So my Aunt & Uncle have a cabin up in Idaho in the Palasades and has been dubbed by Mark as his "dream vacation". This is for 3 reasons: the company, the competition, and the activities (too bad that last one didn't start with a "c").
Company: Usually in a family as large as ours there seem to always be a couple apples that fell pretty far from the tree (I'm not sure if that's the right expression but I'm going with it) But in my family that is not the case. Or maybe it's that we're all oddballs ??? But either way I love being around my family. It is constant fun and activities.
Competition: We are all extremely competitive and not only that but we are always looking for ways to compete. Several of these are organized (i.e., boat races, egg drop competition, scavenger hunts, Dance competitions, Minute to Win its, and Skits) while others are more impromptu (i.e., eating weird things, cooking, puzzple finishing, and lots of board games). It is a big deal to win these competitions!
Activities: In addition to all the planned competitions we also spend several days on the boat wake boarding and wake surfing, we have movies out on the deck, and we go white water rafting on the snake river (it's like 20 min from the cabin).
This was our river rafting group. 
pretty view!
The annual boat races. We take this pretty seriously. You could only use 8 large sticks, 8 small sticks, 2 pieces of paper, and hot glue to make your boat. I tried to mimick the Ether 12 boats "tight like unto a dish" and while the concept was good it was pretty slow! At least it made it whole through all the waterfalls. I guess the Jaredites were more concerned about safety than speed.
The winners.
This was not my boat...but a good example
We went in heats of 6
cliff jumping
Mark used to be really good at wake boarding but only going once a year takes its tole. Last year he wrecked pretty hard core and got a bloody nose doing a flip so he was a lot more careful this year. I keep telling Mark that we are going to be a boat family.....it just may be a while till that happens
hiking group
Conner insisted on walking. Pretty much so he could play in the dirt.
One of my favorite competitions was a photo scavenger hunt. I gave a few of my favorites from different groups.
Where's waldo category
Grandma was a trooper and volunteered in her group for the mohawk from soap
Conner got volunteered to be the cross dresser. I have to admit he'd make a very cute girl. Hopefully my girls have his same sort of looks.
penny's over the eyes dead
fit in a tight place
I love my family and I am so grateful that we are able to do things like this with as big as our family is getting.
