Monday Memory - Cypress Hills

OK I know this is one day late.. shoot me :) It has been a miserable last couple months with record breaking rain and snowfall out here on the west coast and going for my walk today I was thinking of summer and camping. Which brought me up to the memory of our week long annual camp that our family did when we were growing up to Cypress Hills Provincial Park ever summer. Now to those of us from a tiny town of about 500 people if you count numbers on a long weekend with visitors, going to a national park for such a long time and to drive such a long distance with 6 kids was a feat in itself!!

But it was the first of many vacations our family did together and it was the one thing my mother insisted that we go ALL TOGETHER including my father. The second thing that she insisted on was that he was not allowed to go to the bar while we were there. It was always an amazing trip filled with many many memories. One especially, my only sister Adele and my 2 older brothers, Dan and Claude and our parents gave us permission to take paddle boats out on the lake. We had never done this before or at least not to my recollection. We ran around ourselves in circles trying to get them to go straight so we could go from one end to the other but we couldn't coordinate it no how. But we laughed and laughed and splashed one another. It was a Kodak Memory Moment for sure...one that has shaped my idea and beliefs of family vacation to my life now.

Our parents were almost like real parents, letting us be kids, no fighting, no bickering, I mean they even went swimming in the pool with us!!! And now as I think of my siblings and our families I see the next 3 generations doing the same thing, as in camping together, forming new roots, forging new memories and that pleases me tremendously!!I'm glad they have kept it up. When we have our family reunion this summer I think we should have this HUGEOUS campfire that we can legally make without letting Keith or Claude anywhere near it with a gas can or anything that looks like a gas can!

Good Memory to be able to share with you even if it is one day late.