Family Reunion

Well we had a great weekend, the annual family reunion at Lk Wenatchee with Derek's family (his mom's side). We left Thursday and camped til Sunday. The original plan was to take the kids with us, but we realized that Ellie is just too young to expose her to the elements of being in such a dog-friendly environment.. plus she is not able to hold her potty yet so she would have to be with us 24/7 which puts a real damper on swimming! :) Maybe we need a doggy nanny! lol

So I'm sure Russell was not very happy with us as we had to leave the children outside the entire weekend and he hasnt been locked out of the house since.... well he never has been for 4 days straight! My parents came over twice a day to feed them and play with them, we could definately tell he was ready for us to be home though. It really is amazing since Ellie came home, he does not whine and cry, we have yet to hear him howl, he seems happier and not so lonely. Just this morning he really started to "play" with her, he was pinning her down and play biting her neck, just like he used to do with all his other girlfriends... She is getting bigger by the day it seems, she runs circles around him and she loves to steal his ball and hide it under herself.. she's one smart cookie! She has had a couple pee accidents in the house, so I'd say she is 75% trained to go outside.. sometimes she just needs a little reminder. I have been working on "sit" with her, she knows her name already, doesnt always "come" when called as she is not a brave puppy, she tends to steer clear of iffy situations.

Here's the kids after our return home, happy and content!

Later Sunday evening, Ellie was telling me she was hungry... she will lay down at her bowl when she thinks she needs to eat.

So back to camping! We had okay weather, Thursday was spent just getting set up and hanging out.. mid 80's. Derek had said that he would go swimming with me in the mornings, I think after last year I made it look/seem so refreshing that he wanted to do it this year.. Well Thursday night was not so warm of a night, it was not cold, but it was comfortable on the borderline of cool so when we awoke Friday and it was in the 60's he was second guessing his decision. But we headed on down to the water with looks of "Are you crazy!" from those around us. Well apparently we were crazy because that water was COLD! Much colder than last year's morning swim. It took Derek about 15 minutes to get to waste high, then another 15 minutes of standing there deciding if he was going to dunk. I did dunk, washed my hair, was freezing but felt refreshed. After 30 or so minutes, Derek finally decided to dunk and then immediately got the hell out! I was chilled for many hours that morning, I had to put a hoody on to warm up and finally around 1 or 2 it warmed up enough around camp to want to get back in the water. It was much warmer down at the water than in the trees, it probably reached low to mid 80's on Friday and we spent an hour or two in the water. Pam and I swam out to the "No Wake" bouey.. that was a long hard swim as the water was very choppy; It took us atleast 30 minutes to casually swim out there and literally only 5 to get back.

Thursday evening Derek & I had walked down to the lake around 8:20 and realized we had missed the sunset by about 10 minutes, so on Friday we decided we wanted to catch the sunset and let everyone know we'd be down at the lake at 8 for those that would like to join us. It was funny, because Derek's nephew Rick (who is about 12 years younger than us) was teasing Derek and saying "Oh is this what guys your age do, go down and watch sunsets?" :) He thought it was silly, but we all went anyways.. it was beautiful! We had a few pics taken (the only pics taken the entire weekend) and they are a bit dark. There was one taken that used the flash and it was aweful! You could see just how gross my hair was so I decided to burn that picture (okay well I sent it to the trash anyways).. lol But I think these are okay and good enough. The very top pic was the first pic taken as the sun was setting and then we got these shots below as it continued to set behind the mountains.

I did get a chance to tease Rick regarding the sunset issue because his wife ratted him out and said that recently he had "Thanked" her for cuddling with him.. so I told him "Oh I see.. Derek cant enjoy a good sunset, but you can enjoy a good cuddling session?" or something like that.. it was funny though!

There was some thunder Friday evening and maybe a couple minutes of sprinkling, but nothing serious at all and we awoke to clouds :( The boys were going golfing Saturday so there was no morning swim, us wives decided to cook them a nice breakfast of pancakes and eggs and bacon, yummy! I stuck around camp most of the day, I know it was warmer out in the sun but I was comfortable just relaxing and doing nothing! About an hour before the guys were due back, it started to thunder and once they got back, the lightening and rain started. It was pretty loud, pretty much right above our heads! but it also became quite muggy and with the bug spray and sunscreen on, I was feeling a bit sticky and decided it was a good time to take a bath in the lake. Derek and Crystal came down to the water with me, it seemed like the storm had passed by, it was still thundering out, but I hadnt seen any recent lightening and it felt like it had moved on. They both thought I was crazy, but I walked out in the water, it was raining but it felt great.. it was actually a very comfortable water temp. Dawn and Tammy were down at the beach pointing off to something, I assumed they were pointing at where maybe Kenny and Cody were swimming..

So I just casually stood in the water, slowly deciding if I wanted to swim for a bit or just get busy and wash my hair.. when all the sudden a VERY LARGE bolt of lightening struck right above everyone's head!! Apparently the storm had NOT moved on yet... I basically was like, OH SHIT! I dunked pretty fast at that point, Derek was on the shore telling me to hurry the hell up... so I washed the hair and body quickly and got the heck out.. Which was a total bummer because the water felt great and I could have swam out there in the rain for another hour.. When I got on the beach I realized what Dawn and Tammy were pointing at was a forest fire that had started not even 1/4 mile away from the beach by a lightening strike! It clearly had happened within about 45 minutes of us being down there, there was no visible "fire" in all the thick trees, but a lot of smoke so something was definately on fire over there.

It continued to rain for pretty much the entire evening on Saturday.. it would quit here/there but it sure made for a mess in the camper with pine needles stuck to our shoes as we walked in/out. Sunday we awoke to broken clouds, sunny skies.. We casually took down camp and headed out at noon.. no more swimming. Overall it was a great weekend of seeing everyone, Derek's ribs turned out super yummy! I'm already excited to go back next year, and VERY happy that his family has restarted this reunion after about a 20 year break.

I cant say there is much else going on with us lately.. with having the new pup in the house, we havent been getting a lot done, but we hope to start changing that soon. We have a day ride planned for Saturday, I forget what it feels like to ride its been so long! :) We are also having Dave Marzolf (realtor) come over and give us his opinion on the value of our place right now so we can make a decision about what direction to go with trying to get in a home loan modification. The bank is taking their sweet time and of course values are still dropping.. we now worry/think our home value is below our loan value, not good! Dave will give us a better idea on that so we will know how to proceed with the bank and if we will tell them to take this house and shove it or if we'll try to find a new route to approach the loan modification. It is very frustrating, we are just in a hole right now and need to dig out, with or without the banks help. Neither of us wants to loose our house, but we are tired of struggling. I know I know.. some of you are saying "well you can afford a new dog but not your house?" well, yeah actually! We have a little bit of money saved up for such things like a new dog or new fencing etc.. but when I have to start dipping into that "savings" to pay my normal bills/mortgage, thats when I know things are too tight....