Little Pond, Near Squam Lake. NH

View from the screened porch

I have never been a water person at all. In fact, after 2 near drownings, once in a river and once in a pool, I was mortally afraid of going into deep water as a child. When I was around 13 or so, and hanging out at the pool at the mobile home park I lived in, staying in the shallow end of the pool really became embarrassing. I was a good swimmer, but felt mortally terrified if I couldn't touch the bottom. However, personal embarrassment can be very motivating and one day I just dove into the deep end and swam to the shallow area. I still preferred to swim in pools, rather than bodies of water, but at least I conquered at least one issue that day. And I have kept swimming. I have done many, many laps over the years, especially while I was pregnant.

For the last few years, I have been feeling like we really needed to have a vacation on a lake. This seemed odd because of my pool preference, and also because I have never really done much boating or anything like that either (I get motion sickness very easily). But since I try to pay attention to my instincts, I told Doug we should do a lake vacation this year, since we had decided not to do a full on vacation in Cape Cod (I only go into the ocean up to my waist, by the way) this year.

And so, first thing on our first morning at the lake I found myself swimming along with the kids, from the landing outside our rental house out to a dock, in a very cold lake. Then before I knew it, I was in a canoe with my son, paddling around the lake. Luckily, my kids have not inherited my water fears (I was always careful not to show any of that to them) and they were very helpful in showing me how to use the oars, as well as helping me with the kayak, another experience I have missed out on. Always good to have scouts on hand, who have been kayaking, canoing and swimming for years already. Heh.

With the exception of the two days that it rained, we were in the lake several times each day. Doug took the kids fishing quite a lot and we played a lot of board games and cards. We spent a day shopping at the outlet stores in North Conway, and on another day we went to The Flume Gorge and I took the younger kids on a gondola ride at Loon Mountain, which was very cool (Doug and I did this last year on our little trip to NH) yet unbelievably terrifying. Doug stayed at the bottom with our older son who refused to go on the ride.

Besides spending so much time with the kids, my favorite thing about this vacation was sitting on the screened porch reading books! I read two whole books and got about halfway through The Great Deluge, which coincidentally, I started reading this on nearly the exact day that Hurricane Katrina wiped out New Orleans. I am making an effort to continue to read more each day, mostly because this is a really good book and I'd like to finish it before I forget the first part of it.

Anyway, even though it was a great vacation, we are all glad to be home. I am having some trouble getting back into the flow of things, and am feeling distracted and a bit scattered. But I think things will be smoother when the kids go back to school tomorrow.

Surely you can hear my big sigh of relief about that!