Living It Up at the Lake: Weekend 1

Fresh off the plane, we started swim lessons for the two Turks. I breathed a sigh of relief knowing the last little Campbell was learning to swim. After our lesson on Friday morning, we headed to Center Hill Lake with my folks and my brother's family. Laid back and fun summarize our weekend. We let some of the kids play and explore the beach and shore while some took turns on the boat. The little ones seem just as happy finding shells and wading in knee high water as anything.

 Big Ben and his two boy cousins showed us they were not afraid to ride the innertube. My oldest nephew kept protective arms around the little ones, well, except in this picture.

 My mom enjoyed watching the little ones play.

 Firstborn got her first taste of learning how to wakeboard.

 Yet another photo of  Big Ben below. I should note here that strangely absent from this post are pictures of Sweet Cheeks, the other Campbellclankid present with us that day. She spent most of her time gathering chiggers into her body with her cousin Ruth. Ruth and Sweet Cheeks are about as opposite as they can be. Sweet Cheeks loves the life of cuddling, curling up in your lap, letting you get her dressed and bathe her, letting her older sisters dote over her. Ruth, I have no doubt, will one day be on a tv show called, "Roughing It With Ruth." She finds wild blackberries and brings them in with stains on her shirt and hands and clothes. She discovers lizards and critters and makes them her pets. She has a darling scratchy little voice, and no challenge is too great for her. I remember seeing her climb up her mama's counter, stand on it, and get herself a cup when she was about 2 years old. She and Sweet Cheeks are different girls, and yet they click as friends. When I was painting Sweet Cheeks' body with clear nail polish to smother all her chiggers, I thought how good it is that we have friends that bring out new things in us. But I also told her to let Ruth get the blackberries from now on!