Fourth of July Fun

We had a wonderful Independence Day

at the above "Collin's Compound".

Our friends, Mike and Carol Collins

own one of those beauties

among Mike's siblings cottages.

The homes gaze out over

Long Lake.

We spent most of

the time IN the lake.

In this case in a volleyball

BATTLE.

We also arose early to take advantage

of the smooth, boatless,

mirrorlike water to

WATER SKI.

Sonny is good buddies with Jeff Collins,

who is a masterful water skier.

It was kinda hard to

hold my camera steady on

the bobbing boat.

But what fun to get some

ACTION shots!

Jeff even BARE FOOTS

which means he skies without skies!

Takes a lot of strength to do that.

Here's Mike slick on water skies.

My in laws owned a cottage with

a ski boat, but sold it before Sonny

was old enough to try water skiing.

So this weekend was his

FIRST ATTEMPT.

Here, he's thinking...

this should be a cinch...

Uh-oh....HOLD ON!!!

After a few attempts,

we got him in THIS

position.

Here he's saying...YA-HOOO!

I'm ready for bare footin'!

While the boys wallowed in

water sports...

I pretty much stayed flopped in

this floaty with Carol.

We did manage to drag ourselves out of Long Lake

long enough to visit the scenic Ausable River.

The boys hot-footed it down this sand dune.

My flip flops almost melted from the molten sand, and

I didn't think I could handle the hot hike back UP,

so I stood up top taking these photos.

Michigan was once covered in trees

and early last century was a thriving

 lumber state.

We logged some time at

Lumberman's Monument.

Hubby looks so CUTE!

Michigan spends most of its year in WINTER,

so, as you can see...we try to squeeze every

drop of fun out of summer.

This year, Fourth of July was AWESOME!