Chillin' at Oquirrh Lake

One of my boys favorite summer activities is strolling up to the Oquirrh Lake, a man made lake about a 10 minute walk away. We have a ritual we do every time. It includes: packing plenty of snacks to picnic with, yelling "echo" when we go under the road bridge, throwing rocks at the bridge waterfall area, feeding the ducks, feeding ourselves, strolling up to the top of the highest bridge and chucking rocks into the lake below, and then half running home, putting kids down for a nap, and collapsing! It's fabulous let me tell you. Plus I get my workout of the day by pushing 3 boys in a double stroller uphill....bothways. K, not really but I run back so I'm positive I'm burning serious calories :)

These picnic tables are great because little boys can sit on top of them and be close enough to chuck cheerios to the duck, but still feel a safe distance away from them. Last time it was funny because all the ducks were being friendly and then a big fat goose came and chased them back into the lake so he could hoard all the food we were throwing. He was pretty aggressive and kept circling our table...kinda like a shark. Isaac was quite concerned and kept yelling "No ducky!"

Last time, we decided to break up the routine a little and fly a kite. Elmer Fudd, *ahem* I mean Zekie decided it would be a good idea to free the kite and see where it would go. Amazingly it hopped and skipped all the way across the whole lake, and then made it up and over the chain link fence into the weeds. I thought I would try and teach Zekie a lesson by hoisting him up and over the chainlink and then retrieving the kite. He was soo close to getting it, but alas he "heard" the icecream man and was distracted, and then told me the weeds were too "prickly" for him. Dah. Oh well. Little did I know at the time that my mom would be giving us 7 kites at .74 each! So now we can sacrifice them to lakes, fences, weeds, trees, whatever and then say, well that was fun.

Another fun thing to do at the lake is take one of the free kayaks out for a ride. This is the first year Zekie and I attempted to do so and it was quite the adventure. Zekie of course thought it was awesome...for about 10 minutes and then he was totally done. At that point though we were past the point of no return and I was bound and determined to paddle the entired loop (just check out my chistled arms)! It was a beautiful clear windy sunny day. We saw wildflowers, mountains, bridges, docks, waterfalls, and a beach full of happy sunbathers.

Zekie contented himself with trying to talk the fish into jumping into our boat to take a ride and directing me to either paddle left, right or over the top of the "ghosts"/air bubbles that the oxidate the lake with. Here is Captain Zekie doing a very dangerous stand up spin trick. Good times at the lake :)