Monday, July 20, 2009

First Boating Trip!!

Grandpa and Grandma Walker have owned a ski boat ever since I was a teenager and though it is old, this boat keeps on plugging away (just barely sometimes) year after year. My Dad "lovingly" calls it a "hole in the water" and really we have determined it is now mostly "Brent bait" to get my brother to come down to visit the folks more frequently. Either way though, the grandparents wanted to pass on some boating fun to their grandkids. I drove the boys down to Eatonville and then we drove a little further to Alder Lake for the occasion. We first played on this big toy for the kids in the park and then had a picnic in the shade near the water. Grandma and Grandpa brought all the picnic fixings including hotdogs, chips, jello salad, grapes, smore cookie dessert things, and even some Koolaid to make to drink for the kids. This picture above I took of Daniel and I on the boat as it first started to make it's way around the lake. Daniel doesn't appear too sure of all this adventure as you can see at first.

Grandma had to hold the twins at one point together because Josiah was getting so scared of the boat's engine that I had to hold him farther up front. They were both squinting either from the sun or from the wind around the boat when we were going faster I think.

At one point, Daniel felt up to sitting with Grandpa in the driver's seat. It is an ongoing joke in our family that my Dad MUST turn his hat a little off center to impersonate "Earnest" from all the "Earnest goes..." movies if you remember those. So this is my Dad's "Earnest Goes Boating" pose for the camera.

Caleb pretty much looked like this the entire time in the boat. Grandma said he sat like a statue and here looks like one I think too. He is usually our adventurous soul, but this might have been a bit to much adventure for this little one.

Josiah was VERY scared of the boat's engine especially when we would go faster as it would get really loud. He cried and cried and yelled for Grandpa to slow down. So mostly for the whole journey we tooled around the lake at a very slow speed, which unfortunately for me isn't my favorite part of boating. I like going fast and feeling the cool breeze. Oh well...what we do for our children. I think too that Josiah is used to being strapped in to moving vehicles and I think he felt a little out of control that he wasn't strapped down to a seat. He wanted to go back to the shore almost as soon as we started. I think he might enjoy this when he is a little older, but for now it was a little traumatic. Josiah really loved the picnic part though and talked about how he wanted to have a picnic again sometime on the way home.

Daniel is steering the boat here in this shot. We had to watch him closely though that he did not push any wrong buttons or take the key out of the boat.

As you can see, the "mountain was out" (AKA not covered in clouds) as we say here in the Northwest. Mt. Rainier was gorgeous today and we could see a nice view of it from the lake.

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