How to Take a Vacation

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how summer was already halfway over and how much I was looking forward to a few upcoming things on my schedule. One of them was a trip to Virginia Beach to see Dave Matthews Band – a trip that didn’t go as planned (it rained nearly the whole time we had planned to be beachgoing), but was still a good time. Until the air conditioner in Clay’s car died about 10 minutes in to our four hour drive home. Because of course.

The other bit of travel I was looking forward to was a trip to Wisconsin to visit my family and see cousins and aunts and uncles and play at my parent’s lake house. THAT trip went much more to plan and was just what I needed: an extra long weekend, spent mostly outside, with people I love.

Northern Wisconsin is beautiful – and my parents are enjoying calling it their new home. Trading Alaska for this place is a pretty good deal – it’s not The Great Land, but it’s still pretty great.

So, here’s how I take a vacation:

The view from my parent’s yard. I could stay here forever.

My sister and I made up this photo display of our family – earlier in the night we had a memorial table out, too, with photos of Grammie and Grandpa Jennings, my great aunt – AJ, my cousin Amy, and my Uncle Mike and Aunt Terri. We lost all of them but we still wanted them to be present for our day together.

When you have a big party with folks who couldn’t make it to your wedding – you bring your wedding cake to everyone! Round two turned out just as good as the original.

Sisters and cousins – well, two of them anyways. These kids we like my sibling substitutes while I was in college. It’s hard to believe now they are in college!

Mom and I got out for a short paddle on my last day. I can’t wait to go back and do some more exploring!

Momma. <3

The weather cooperated and we were able to play outside quite a bit – the paddleboards were the best!

I’ll be honest – I didn’t think I could do this.

Out on the boat with these goofs. Short fishing excursion – they all got skunked, but I landed a few small ones.

Dad with one of the better catches of the weekend. Not quite long enough to keep, though.

On our last night, Dad took us out for some sunset fishing – I didn’t catch anything, but being out on the lake at dusk was kind of magical.

Guys, my sister is cute.

I was reading in the hammock for about ten minutes… it was great, but there were more exciting things to do!

I’m already counting the days until I can go back and hang out on the lake with my family. There’s never enough time in that place with those great people.

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