SUN LAKES ADVENTURES!!!

hi all....
the long awaited sun lakes pictures are finally here! we, once again, had a wonderful trip with friends and family. a nice big group this year. my folks even made the trip on their new 'scooters'. they are basically motorcycles if you aske me. gary and cindy, brandon and greta, taryn, mom likkel, auntie karin, todd and colleen, jason and holly (colleen's brother and wife), dan and his friend, harv. even though we had 20 people, we STILL had extra food so on wedneday night, we are having a 'leftovers' bbq at our place. it was too hot to eat. :) the weather was perfect...well....insainly HOT!!! out on the boat and in the air conditioned trailers were the only place of true relief. the boys did early morning fishing when the weather was pleasant. of course, they let me sleep in! bless them! :) our days were filled with knee boarding, tons of swimming, a tad bit of hiking, lots of snacking, mini golfing, water wars, bug and ant watching among a million other little things. this is the trip that our boys talk about all year long and this year, sun lakes did not disappoint! this year, the wind hit an all time high!! those of us in trailers fared well but those in tents, not so much! we had borrowed my brother Brady's tent and in the night, fell on todd and colleen. in all the years that we've been going to sun lakes, this was the worst for wind damage. although it's tradition, we are seriously looking into moving our location next year...although, by the time we are due to make reservations, i'm sure we'll have forgotten how bad it was. :)
beck. you'll notice that we did bring our 'flat friends' along! since we have 3 boys, i figured, i'd make 3 more flat people out of the triplets. (i copied and pasted from your blog :) ) so, i'll add them to becks envelope and let them share, with their sisters, the summer adventures ahead!! most of the pictures are self explanatory although, i do need to tell you why the five of them are laying in the mud. the boys had a whole colony of ants that they were feeding so they insisted on having the van hofs join them. :) (we washed you)
the last night there, we had a BLAST mini golfing!!! holly, you won!!!! :)
thanks for checking in on us. we'll keep posting since you keep reading!!! :)

return from the pre-camping costco trip......thanks for your help girls....

our flat friends are here!!!

for those of you who don't know my friend, becky, let me tell you about her and her amazing creative abilities!! first of all, she is the mother of 2 girls. mia-9, holly-6 and 3 identical(and i mean IDENTICAL) triplet boys- tyler, lucas and joey. their family is in the midst of a 16 (?) state trip. since their kids were going to be missing their friends, beck and mia, came up with the brilliant idea to create 'flat friends'. the likkel boys decided that they would love to join in on the fun so we created our own. as we speak, they are enjoying lazy days in holland, michigan. my old stomping grounds! (becky grew up just across town from me. we never knew each other until we had a chance to become friends, since our husbands are friends. (wasn't that good of God to bring her into my life at just the right time! :) ) anyways....becky was kind enough to leave her girls behind. ok, not really in person, but in paper. they have already spent the first 2 weeks with the vander veens and the mellemas. today, we started our week with them. we plan on taking them to sun lakes with us. i don't think they have ever been there so it should be a great time. after our week together, beck has started a journal of sorts, to track all the fun. we can add journaling and pictures so that the girls can have something to 'remember' their summer by. we will be adding pictures to our blog and you can check out all of their adventures by checking our her blog at...www.fivesourlimit.blogspot.com

i'm pretty sure that that's the right address. let me know if it doesn't work....