Update #4 - Our Michigan Trip (part 3)

The rest of the week was spent reading (my sisters and I were hooked on the Twilight series... once I finished one book, I passed it to Melinda, who passed it to Liane...) and playing at Crystal Lake. Papa has vivid childhood memories of his summers here, playing at the beach owned by the Congregational Summer Assembly. So of course, we went to the same beach and made some amazing memories for our kiddos.

Melinda got to show off her new, super rad tattoo...
and then she, Rick, Violet, Papa, Liane, and Carl (and some random kid) all swam out to the dock in the lake... and they all did a super family cannonball!
I love that, in this picture, Carl is completely gone... Papa is the highest, Melinda is being crazy, and Rick is pasty white ;)
After a long day at Crystal Lake, we always would spend our evenings on the Lake Michigan shore, watching the sunset, skipping rocks, and roasting marshmallows by the fire.

These two short people crack me right up.
Skipping rocks at sunset on the lake... what could be better?
oooo Carl knows! Piling rocks into towers!
Of course our time at Crystal Lake wouldn't be complete without stopping at the A&W for their famous root beer floats. And, well, they were freaking awesome.
Each day when we got to the Assembly beach, the kids would go out and make friends. Sometimes they would hunt for guppies underwater, play tetherball, or pretend to kayak around the lake.

I love this picture of Rick :)
And of course, Violet would find a way to amaze us.
Riley loved "surfing"
Our suntanned family!
I loved our time at Crystal Lake. It was like going back in time there... everything was just a little slower paced, a little quieter. I wish there was a way to transplant this lake to somewhere close to us. I would spend every summer there, too. :)