Life's Moments: Lake House Trip

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Lake House Trip

We arrived at the lake house late on Thursday night so we could take full advantage of the two full days we would be there. On Friday morning after making a trip into town for groceries and a fishing license, Brian tried some fishing off the pier while Hailey played in the sand and water. She had fun building a little sand castle and finding rocks in the water. Hailey and I then walked over to the pier and apparently brought Brian some good luck, because he ended up catching two large mouth bass right after that. We went inside to get some lunch when Hailey started itching her legs and arms...oh no! Swimmer's Itch! We had even rinsed off her legs and arms twice prior to that, but obviously not good enough. Thankfully the next door neighbor had some stuff to help get rid of it and another neighbor said it's always bad for the first hour...yes, Hailey's not the first to get it up there. In case you've never heard of swimmer's itch, it is caused by parasites that normally live in freshwater snails, but are released into the water on warm sunny days. The parasites burrow into human skin and cause the skin to break out into a rash. Humans aren't good hosts for them, so they die quickly, but the rash continues for a couple days. Hailey seemed to get better an hour and a half after using the over-the-counter cream and only itched (very briefly) a few times again within the next 24 hours. Since it was the heat of the day at this point, we decided to drive into town and do a little shopping. We also picked up a pizza at the Minocqua Pizza Co...a suggestion we got from an employee at the fudge shop. It was pretty good pizza! After dinner, we headed out on the lake for a boat ride. Brian ended up catching another large mouth bass, but Hailey's fishing attempts were unsuccessful. She was patient at first, but after a few casts with no bites, she was telling Brian he needed to go to a different spot cause "there aren't any fish here." We tried a couple more spots she suggested with no luck and by that point, she said she wanted to go back to the house. :-)

Saturday's forecast was calling for isolated thunderstorms and when we got up, it was overcast, cool, and windy. Brian tried a little more fishing off the pier and then out in front at the pond, but nothing was biting. The lake was too choppy to go for a boat ride, so after playing at the park for a little bit, we drove back into town to go to a couple stores that have home decorating items. I was excited, because I found several things I had been looking for! After lunch, we went back out on the boat to try more fishing. The water was still very choppy, so we couldn't go very fast or we'd get sprayed with lots of water! We tried out a smaller, calmer lake, but again didn't have much luck with fishing, so we came back in. A young family owns a condo two doors down from my parents and their youngest son was out playing in the yard. I had gotten bubbles out to let Hailey chase around and she said to him, "Hey, do you want to come chase the bubbles with me?" He said, "Sure!" She said, "What is your name?" He said, "Mario" very quietly. She said, "Oreo?" :-) Thankfully he didn't hear her say that and I quickly corrected her with "Mario." They chased the bubbles and then they wanted to go play on the playground for a little bit. Shortly after they started swinging, a rain shower moved through, so we had to go in. We had some dinner before going to see the Lumberjack Show at 7:30. Four lumberjacks participate in 10 different logging competitions...pole climbing, hand sawing, log rolling, etc. They throw in some cheesy comedy and the result is a fun hour of entertainment. One of the lumberjacks is nationally known for hand chopping and another holds the world record (three years in a row now) for chainsaw carving an animal out of wood in 34 seconds! Too bad we didn't get to see him do that, though! We stopped at a little ice cream shop on the way home and got a scoop of ice cream. Hailey got rainbow sherbert which she really liked!

We headed home early on Sunday, around 9:30 am, so we could get laundry, grocery shopping, and such done at home. This trip was sort of impromptu, because we were actually supposed to go up next weekend. However, my mom let us know that the roof was being replaced up there starting next weekend, so we decided to go this weekend instead.