Me and my sweet husband...
Me, Sweet Hubs, and Precious Kids...
Father and Son moment...
can't help but love him...
me and my sweet friend...Queens of the Mountain!
this was a little nerve-wracking for me!
So, the weekend was full of fun stuff and of course, lots of yummy food. The men kept us fed with grilled burgers, steaks and chicken each night throughout the weekend and Becky and I took turns cooking breakfast. The first morning, Becky made a fabulous breakfast casserole full of tasty ingredients and the next morning I made pancakes, courtesy of the Pioneer Woman's recipe, always tasty! We did 3 different hiking trails, each a different level of difficulty and with equally amazing views of the area. The kids spent the evenings catching lightening bugs and playing tag. It was really nice to see them let go of the idea of TV and video games for a weekend and really embrace the options. They all got along the entire weekend, which made it even better!
The last afternoon there, we decided to take them out to the lake (which was really just a big pond) to go swimming. It was a nice area with a beach and a marked off swimming area where the water never got higher than waist deep. They had an additional area for swimming that was deeper and there was a floating pier that the braver big kids were jumping off into the water doing all kinds of somersaults that made me nervous. Becky and I were happy our kids didn't go over there. We were just getting ready to start heading back to the cabins when we noticed alot of commotion going on over in that deeper area and there were atleast 15-20 men that kept diving under as if they were looking for something. Quickly we realized they were searching for a person and after about 10 minutes of diving, they found the man and got him up onto one of the paddle boats they had out there. Those 15-20 men swam and pushed that boat over to the pier where a couple of people took turns performing CPR on this man. Tragically, they were unable to revive him. I think I can speak for myself, Richard, Becky and Courtney when I say, this was the last thing we expected to witness over the weekend and certainly was the last thing we wanted our kids to see. When we were finally able to leave the park area (the entrance/exit was blocked with park ranger and emergency worker vehicles), we were heavy-hearted and a little in shock of what we had just seen. We've yet to find out all the facts, but what we gathered from the other bystanders was that they believe the man had a heart attack while swimming. He was 54 years old. The rest of our evening was bittersweet, as we tried to enjoy our last night together as our thoughts kept returning to what we had seen.
All in all, for many reasons, this will be a vacation that we will never forget. We returned home counting our blessings and thankful for the time we'd been given to spend with each other. When we got home, we had to take our son straight to check in for his first time ever at church camp. (Sobs from me...) I can't believe my little man is old enough to be at an overnight camp for a whole week! I can't wait to hear about all of his experiences and friends that he makes this week. I have to admit, I had a hard time leaving my baby there after what we'd seen happen this weekend, but I have no doubt God's protection is around him and each of the campers there.
I hope everyone had a great 4th of July, and took time to be thankful for our independence and for the salvation that we are free to enjoy!
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