a little island time, eh?

Yes please. Sign me up. My growing family has found, against all hope, a little slice of the summer during which we can all almost all be together and hit up our beloved and favorite vacation spot: the family island in Canada. (For those of you unfamiliar with this tradition in my family…don’t go thinking we are all refined and snobby and loaded enough to buy our own island…we just happen to reap the benefits of my grandparents decision to buy up cheap Canadian property in the sixties). And yes, we are freaking lucky and you are probably jealous. That is allowed in this situation. You may also be jealous of our matching shirts from two years ago.

In my excitement that the stars and our various calendars have aligned for 2011, I thought I’d post some photos of Canadian Summers Past. My mother was a dear and sent me some oldies-but-goodies. Yes, this is me:

I know. Some of these are cute. Like me (left) and my sister curled up with my dad.

And some of them are not cute. I never did have good post-swimming hair. Still don’t, but this picture absolutely cracks. me. up.

Mmm. I like this place a lot. No electricity. No running water. Just people I love on a teeny tiny island in the middle of a giant lake by ourselves. It’s pretty heavenly.

I believe this next picture is my pick for “Most Winning” and “Least Flattering”. I know I am wearing windpants at least two sizes too big for me, and I’m pretty darn sure there is a shark tooth hanging from that necklace. I had one hot middle school experience, as I’m sure you can imagine.

When I graduated from high school, my parents let me take a few of my closest friends there with just my dad. It was one of my favorite trips, and was pretty completely filled with hillarious things that high school senior girls do. And of course, a few posed photo sessions. I’m too embarrassed to post most of those…

This family road-n-boat trip used to be a given every summer. Now that we’re more spread out and our lives are starting to look more and more different from one another, it can be really difficult to plan. We’re also adding to our family piece by piece, and marriages have brought new people and new experiences to our vacation locale. The last few times we have gone have been excitingly marked as the newest family member’s “first trip to the island”.

First Steve’s…

then David’s…

and this year will be no exception as we giddily welcome Mark’s fiancée Jenna to our “We Believe We Are Part Canadian” club! Sadly, we are not getting 100% attendance this year. My littlest bro Jeffy went and planned his entire summer in Wisconsin, so he will have to miss out on all our adventures this summer.

Can we go today?