Something Fishy...

Now for the Fun!

Ok, got the downer posts out of the way. Here are the pics of the fun, by theme. I will start with the theme that takes the MOST of my photos. The Birds. This year, we were visited, not only by the regular Loons, but also by a baby Loon. I have never seen a baby in person...so fun! The baby even hobbled on to our beach to use the "bathroom" one afternoon! She was clearly out of Mom and Dad's reach at that point and they quickly called her back out to the lake! (This is only a SMALL fraction of the pictures of Loons we took this week!)

 Open Beak, Insert Fish

 Grab a Drink

 Swallow

 The Whole Fish Down the Hatch

 Expand Neck

 And Done.

 Hello!

 Preening

 This close!

 Baby Baldy

 Big Blue

And one more baby...a HUGE baby Bald Eagle...flew in on us while we were waiting for dinner at Ernie's!

The Big Blue (Blue Heron) was at Maddens, hanging out on a downed tree.

The Itch

Ok, I have a picture of the the three worst cases, but it's on my phone so I will add in a minute...(Ok, my phone is not talking to my computer...still working on it...)

The first day we got there, we unloaded all the cars, and since the kids were really helpful this year, they got to go swimming in the evening. Then all the next morning they were in the water until lunch...when they all started itching...badly! For the first few hours, there was no rash, so we thought maybe it was a new sunscreen they had all used. But by bed time this rash appeared (which is actually "better" in this picture than it was). First we thought it was chiggers, but by morning it was pretty clear it was more likely swimmers itch. We took the three worst cases to Urgent Care for some meds and spent the rest of the week fighting Riley to take them! Turns out, each person has a different sensitivity to this and so some of them were fine after just some Benadryl, but I would say Riley has very little pain tolerance and she maybe got it the worst! (Although Kiley's tummy was a MESS of polka dots!) The rest of the week, we had to put a special sunscreen that was a barrier to protect from swimmers itch. It was kinda stinky, but it worked! We didn't have to stay out of the water!

Where to Start?!?

Ok, back from our annual trip to Nisswa with my family. This year's trip had a few roller coaster "adventures" so to speak. In clouding Swimmers itch x 6 and car sickness and other strange quirks. But we still managed to squeeze in some fun, fish, and relaxing flops on the beach.

I will start with the pictures that are maybe the hardest to see. Two weeks before our trip the area was hit with 100 mile an hour straight line winds. The resort where my mom and sisters spend Girls Weekend was one of the hardest hit areas, so we toured the area one day without the kids to see how bad it was. While all the resorts are now open again, Maddens and Craguns were forever changed. Some of the buildings at Maddens are not open yet, although the restaurants, amenities and most of the golf courses are back up and running. Two courses will remain closed for the season. Crayons lost something like 60% of it's trees! It's hard to see, but the area is determined to rebuild and the community is strong up there! But they want people to know they are open for business and ready for tourists!

The first 7 pictures are from the road leading up to the house where we stay. Lake Hubert was the end of the destruction which started at Gull Lake, and thankfully, only two trees were down on the property. The tree did take out the front deck and door, but we could still access the house from the side and the back and the front was repaired by Monday. Meg has better pictures on her blog of the damage to the front of our place. The rest of the pics are from Maddens. We didn't get pictures from Craguns because we didn't get there to see the damage. My parents did, and they said it was maybe even worse there.