Long Overdue Visit to Crystal Lake

So the question is whether the visit to my family's cottage was overdue, or is this post simply overdue? Well, to me the yearly visit to the cottage is always overdue, as it is one of my favorite places in the world. But, since we were there about 5 weeks ago, I guess this posting is just as overdue. I fell off the blogging wagon again - both writing on ours and reading on other people's blogs, but I'm going to try to catch right back up. To start, I wanted to post some pictures of our relaxing time in northern Michigan the first week of August. The weather was wonderful, and we had a great time just lounging around the beaches, walking in the woods, and going for bike rides and walks. It was just what we needed. My parents and sister Jody and her kids Ethan and Owen came, and my aunt, uncle, and cousins were there as well. We also got to see some grandparents, and a couple of visitors. Here's some pics from the week:

Elsie loving the beach time.

Watching her brother jumping around in the water

The bigger splash, the better

Turning into a little fish already

Elsie at Pointe Petsie on Lake Michigan

Jess warming up with his daddy

Elsie seemed to like the sand more than the water.

Abby (our former nanny) and her boyfriend Justin came up for a day -- the kids were really happy to see her again and sad to see her leave.

Great Grandma Mulder (my mom's mom)

Great Grandma Heeringa (my dad's mom)

Great Grandpa Jess Heeringa (my dad's dad). This is who Jess is named after.

Last year we got the cutest picture of Ethan and Owen holding Elsie and Jess, and we wanted to start a tradition of snapping a picture every year. However, during the toddler stage, this can be very difficult. This is the best picture we could get of all the cousins together.

Very intent on playing with pebbles

Ethan and Jess watching Owen's old Elmo videos

Grammy and Elsie

Grampy and Elsie and the favorite activity : reading books.