Labor Day Weekend

A few months back my co-workers Barb, Shawn (left) and I started planning for a fun, long weekend in Bull Shoals, Arkansas - located in Northern Arkansas in the Ozark Mountains. Barb grew up in the area and was very familiar with the area and always enjoys her time there so she wanted her friends from work to join her and her family over the holiday weekend!

Barb's family - hubby David and daughters Natalie and Maddy and Shawn's family - wife Becky, son Blake (11) and daughter Sheridan (5) all headed south for a great time!

We left Friday after Hunter got home from football practice and headed on the five hour journey. We arrived at the cottage around midnight on Friday night. We unloaded the truck and settled in for the night ... excited for the next day's big events!

Me, waiting for the crew to load up on the boats so we could frollick in the water!!

The kids on the dock in front of our cabin.
Dayne jumping off the dock! The water was so clear we could see all the way to the bottom!

SATURDAY: We all slept in 'til about 9:30, ate breakfast, made lunch to pack in the coolers and loaded up the boats for a day out on the lake! We settled into a cove and were having fun, minding our own business when the "Confederate Mafia" started interloping ... one boat at a time until they had literally enclosed us in the cove! All was well, until their puppy lab "Princess" accidentally knocked down one of the toddlers and started chewing on the kids' toys. The owner came to retrieve the dog .... but a while later, Princess - and a companion - honed in on the area again and all hell broke loose when someone (in our party) picked up a rock. (I admit, I was not comfortable with this move, but I didn't know the fella so I just minded my own business.)

Once the interloping party goers noticed that he had a rock in hand they got pretty excited and even got so crazy as to compare "us" throwing a rock at the dogs with them throwing rocks at our kids! Influenced by four glasses of home made beer (by aforementioned would be rock thrower), Shawn intervenes and tells the lady that our real problem is that our kids have to smell their smoke. Awww shit. "Oh no he didn't say that" was the general attitude of the Interloping Pirates now. As soon as he said it the ladies went off like nobody's business! "This is a public beach our dogs can be here ... we've been coming here for 10 years ... this is OUR beach!" Yes, the same beach she identified as public was now theirs and had been for 10 years. At one point, I took a good look around me and noticed that ALL the interloping pirates were looking at us. I'd guess there were probably 30 pirates. Needless to say, not one of the more comfortable moments in my life! Eventually they retreived their dogs and went back to their boats. About 15 minutes later, we decided we were going to leave (we had just been discussing leaving, prior to the "incident" .... so it wasn't really as if we left because of their comments. Although, I am sure they thought they had showed us whose beach that was!).

I should mention that Shawn is not an avid boater. In fact, this may have been his first time driving a boat - he is from Chicago and a city boy all the way! I helped Shawn push the pontoon off the shore and he gets all sorts of turned around and now the boat becomes parallel with the shore. I get out of the boat and give another shove - and a good one. Shawn is well on his way out of the cove .... but without me!! I am being left behind with the Confederate Pirates!! As I am swimming along side the boat Shawn is looking dead at me pushing the throttle forward. He is looking at me and I swear he is thinking, "Oh! Did you want on this boat?" I toss my shoes on board (they were weighing me down!) and have to swim to the front of the boat. Mind you Shawn is new to the operation of a boat so as I am in front of the pontoon I have a clear view of the motor. This served as a source of adrenaline to get my fat ass in the boat - quick!!! I will admit, I was laughing during the ordeal, it was funny! So I am finally on the boat and as we are coasting away they moon us. Nice. Perfect ending to the ordeal.

We went along and visited some bluffs and settled into a different cove for a while longer. About 5:00 we headed back to the cabins to start dinner - burgers, beef kabobs, mac-n-cheese, green beans and lots of other yummy eats! That night we all sat around and ate dinner and talked and talked and talked. We all got a great insight into Barb's family and what influenced her to be the way she is! : ) She is a hilarious character!!

SUNDAY: On Sunday morning Graden, David, Shawn and Hank (Barb's dad) went golfing. They got back to the cabin about 2:00 and we headed back out to the water! We found a (safe, pirate free) cove and swam for a few hours. Then we headed out to the cliffs to watch people jump from the cliff (we didn't see anyone jump) and did some deep water swimming - Dayne loved jumping off the boat into the water! The water was about 125' deep where we were! The water is clear and clean and very beautiful! The temperature was about 85 degrees!

We headed back to the cabin for dinner and enjoyed brisket, salad, green beans, potato casseroles and many other tasty foods!

Graden and I, sitting around the dinner table chattin' away!!

Not real sure why Graden looks frightened ...

The kids played hide - n - seek, water balloons and painted their finger nails the adults sat around and enjoyed a few beverages and talked into the wee hours of the night!

Hunter was dubbed, "Survivorman" during our time at the lake. He spent a lot of time wandering around and being naturesque. He had four kabobs in his hand one morning and when I asked what he was doing he explained he was going hunting. He caught two grasshoppers and skewered them. Mmm ... just like Survivorman on the Discovery Channel! I guess his name IS Hunter, huh!??

Check out time was 10am on Monday morning (eww, a little too early for our liking!) so we loaded up and hit the road about 10:45! We ran into a few traffic jams and stopped to eat at Braums (yummy ice cream!) so we didn't get home until 4:57 (the kids and Graden had a bet as to what exact time we'd get home - Graden won). It was a nice, relaxing time!