More Bear Lake

After spending the good part of a week at Bear Lake with my family, we moved over to spend another week with Brad's family at the lake. It was very relaxing and fun to laze around with them on the beach and watch some of the kids waterski for the first time.

Casey and Luke - Cool on the boat!

A typical afternoon at the beach.

Lots of sand structures were constructed and destroyed. Here are Pep, Jess, Adam, Ellie, Tiana, Isaac (hidden) and Taevyn with their masterpiece-of-the-day.

We spent some quality time on the boat, too. Here is Brad's sister Haley with her tired daughter Livvy. I guess all the sun and fun got to her.

We had some children's water skis that are shorter and hooked together to make them easier to control. Brad spent about 2 1/2 hours floating in the lake one afternoon while he helped a bunch of the kids learn to water ski. There was a lot of success; every child that wanted to went out and was able to get up (with Uncle Brad giving them a hefty shove on the back after they called "Hit it"). Some of the kids even stayed up and went for a while on their own, while Brad got further and further away.

Pepper was the champion - he could have stayed up and skied around the entire lake if he hadn't been so concerned about abandoning his dad (you can see Brad floating off in the distance).

Jess was an old pro. She actually got up and did some skiing last summer, so this year it was old hat.

Ellie was very gung-ho to give water skiing a try. She jumped in with a big grin on her face and kept trying and trying until she was able to get up and stay up.

Emma was the smallest and possibly the cutest waterskier out there! She just popped up like she could walk on water and hung out like it was no big deal.

Isaac's competitive spirit didn't let him give up, especially after his kid sister Emma made it look so easy. This was one of his many tries and he did great!

(Becky, you will note that I did not include any pictures of you scurfing with the kids, even though the pictures were very cute. I hope you appreciate the sacrifice I made for you and your vanity.)

It is so funny that both Brad's and my families have a Bear Lake tradition. We both grew up spending a week up at the lake every summer with our extended families. Now, we get to spend two weeks every summer, and our kids think it is the best place on earth (which is quite possibly is!).