It’s one of the most wonderful times of the year: The Lakehouse in Vernon, B.C. For one glorious week, we unplug, boat, play games, watch movies on the beach, eat oodles of fruit pies from Davison Orchards and just relax. It wouldn’t be possible without my brother Pat and his wife Jane who tirelessly cart us around on their boat without complaint and do 99% of the planning leading up to the trip.
This year, the theme was wakesurfing. Hadley was moderately obsessed with beating her dear old mom in the water, which doesn’t take much. She rocked it!
It was also fun to see Bode take to wakesurfing as well (with Jane’s help positioning his board in the water).
I showed some signs of improvement and even jumped in for a run fully-clothed when I had an unexpected chance to go. Getting up has always been my biggest struggle and was able to do it the first try every day until the final one when the water was choppy. I should have quit while I was ahead!
The kids spent hours upon hours playing off the dock.
In fact, I barely saw Hadley the entire week. Bode and I bunked with my parents while she slept in another unit with Cousin Emily. When Hadley wasn’t on the boat, I’d see her swimming with cousins or by herself and relaxing in the hammocks. As much as she enjoys people, she truly loves just being by herself as well.
She introduced a game to us called “Never Have I Ever” where everyone takes a turn saying something they have never done. I.e. “Never have I ever worn a dress.” Anyone who has done that thing has to take a piece of candy but if you swallow it, you lose. The winner is the last person standing.
My mouth was literally bursting with gummy bear juice and I was one of the first to spit out my candy. Some call me a loser; I say that was for the win. No one was funnier than Ashton.
Just thinking about it makes my teeth ache!
I rarely took my phone on the boat because of my little incident a few months ago during my adventure race with Bode where I landed in the dunk and ruined it. The threat of Jamie kept it far, far away from the water.
We had our annual family dive-off. Usually we go over to the West Side but we’re getting too big (fat?) to all fit on the boat so we did it off the dock. As usual, Pat stayed under the longest. His 44-year-long winning streak is really getting old.
Pat’s friend Todd always invites us over for movie night on his beach and it’s one of our favorite traditions. This year, we watched the Addams Family and conditions could not have been more pristine. As Bode gazed at the sky, he marveled “Mom, will we be able to see the stars like this when we move to Midway?” You’d better believe it.
Ashton cut our hair while Emily gave Hadley a makeover. Good thing Jamie wasn’t there because he would have had nightmares about her future suitors.
Twelve going on 22.
In the evenings, we wound down by playing lots of card games.
And it was great just to chill out together.
“YAWP!”
The week wasn’t perfect by any means. Mom was scary-sick after the long drive. There were some good, old-fashioned meltdowns but overall, I couldn’t be more blessed than to call these people Family.
Here’s to the sun setting on another great year at the lake.
I'm a Canadian-born mom of two, former Denver Post columnist, family travel writer, editor of MileHighMamas.com and 9News contributor. Expert on all things Utah, Denver, family and travel. Lover of laughter and life. Happily married to a man obsessed with growing The Great Pumpkin. 