Lake of the Ozarks

We took our trip to Lake of the Ozarks this year and decided to extend it to 8 days since I will more than likely be stuck in Pittsburgh for the month of August and won't be taking vacation.

Here's a picture dump of our trip.

We're all packed up and getting ready to leave the house.

Joe and the kiddos in the hotel bed, we drove as far as Junction City, KS the first night and then finished the trip in the morning.

Girls were staying up super late and hanging out at the bonfire with us.

The next morning the view from our porch.

Joe managed to save this turtle off the road and bring it home to a very excited Austin.

Breakfast the first morning at Jolly Roger's.

Paddle boatin' with Dad.

When my parents got there the kids and I spent pretty much all our time on their boat.

Joe was able to put on a professional level fireworks display at the house.

The expectant parents. :-D

It rained a ton a couple of the nights and caused the whole lake to rise up over our sea wall.  Which in turn caused the Governor of Missouri to declare the lake a no wake lake until the water drained.

So we went on very slow cruises.  Complete with Jackson's jumpy seat.

And Austin driving.

And Goose and Helen laying out.

I kept him in the shade most of the time but moved the towel to take this picture.

 'I love Austin's perplexed look here.  Not sure what she is confused about.

These boys, it's always so much fun to watch lifelong friends hang out together.

Lord only knows what Moorehouse has on the other end of this.

These two...

The girls and I went to get our toenails painted for our vacation so Jackson hung out with Dad and "worked on the boat".  Or as I imagine it, played and attempted to put everything in his mouth.  When I asked how it was going at home, this is the response I got.  Boy I sure do love them. :-D

Eek!

It's been about impossible to keep it quiet, but I figured I would wait until they made it "Facebook official".

Tadd and Carri are expecting a baby in November!!!!!!

This was her cute little announcement on her Facebook page.

Camping

Camping with a six month old is about as hard as it sounds.  It took me a week to pack and prepare for everything, but all in all Jackson did wonderfully.


The water level in Glendo Reservoir in Wyoming is so high that the inlet to the lake it's self is actually boat-able.  It feels like you are boating up a river...super cool!

 Joe and Rob hanging out on the front of our boat.

The kids would swarm Trudi and John's campsite every morning with the hopes to score some flapjacks or
as the girls called them "camping waffles".

Just look at that canyon...simply beautiful!

One of the other boats in our group.

The view from our camping site... a bit off the water, but very pretty.

The girls went on a scavenger hunt.

This year we will all up in Glendo to celebrate this beautiful girls' 30th birthday - our friend Anna.

Jackson just loved everything since he pretty much had to be help at the campsite.

And here's Joe's newest love...not the lovely lady Brooke (Hoss' little sister) but surfing behind a boat.  So here we go shopping for boats again. ;-)  Since we can't surf behind ours due to the prop being too far out to the end of the boat.

Thanks to our massive tent "Casa DiFabio" we can fit two air mattresses, a pack and play and a remnant of carpet.

Jackson was an excellent little boater baby and even took a nap while we were coved up.

Don't mind me...

Don't mind me...I'm just hanging out with Mom while she works.

These two aren't allowed to sleep in each other's beds when it's a school night...so summer time has made it super special to limit their personal space while sleeping. ;-)

We took the boat out for our first trip of the season on Sunday...the boat checked out well and Jackson did just about as good as you could expect for a 6 month old.

 We were pulling up to take the boat out of the water so I snapped this after I took off his life jacket. 

And that's one sleepy baby on the way home.

We found a salamander in our pond...Tyler's personality is summed up perfectly by this expression.

Squeaker...

Squeaker our very expressive son, this poor kiddo just needs some words.