Memorial Day with the Fam 2009

This post is mostly photos, and a lot of them speak for themselves. Most were taken by me, but obviously the ones I'm in were taken by somebody else...

This is the home my grandpa grew up in - it's in Altus, the town in Arkansas where they filmed the first season of the simple life. As you can see, the house has been vacant for so long, it's basically falling down around itself.

I didn't go on the drive to Altus. When we got back from the boat trip, I got a migraine, so I took some high-powered ibuprofen and took a three-hour nap. So, I think Carrie or Ann probably took the photo above.

The highlights of the trip for me were taking the boat out on the lake, and two nights spent playing dominoes with my cousins.

It was cloudy and a tad on the cool side on Sunday, but we decided to try the lake anyway.

Sara got to go tubing for the first time.

We did brave the cool waters. Once you got in the water, though, it wasn't so bad. Ann shot the above photo of us.


Malachi didn't seem to be a big fan of the lake. He got in, but got right back out.


Same thing with Kenzie. She got in, swam out to her mom, and swam back to the boat.


Even though he wasn't a big fan of swimming in the water, Malachi loved the boat ride.


Sara and her girls.


We picked up Matt from shore so Ann could drag him around the lake. He was quite the skilled tube-er. He was steering up and over the wake, and doing all kinds of cool stuff.

Even my dear old dad got in the lake. As you can see, he thought it was a little cold. I had stuck my foot in and said "It's not that bad!" just before I shot this photo of him getting in the water...

Dad even went tubing. I think he really enjoyed it. I'm pretty sure he's never done anything like that before, but I could be wrong...


That's me way back there on the tube. The water was a little cold when you first got in, but once in the water it wasn't so bad. Ann shot the photo of me. (Hey, zoom in next time!)

Other than being out in the boat, we hung out in the condo most of the weekend, since the weather was chilly and rainy. I think I'll definitely go back to Beaver Lake again. It wasn't really crowded, and the scenery was nice.

This was the view down the hill from our balcony.


Here's the little goober.


Saturday morning I went down to the shore with the kids so they could go "fishing." Mostly, they just played around in the mud and water, but the weather was really nice at that point, so it was okay hanging out down there.




I really like this photo of Kasie. If I was shooting this vacation for a photo assignment, I'd have edited a lot tighter (obviously) but I figured I'd show off as much of the fam as possible.