Three Colorado hotels have made Travel + Leisure magazine's list of top 50 family-friendly hotels in the United States and Canada, and two of them entice readers to start planning their winter ski vacations. The Ritz-Carlton Bachelor Gulch comes in at number 10 for its "ski nannies, who will shepherd your brood to the slopes while you decompress with a private yoga lesson," and Vail's Cascade Resort & Spa ranks at number 20.

And even though winter is officially months away, this is typically the time of year when the snow-making machines at some resorts are powered up. Still, Loveland Ski Area’s anticipated start to snowmaking came and went yesterday without a flake, notes OutThereColorado.com. Temperatures on the Front Range hovered around 90 and in the mid-60s at the Continental Divide. Arapahoe Basin, which typically competes with Loveland to be the first resort in North America to open for the season, is also waiting for cooler weather.

"We just need the weather to cooperate," says Leigh Hierholzer, marketing director for A-Basin.