mason lake

Before you sink your teeth into this long blog post, please please please click here and go vote for my friends in the John Kelly Band to move on to the final round in the CBS Early Show "Living Room... LIVE!" contest. Vote a LOT, then come on back here and take a gander at the photos from our vacation. I'll wait right here.

Okay, on with the show.


This is the first photo I took on our trip. It made me laugh at first, and then I became sad to realize that even toilet handles need to be held sometimes, too.

Here's Henry with his auntie Amy and his Mimi on the dock.


We took Henry out on the motorboat a lot, usually to take him to the lodge for meals. This time we went out to go fishing. I promise that he wore a life-jacket 98% of the time, and we only took it off here so that he could use his arms better to fish with Timon.


See? Life-jacket on.


Even the boat captain wears a life-jacket.


Here's all the cousins, their spouses, and children. We are a growing group - one of Timon's cousins announced her 3rd pregnancy last week!


Mason Lake is full of gorgeous natural sights, including this view of one of the several lakes on the resort property...


... and these deer, whom the resort owners will feed all fall and winter, along with their many hundreds of friends.


We finished up our trip with a visit to Henry's godfather and our friend, Chad. He took us to this cool park where Henry had a blast doing this:


And I think we all enjoyed this too:


It was a lovely trip, as always. This place is my idea of paradise. Only 51 more weeks until we go back!