when i was little

we went out of town often. 

it went like this.

shasta lake

camp nelson ( it's in the sequoia national forest )

lake tahoe

repeat. 

each and every summer. 

by the time i got married and had kids of my own i could not, would not go to the mountains ever. i was over it. i declared myself a beach lover, and beach lovers only vacay at the beach. duh.

this week we snuck off for a quick over night trip to the beach. it was great, and i was glad to get out of the 109* heat. however, while lying on the beach trying to keep the sand off of my towel and listening to passers by have the most disgusting conversation ever, that i miss the mountains. 

on Shasta Lake my uncle had a houseboat, a ski boat, jet ski's and a pontoon. why he needed the pontoon i have no idea. actually i do. i think this song explains how he must have felt perfectly. somedays you just wanna float. i miss him. great. now i'm crying. ha! 

a few years in a row a black bear tried to climb aboard the house boat, and everytime my uncle would scream like a girl. you see the trash cans were on the bow of the boat. my aunt and uncle slept on the bow of the boat.  my cousin would bound down the ladder (he slept on top of the houseboat) run through the cabin and grab a the shot gun off the wall and pretend like he was going to do something. i prayed like heck that i didn't get eaten by the angry bear. by the time my cousin made it to the bow the bear was long gone. 

my brother and i would leave Oreo cookies on the bank for the deer. deer love Oreos i bet you didn't know that. they were fun to watch. so brave quenching their thirst only feet from our house boat. we saw snapping turtles, bald eagles and hawks. we played toe fish. oh you haven't heard of toe fish? it goes like this. it a two player game. first you need a gullible child and an adult who enjoys tormenting children. then when gullible child is floating and spalshing in the water having a grand ole time the tormenting adult swims close and shrills "the toe fish are going to get you" and simultaneously pinching your toes. i learned to swim with bent knees and feet sticking out of the water while keeping my toes curled. i am pretty sure that if you could get me in a lake now i would swim the same way.

my moms best friend had a cabin in sequoia. it was always such a fun trip. down by the camp nelson general store there were three little cottages that someone had decorated in story book themes. one belong to the three bears. one to little red riding hood and one to the three little pig. i was told that the recently that the cottages are still there. just beyond the houses was a meadow with a little creek running through the middle. the trees were covered in spanish moss. everything was so green. we would play there for hours and pretend that at any minute the big bad wolf was going to come get us. it was so perfect when a dog would howl while we were playing.  our imaginations ran wild.

my dads golfing buddy had a condo in tahoe more specifically in incline village, and he let us use it. tahoe is beautiful and still one of my favorite place in the world. we would go on boat tours to emerald cove. play on the shore and dare each other to get in the ice cold water. pass by ponderosa ranch (where bonanza was filmed) go to the mint in carson and try our luck at circus circus in reno. there was bowling alley across the street from the condo and a school around the corner. we were a soccer family, every evening my brother and i would kick around the ball in the school yard while my dad prepared dinner. 

i miss the quietness of the mountains and their majesty. the smell of the trees and the cool evening air. 

memories are good aren't they? 

the next chance we get i am for sure taking my boys to the mountains. they have hardly been. i feel like when they were little little i didn't get them out into nature to explore enough and be rough and tumble little guys. so today instead of feeling guilty over it this is my resolve...

it's never too late.

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