The End Of Summer (With Our Family)

The Gang

7:01

It's after 7:00 and everyone is still sleeping in, tired no doubt from yesterday's beautiful day on the lake.  It's a partly morning cloudy morning, 57º, no rain till this evening, a high in the 80's, a great final day for Jill and her family.

Friday was another perfect day at the lake, sunny yet not too warm, perfect weather to be outside on the dock, or under a tree taking a nap.  I did both.  The morning, however, was taken up with a couple of trips to the store, one to Hogan's Hut, to get ice and worms for Halle, anxious to catch a few perch off the dock.  And later, Drew and I drove to the Lighthouse, picked up three and a half pounds of thinly sliced delmonico steak, for our favorite meat, a Hawaiian teriyaki steak dinner.  We then drove to Tops, picked up a 12 pack of Shandies, then on the way home, we bought another dozen ears of corn for dinner and we were set for the day.

Halle Sunfishing

The rest of the day we just hung out and eating a great lunch of pea meal bacon from the Lighthouse, with eggs and Pepperidge Farm White bread, reminding me of my Grandmother who, after I had cut their lawn, would  make me lunch with this kind of bread.  All of us then went out on the dock, to swim and sun, the girls going in around 4:30, leaving the four adults out for an hour, a rare time for the four of us to be together without the voices of grandchildren.  Hayden and Halle were inside getting their rooms cleaned and organized in between checking their idevices.

Dinner Al Fresco, Finally

We started dinner around 6:00, Evie making the rice and salad, Jill the roasted cauliflower  and I grilled the teriyaki steak out side.  Drew and the girls set the table outside, the first time this summer we were eating outside, and dinner was great, Hayden especially loving the teriyaki steak. In fact, it was her call that sent us to get the meat from the Lighthouse.  I am not sure why we haven't eaten outside much, perhaps the weather, the fact we spent a week at Topsail but I can remember a couple of summers where every dinner for a couple of weeks was eaten outside.

Halle

Hayden (stop with the pictures)

Around 8:00, just as it was getting dark, we decided to take a cruise off towards Maple Springs. Unfortunately, I missed seeing a buoy in an area I know well and we hit bottom, bending the prop, a sickening feeling.  We decided to not take a chance and boated home on the bent prop.  I called Chris, my mechanic friend, and he stopped by on his way home from Jamestown, pulled the prop in the dark, put in new plugs, and said he would try to be back this evening with a new prop if they had one around at the marina.  What a great kid.  After boating, we sat around on our machines until the kids convinced us to play spoons.  First, however, we had ice cream sundaes, or rather Halle had a whipped cream sundae.  Jill and I made tin roofs, her favorite, vanilla ice cream, chocolate sauce, and Spanish peanuts, the best.  We then had three rousing games of spoons, fortunately, breaking no chairs or limbs, despite the energetic play.

8:26