Can't...Move...

On Saturday, David, the girls and I headed north to Bryan's parents' lake house to spend the day jet skiing, wake surfing (hence the "Can't...Move..."), and all around lazing about. It was SO much fun. We would have gotten there about 17 hours earlier, but we followed Sara's emailed directions. A heads up...don't ever follow Sara's directions. There were about 10 turns/roads, and about 8.5 of them were wrong. The "when you come to a T in the road" actually means "when you come to the second T". The "first house on the right" is actually the second house. Etc. God bless her.

Mom and Dad were able to come up and join us and Noah drove down, too. Peter couldn't come because of work. He's headed with the youth group to Centrifuge this week and had to work the weekend. We missed having him there.

We all attempted wake surfing. I have some pretty great video of that and I'm putting together an "epic fail" montage of our surfing endeavors.

The girls were perfect all day long. They loved riding in the boat. We tried to get them to wake surf, but no takers. Maybe next year.

They ADORE animals. Bryan's parents have three huge dogs (Chip, Lewis, and Moose) and one medium dog (Clementine). This is Chip. And yes, we used leashes in the boat house. My kids have never walked anywhere. Their feet hit the floor and PHEW! they're at a full-out run.

Harper and Mom looking for the boats.

Listen, I don't want to hear it about the Auburn hat. I lost my sunglasses in the lake (story in a second) and I did what I had to do. Noah let me borry it.

The only actual pictures I got of anybody surfing. Go, Uncle Noah!

Later in the day, Noah, David, and I decided to go jet skiing. Mom and Dad graciously offered to watch the girls in the house. Kelsey, Bryan's cousin, took one of the jet skis out. We didn't want to hog two jet skis in case Sara and Kim wanted to go out. They have one huge jet ski that carries three people, so we thought it'd be a brilliant idea to take that one and all three ride. Of course, I called dibs on driving first. Before we headed out, Sara warned, "Y'all be careful with that one. It's really powerful. Don't try to throw each other off." Yeah, okay, thanks, Mom.

So, I was driving, Noah behind me, David behind him. I started out straight, made a smooth turn left, saw a boat headed towards us and I squeezed the throttle. I was headed for its wake. It was a small boat, but I figured any wake is better than none. I was used to riding alone, not thinking anything about jumping waves with the extra weight. I sped up. As we got closer to the blue green peaks, I thought, "This probably isn't the best idea...but it's going to be amazing." The nose of the jet ski turned towards the sky as we reached the first wave. Our momentum, increased by the two extra passengers, drove us down over the crest into the trough of the wake and sling shot us straight up over the second wave. The jet ski stopped three feet over the wave, gravity pulling it back down, but the three humans kept going up. Somehow, the force of the wave propelled us to the left, while the jet ski shot out from under us to the right.

As I was flying through the air, my wrist yanked the emergency stop strap free from its place on the left handle. I thought, "Well, that's good, cuz I don't wanna have to swim too far." I hit the water first. I felt Noah close behind me. The rush of the water slammed my head forward, touching my chin to my life jacket. My face felt like it was in an automatic car wash. I pondered many things..."Dag yo! My sunglasses!" "This is probably a good exfoliation." "Mom is going to be so mad if I've killed David and Noah." I eventually slowed after what felt like an eternity, the water becoming softer, more compassionate, and less like swimming through boulders. I shot up and looked around. Nothing. Panic. I spun to face behind me...relief. Noah and David's heads bobbing above the surface several feet away from me. I yelled, "Everybody okay?!" Noah replied, "Yeah. My eyes feel like they were pushed into the back of my skull, but other than that I'm fine." David was quiet, feeling each of his teeth to make sure they were still there. His response, "Are my teeth still there?" We checked. They were still there.

We located the jet ski and swam towards it, feeling like we just got a big hug from a lacrosse team. We got back on, me still driving...I'm surprised they let me...and all agreed, "That was AWESOME!" However, we decided that just two on the jet ski was a better idea, so Noah and I took a turn and then David and Noah went out for a little bit. Sara, you were right...that WAS a powerful jet ski.

Ugh, I'm still so bummed about my sunglasses. I drove around for a second, hoping they would float. Sunglasses don't float, Ruth. Thank goodness I didn't wear my good ones like I almost did. And you know what, that stupid water ripped my ponytail holder out, too. I had to go all cave woman the rest of the day.

Yesterday, we were a little sore from surfing. My neck and shoulders hurt from the jet ski. But, today is much better. Amazing how many muscles you can pull that you didn't even know you had.

Okay, change of subject...yes, how frustrating is HTML, girls. Brandi, it's HyperText Markup Language, which makes as much sense as Cascading Style Sheets. Who names this stuff, honestly? I swear I have ALL of the coding exactly as it's supposed to be and it's still not doing what I want. Obviously, that means I don't have it exactly as it's supposed to be, but still. It's like one little semi-colon is in the wrong place and I can't find it. Booooooo HTML. Maybe we'll figure it out soon. :) If you do, let me know and I'll do the same!