August brought a lovely car accident after which our van looked like this.
Thank goodness the van took the worst of it. All four of us were in the van when it happened and it was at 50 km/hr that we crunched into a truck whose driver thought the stop sign meant slow down slightly and pray. Well that prayer was not answered unless he wanted to have us hit him and push him head on into another stopped vehicle. Thank goodness no one was hurt. A hard lesson for him to learn - he was quite young.
This occurred two days before our planned departure to Jan Lake to spend a few days at my parent's cabin. The Civic, which is our second car, was not going to cut it. We do not travel light. So we rented the only thing we could find. Apparently a lot of people rent cars in Regina on an August summer weekend. Who knew.
The Ford Flex is awesome on the inside. The outside just doesn't do it for me. It's part station wagon, part box. I liked to call it the Cragon. You know those car/trucks from the 70's that were called Crucks. Yeah, like that only it's car and wagon and yeah, it makes no sense to anyone except to me.
It had satellite radio which is awesome because we lose radio about half way - Jan Lake is north. Like far north. Like no cell service or radio north. But satellite is everywhere, you know on account of them being in space and all. Lucky me because Jay found an 80's station that played Debbie Gibson.
I survived. Barely.
Views like these are worth even suffering through Debbie Gibson. Or what might be worse, Jay singing along to DB. I kid, I kid.
Kind of.
And this view makes me laugh, Kamden of the refusing to ever be without a funny face in a picture. I need lots of pictures to remember this stage by.
I love relaxing in the boat and throwing a line out. If I catch something, great, if not, whatevs. The scenery and peace more than makes up for the lack of fish.
We made supper on an island over the camp fire, an annual tradition. I love that my dad is in the background. Photobomb!
After a morning of tubing, we got back to the cabin only to realize I left my camera in the boat. Jay went back to get it. On his way back to the cabin after retrieving the camera, he ran into this dude. Yes, that is a bear. Did I mention we had all walked from the boat to the cabin and Jay was still on foot. The reason the bear is so small is because Jay backed the hell up from that bad boy. I had forgotten the telephoto lens too. If he had that lens, man would he have gotten a nice shot.
Have I mentioned that I have a phobia of bears. And spiders but that's not important right now.
Needless to say, I am super glad I wasn't with him. Oh and the kids too. The drama, I can only imagine. Jack takes after me with bears and spiders.
But that was the only "excitement" and we even managed to see that bear's footprints in the sand on the beach the next day. Pretty neat.
From a distance and days after the fact says Kami.
We spent as much time as the gas tank on the boat would allow pulling the kids in the tube. I am official boat driver and enjoy watching the big smiles and hearing the screams of glee.
However, I did almost drown my sister in law. Somehow one of the bumps launched her out of the tube. Her life jacket was too big and all I could see for what seemed like an eternity was the life jacket. No Nicole. Then her head popped up and we breathed a sigh of relief. We, um, I, slowed down and took some smaller bumps after that.
Here we are going much slower and over much smaller bumps. That is the only reason we have three on a two man tube. We do think about safety. Sort of.
And these two loved it fast and as bumpy as possible. Within reason, flipping the boat to get them massive air is NOT an option.
My mom even wanted to try. She did not witness the Nicole almost drowning incident which is pretty obvious given the fact that she wanted to give it a go now, 3 years after we started the tubing with the kids.
The best part was when we got out there and I asked if she still wanted to do it, she asked her grand kids if she should and they all yelled "YES!". Kind of forced her into it, didn't they?
We went nice and slow even hitting a few bumps. We got some smiles all around. And I didn't almost drown her. Oh no, I save that for the in laws. *smacks forehead*
It has been a fabulous summer of great weather and fun times. We are blessed indeed.
And today, after much research and discussion, we picked up this baby.
A brand new shiny Honda Pilot. The van was due to be replaced any way so the accident just did us a nice favour since the damage was more than the value of it. I try not to think of what we paid for it a mere 7 years ago because well I have a small pain tolerance. This time we went Honda because they seem to hold their value much better. We now own two Honda's so hopefully that continues to be true.
If you need me, I'll be out shining our new truck.
And if you know me well, you just snorted coffee through your nose because hell will likely freeze over before that happens. Cleaning and washing vehicles is a twice a year kind of thing, whether it needs it or not around here.
I will admire it through the window though so there's that.
