FUN ON THE HOUSEBOAT AND IN THE WATER

We've had company at our house since the last part of June - my brother and sister (she has her own house here, so my brother stayed with her), and both of our daughters and their families, sometimes separately, other times everyone together.  It's been wild - but a very good time.

For 4 days during the 4th of July week-end, our daughters and their kiddos spent the time on a huge rented house boat, and we brought our Moomba wake board boat out so that they could ride the tube and wake board - and,  so that we could go back home to sleep.  The houseboat slept 10 people, but my husband and I prefer the comfort and peace and quite of our own bed at night.  The weather was less than delightful, in fact it was kind of cool, but, as far as I was concerned, I'd rather be a little cool on the water than frying in the hot sun.  And it hardly rained at all.  Mostly  it was just cloudy.  

Here are some great pics that I want to share with you:

 This is our oldest grandson, Benjamin and his sister Abby tubing.

This is our only grandaughter, 11 year old Abby.

Lunch time with our daughter, Kim and her husband, Ben, and some of the kiddos.

This is our houseboat and the raft that we pumped up and tied to the boat.  This is so the adults could get the the water with their drinks and snacks.

This is our own ski boat.  All the boys are learning to wake board.

Here Cade and Abby are giving Eli the "High 5" as he comes down the slide."

               This raft is as big as a barge!!

                   Cade and Eli loved going tubing.
                 

Good old Kim did the food preparations.  Yummy!!

I did a lot of sitting on the deck and watching, although I did manage to flop into the raft one afternoon.

                Here's Eli going down the slide.

Even my sister Jan went down the slide.  I, however,
         spared myself the embarrasment.

SOME TIME WITH OUR DAUGHTERS AT THE LAKE

We left with our visiting daughter, son-in-law and their son Cade to spend 2 days and a night with our youngest daughter on Norris Lake just outside of LaFollette, north of Knoxville.  It was a huge cabin with 3 stories, 5 bedrooms and three full baths, and Kim and her family had rented it for a week and taken our boat to the dock right below the cabin.  The first few days they spent with their employees and their families, but the last three days were for family members - and boy did a lot of family members show up!  Kim's husband's family and a baby showed up, as well as the 5 of us with my sister and brother (who were only there for Thursday during the day).  We all had to bring our pot-luck offerings, so there was food galore!

For the most part, we spent all of our time either on the boat or on the dock  floating in the water on our life vests.  The younger kids were learning to ski on youth skiis tied together, while Benjamin, the teenager, practiced his wake boarding and slalom skiing.  I prefered to stay at the dock and just stay cool floating in the water.

At about 5:00, the afternoon storm arrived with a vengance, and by the time we got back to the house, the wind was roaring, the thunder and lightening got closer and closer, and our electricity went out.  So much for warming up our pot-luck supper!  It was really quite a storm all over east Tennessee.  the Smokies were really hit hard.  Two people were killed when trees fell on them, and people in the campgrounds were trapped in by trees across the roads. As for us,  Ben's family all left, and my brother and sister had to head for home too, so that just left our family with Kim and hers.  We almost left too, but all the kids began to cry, Kim started to cry, and then I started to cry, because I felt that we were deserting the ship, so to speak.  So, as it turned out, my husband drove into town and found a CVS pharmacy that was open and bought three flashlights.  We had hot dogs on the grill and played charades in the dark, and the kids absolutely loved it.  Finally, at about 10:00 P.M., the electricity came back on, and things returned to normal, and we all got a good night's sleep.  We did have to leave the next day, but I'm so glad that we didn't ruin things by leaving the night before.  Kim and Ben had planned so much for this family get-together, and I know she would have been so disappointed if we left just because the electricity was out

On the way home, we stopped at the Museum of Appalachia in Norris, TN.  My next few posts will be all about that.