep, definitely know that feeling!!! We should in fact NOT be paying for a holiday but the deposit on our honeymoon (skiing in canada though so that's always going to be happening whether or not a loan may be involved!!!) along with paying for our wedding next January. Whoops!
Last second deal for us this year in the hope we'll get something slightly cheaper. 
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Well I'd definitely give up everything but a simple, family-style DIY wedding. In our case we give up all other "paid for" holidays, we have one car which has done over 100K miles and is going to have to do a lot more, and we take in a lodger to pay for our apartment in France. My kitchen is at least 24 years old (no idea really, it was in the house when we bought it 18 years ago and needed replacing then). The carpets aren't that old but could do with replacing all the same! When the kids were younger and I was working we had quite a few weeks ski holidays but they were always "the" holiday of the year.
Now we can spend a lot of time in the mountains, winter, spring, summer and autumn. 
It's not just skiing (as we get older we ski less long and hard) but the mountains. So much more important than a shiny new kitchen or car. Or frying on a beach with farsands of others.
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Off now on the first lift; the sun is shining and the snow is gigantic.....
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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At the moment I'm giving up a lot of non-mountainous places, notably numerous European cities, which I'd like to visit. And there are various home improvements which I too would undertake, but which aren't really essential. I doubt that I'd forego anything 'essential', whatever that may mean.
Have a nice ski, pam w!
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Mrs Higs tells me it's one ski holiday a year from now on until we get the bathroom sorted out.
In her defence, she enjoys the skiing every bit as much as me and the bathroom is a complete state.
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Higs, keep the bathroom and change the Mrs
I think pam w may be taken but that's the sort you want
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Before skiing I used to do several Autumn/Winter/Spring city weekends and perhaps a Winter week in the sun. No more, all my holidays (days and money) now goes on skiing.
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I have pretty much no social life and no other holidays just so that I can save up the money I need to go skiing. Not to mention two, sometimes three jobs. Worth every penny of course.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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prob should put the money towards something more sensible like a new car fund.
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It's not a huge sacrifice for me because cars don't interest me that much but one of the luxuries that I do not indulge in is new cars to afford more skiing. I buy second hand and keep them untill they fail (Which with my maintenance skills is not exactly forever)
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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queen bodecia,
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I have pretty much no social life...so that I can save up the money I need to go skiing.
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That, for me, would be a step way too far. Skiing for two weeks, or so, a year instead of a social life for the rest of the year? I don't think so.
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We gave up work (hurrah) and therefore money (boo), all holidays, toys and gadgets. OK, still got the motorbikes. We gave up electricity - although we finally should get a grid connection next month after two years of relying on solar and 2 gennies. Two years without meals out or expensive food in. No coke, crisps, chocolate unless we have saved enough money at the end of the month. We spend 94 cents a litre on wine. As a bookshop manager I had a serious book buying habbit but haven't bought a book for over two years. We would still have our 12 year old car, except we wrote it off in a blizzard whilst moving to France. Fortunately we'd only managed half a mile of the 800 and could walk back!
So huge sacrifices and our families think (rightly) that we are mad but it is so worth it.
We ski whenever we like from home and all our friends from the UK come and visit us (OK visit the mountains). And we have nearly finished building our own house, which is an amazing sense of achievement. This year tile the salon/sejour and finish decorating.
Not sure what we'll do if we decide we don't like skiing anymore...
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You know it makes sense.
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Pedantica, agreed, it is important to have some sort of social life for the remaining 50 weeks of the year. A social life doesn't need to be expensive.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Stella, Wow, good on you... and good luck to you. That's impressive!
Hells Bells, Pedantica, Agreed. My social life doesn't cost me much at all and I certainly wouldn't give it up for just a week or two's skiing per year. How miserable would I be for the other 50 weeks?
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Poster: A snowHead
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Personally, I don't know what I'd give up because I don't really know what I have to give up!
I couldn't give up the money spent on photography - that's a major thing for me, as it's my main hobby and part of my job - and I can stick with the two cars we have, which aren't new (Y-reg SEAT Arosa and 54-reg Volvo S60). The house is pretty fresh anyway and if anything needs doing, it's a lick of paint. I'll fit a new kitchen this ear but it'll be cheap (but nice) from IKEA and I'll do the majority of the work myself.
We have a summer holiday these days because of the nipper; before kids that would have been a second ski holiday, probably in March/April. When he's older then we'll suss out whether he prefers summer to winter hold.... just have to get him on planks first to gauge his reaction.
Social life is very low-key; we don't go out at all to pubs and restaurants - we have the odd sunday lunch out with friends but most of the time we all head round someone's house with a few beers and some snacks, or someone cooks a big meal. Cheap and simple.
Kids definitely help curb your social life as in going to the pub and doing a load of money. I used to love the pub three or four nights a week but now I'm much happier at home, relaxing and doing my photography.
I'd love to jack it all in and live in the mountains but maybe that's something I can do when the nipper has flown the nest....
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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My social life costs me very little - I think for many younger people it means going out drinking and clubbing which costs a fortune. If I am cooking a meal, I can cook a bit more for friends or family, and they don't seem to find it a strain to reciprocate! Drinks are very cheap at our sailing club, not that we drink v much there. We visit friends who don't live nearby, so that's a bit of fuel cost, but we would always eat in when we get there. There are loads and loads of social opportunities which cost very little - I don't have time to indulge in them all. For example there's a nice low key group of women from the sailing club that do some cycling trips which would be within my (limited) capacity but so far I've never managed to get to a ride because they are mostly in winter (the group is one that sails together in the summer) when we are skiing! A favourite outing for me and the OH is ride down to Hayling Beach, have a cheese and ham sarnie and a flask of coffee watching the windsurfers, and ride back. OK, the bikes cost money in the first place, but the marginal cost is zilch. Hardly a wild social life but suits us fine. One thing I'd do a lot more often if money were no object is go to the theatre in Chichester; that's pricey, and an occasional treat.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Right now... Everything.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Well I have two jobs and friends who I visit, so it's not like I don't ever spend time with other people. I just hardly ever go out spending money such as dining out, pubs, etc. Maybe once every 2 or 3 months. I know plenty of people who go out every week but it's far more important for me to save for my ski trips.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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pam w, hmm, interesting one. I'm fortunate not to have to choose between the concertizing/theatregoing of which I do a lot, and skiing. If I had to, I think I'd probably make the same choice as you, but it would be very frustrating, as there's nothing to beat the live stage experience for concerts, theatre and opera, and I'm on the doorstep of so much of it. There again, would I move out of London and downsize just to ski more often? No, and that's as much because of all the live entertainment and exhibitions as anything. So maybe skiing would take second place to 'art' for me after all. 
queen bodecia, that's fair enough, going out to pubs and restaurants can be pretty over-rated anyway.
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I have sacrificed two knees to skiing.
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johnE, 
Pedantica, when we were weighing up the arguments for buying our apartment, we had to take all that into consideration. In particular we told ourselves it would have to be instead of other expensive holidays, not in addition. It's not as simple as "skiing". It's having a second home in the mountains, and all that goes with it. Sitting on the terrace in the summer with a book and a cold white wine, watching the sunset on Mont Blanc, pottering round the Beaufort market, having the incentive to have learnt to cope OK in French - all sorts of stuff. And having the place to invite friends and family to join us (if they are prepared to sleep in a cramped bedroom!).
for all that, yes we certainly had to make "sacrifices" in the sense that there's a clear opportunity cost. But if we didn't have the apartment I still wouldn't spend a lot of money on new cars or a new kitchen - I'd spend it on lots of other things, including more sailing and more theatre and travel to other places.
Having taken the plunge and bought the apartment, there are high fixed costs - including a season lift pass - which means there are powerful arguments for spending a lot of time here. It's a bit all or nothing, really - we can't save any significant money by giving up a week's skiing. We spend quite a lot on travel to and forth - so the best value for money is to stay a long time. 
When the kids were younger we definitely did some ski holidays we couldn't really "afford" - it's such an unbeatable way to have a family holiday, and they're only young once. They were all done on a fairly tight budget, and none the worse for that. Even budget family ski trips cost a fortune. The kids opted more than once to have a ski trip instead of "big" Christmas presents.
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It's having a second home in the mountains, and all that goes with it. Sitting on the terrace in the summer with a book and a cold white wine, watching the sunset on Mont Blanc, pottering round the Beaufort market, having the incentive to have learnt to cope OK in French - all sorts of stuff. And having the place to invite friends and family to join us (if they are prepared to sleep in a cramped bedroom!).
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Oh yes, I can relate to all of that (I used to have similar idyllic times, though the sunset was over the Dentelles de Montmirail and Mont Ventoux, rather than Mont Blanc) but I thought, perhaps wrongly, that the OP was more about actual skiing.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Actually, I've just remembered, when I moved to my present house about 15 years ago, I did sacrifice skiing that year - to having some work done in the bathroom!
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Pedantica, you are Mrs Higs and I claim my ..er.. 5 piece bathroom suite
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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I thought, perhaps wrongly, that the OP was more about actual skiing.
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No, I'm sure you're right. It's just that for us it is now not possible to distinguish between the opportunity cost of the skiing and the opportunity cost of having an apartment, as they are part and parcel of the same thing.
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You know it makes sense.
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to go skiing .................... i'd give up .................................................................. work. 
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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theskibob, Aaaah free skiing... and the rest of your life living with M&D
I'd give up summer holidays.
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Poster: A snowHead
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We tend to be quite focussed about what we spend our money on so don't buy lots of gadgets/ eat out lots etc because we tend to prefer to spend money on holidays and save quite a bit. These days that means 2 or 3 ski trips a year as we love being outside as a family doing something together. We would spend the same on hols v meals out though even if we hadn't discovered skiing - like to work hard and play hard; life with kids means the playing is concentrated into holidays!!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I normally give up a morning at work, and a lie in 
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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When we first started skiing my summer hols were the be all and end all for me - now skiing is our "main" holiday of the year and I would direct all my holiday savings to that, getting a cheap week somewhere in the sun in September.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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I quite simply don't go out - but I do work in the late night industry, so leaving the house post 7pm has lost it's allure. I live in a pretty rough and ready corner of Leeds (which I love) and my 'car' is a green rider bus pass. Former obsesssions with clothes, books and eating out are all indulged rarely as I find myself converting the bill into € in my head and working out what it would buy whilst skiing... I do sometimes wonder if all the scrimping and saving is worth it, but those doubts are swiftly blown away on the first run down!
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Occasionally give away a morning transfer if there is a good powder morning in the offing.
Shhhh, do not tell Mrs Dallypaul. Our secret OK 
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Skiing is our main (ie most expensive) holiday of the year and if we didn't ski, we could go on 2, reasonably priced hols a year, instead of our usual camping trip in the summer
Apart from that, we don't give up awful lot, as there are only 2 of us, we both have good jobs and apart from the mortgage and usual living costs (and my expensive horse habit), we don't spend a lot - we go out for the odd meal, but don't go out drinking, etc. I drive a 11yo mobile kennel/tack room, OH drives an 8yo and rather battered car, neither of us are materialistic.
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