Our GRAND Lake Adventure. .

My version of "vacation" is to go somewhere we have never been. .

and DO the town. .

seeing ABSOLUTELY everything we can before it is time to leave. .

coming home as exhausted as we were when we left. .

but full of new experiences and culturing activities.

Jeremy's idea of vacation is to. .

go somewhere quiet. .

with no reason to go out into the public. .

or speak to people. .

pretty much just hibernating.

So, three years ago. .

we agreed. .

on a trip to Lake Eufala in Oklahoma. .

under the condition. .

that there would be NO tents involved.

He searched online and found a nice 3 bedroom house right on the lake. .

his big question was. .

2 nights or 3.

After I talked him into 4 nights. .

last year his question was. .2 weeks or 10 days??

We really enjoy the downtime. .and it will apparently become a family tradition to do a week at the lake. The last 2 years we have spent the time at Grand Lake. .which is closer and cleaner.

He starts looking in January to see what houses are available to rent. Then he gives me a list of 4 or 5 with the amenities and pictures. .and I pick. Here was our house this year. .which was listed as being "on a bluff." Laughing about some of the homes we saw from the lake last year high up in the trees. .we hoped it wasn't one of those. When we looked at the photos again last month. .the owner had updated them. .and noted that there were 82 steps. Still laughing. .

We had NO idea until we saw them. .

And there were 92 steps from the house down to the boat slip on the water.

So many steps and so steep that we noted made the discovery of 

THIS. .

inscribed into the top of the last step pretty comical.

It was a nice house with a great view. .but the steps were really, really brutal!! Especially when your 4 year old decides she needs to POOP 10 minutes after you got down them. .

Really, Cami. .REALLY!!!

We enjoyed sleeping in a bit (if you consider 7:30 late). .

and our favorite water games. .

wakeboarding. .

knee boarding. .

skiing. .

and swimming!!

You may have noticed all the trees surrounding the house. .great for a bird watcher's dreams!! There were at least a half dozen ruby throated hummers around the trees from sun-up to sunset!! We loved that!! I didn't know that hummers made much noise. .but they squeak and bicker like my kids!! They were a hoot to watch. .

and photograph!!

They enchanted all of us with their petite stature and playful games. Along with the usual geese, ducks, herons, and egrets on the water. .we saw cardinals, chickadees, titmice, doves, and bluejays. .Fun indeed!

On my bucket list from last year, was "boating in" to a restaurant. We did that this year. .and enjoyed a great restaurant along the water. It was a little nerve wracking to leave all our camera equipment in a boat that you can't lock, in a "parking lot" with other boats. .but no problems were incurred!

Another thing that we did included a short drive to Tulsa to do some school shopping one day. We enjoyed a trip to the Oklahoma Aquarium while there. .

The kids petted fish. .

Enjoyed the jelly fish exhibits. .

and walked through a shark tube. We weren't there at the right time to pet the sharks. .but we did watch them feed the piraunas, electric eel, and archer fish (which are crazy little fish that spit at the insects flying OUT of the water, knocking them INTO the water to be consumed for lunch-isn't God's sense of adventure AWESOME??).

On the way back to the lake house, we stopped off at this McDonalds, which at one time, was considered the worlds largest McDonalds. The huge golden arch spans aross the top of Interstate 44. .

Unfortunately, we got in the restaurant and found that they didn't serve ice cream. .

so we took our pictures. .

and went to Braums!

This family LIKES our ice cream!!

The rest of the week was spent relaxing on the boat. .

. .and in the water.

We learned how to ski . .

and wake board double. .
 without injuring anyone. .

Cami and I enjoyed pedicures while watching TV.

Some people like to be TV-free during vacation. .

as someone who never watches TV because there isn't enough time in my day. .

I LOVED it!!

I enjoyed the Olympics (my proverbial "bucket list" includes watching them IN PERSON someday!) a few episodes of Pawn Stars. .and some show new-to-me that showcased crazy guys buying houses from ONLY the outside appearance. .and trying to fix them and flip them to make a profit for themselves. .darned if I can remember the name of the show though!

We ate good. .

I love to cook. .and I LOVE to try new recipes when I have the time and energy!! We enjoyed several recipes from Pioneer Woman's new cookbook that I hadn't had time to try out!!

We made smores in the outdoor firepit. .in a rainstorm the first time! We didn't mind. .we haven't seen rain for a while. .and as badly as northeast Oklahoma needed the rain. .we were more than glad to enjoy theirs!!

Saturday took a turn for the worse, when the propeller on the boat was damaged by a rock causing a bad vibration in the vessel. .that was unknowingly FIXED Saturday night when Jeremy used a pliers to bend the prop dent out. .

So in the meantime, thinking it was not really driveable. .

Sunday found us looking for new props at the boat shops (lake related industries take a Tues and Wednesday weekend, instead of Sat/Sun). No props anywhere. .

BUT. .

the boys came home with a new toy instead!!

A wake surfboard.

Jeremy knew the prop would be good at a slow speed. .which is just what this toy takes. .8-12 mph to make a big fat water-wake to surf on!! I almost preferred the triple flipping skips across the lake to the head-knocking, neck twisting, sinus-enema that I got everytime I crashed off this little princess. It was a little different because you had nothing holding your feet to the board, other than gravity. .and if you broke that by trying to move the foot on the board a smidge. .you were looking up from under a wave!

But after we discovered that the vibration problem had been fixed with his twist of the pliers. .

it was back to high speed water skiing until sunset!!

And up again early to do it just ONE MORE TIME before coming home Monday!!

Even Cami was ready to come home by Monday. .she had been begging to go to the party cove up the lake to see if there were any "children" there. .as she was tired of playing "only with my brothers!"

Vacation is great fun. .

but it is nice to be productive, it's nice to be back to a routine. .

and it's a very nice reminder that. .

THERE IS 

NO 

PLACE LIKE HOME!!

Thanks for stopping by today. .

I have saved the best of the favorite pictures for one more post. .

You DIDN'T forget that I mentioned taking 250-something photos, 

did you??

Come back soon!