Shrine Mont Memories!

What a great wedding place! My Uncle Brian had a wedding at Shrine Mont. I had lots of fun. We played lots of games, too. After about a 3 hour ride, we arrived and got settled in to our cabin named "Washington." We were in the cabin with Uncle Jim and Aunt Brenda, Uncle Mac and Aunt Cindi, Grammy, Pa, Jason, Tanya, and Patrick. We barely had time to go to the pool and swim with our cousins. Grammy took us...THANKS, GRAMMY! Dinner was in a big hotelish diner that had three rooms to it. There were about...30 tables. The people who worked there brought the food to the tables and we passed the dishes of food around. Can you believe they even served dessert? I loved the apple crisp that had an icing whipped creme taste. Just writing about it makes my mouth water...it does...really! After dinner we got to play Corn Hole until dark. I won a couple games and lost LOTS! I'm not a very good player (giggle, giggle), but I do have a great time and spirit. We finished the night by playing games in the room off of the dining hall. Mom brought a huge bag of games for everyone to share. We loved it!!!!! This will make you laugh...Uncle Jim dunked my head into a freezing water/ice bucket after the water and juice boxes were out of it. All I did was put two ice cubes down his back. Which do you think is worse? Two ice cubes down your back or your head DUNKED in a freezing water bucket? You decide which I think is the freezing water bucket. It was after 11:00 before we got to bed...yahoo (lol).

The second day we were there was the day of the wedding. Breakfast was at 8:00 so we had to get up by 7:30. We were SOOOO tired! After breakfast we got to play on the playground. One thing that I really loved was that we could go anywhere we wanted as long as we told our parents where we were going. That's because it's a very safe place. Can you believe that we didn't even lock our bedroom door? After the playground, we went to have a water balloon fight. Now that was some fun! The pool was next and we went with our uncles and cousins, too. I loved how the pool was shaped. It had a ramp into the water so that it was extremely shallow at the top and then it got deeper and deeper until it was 5 feet deep. It reminded me of a wheelchair ramp.

Before long, it was time to get ready for lunch. After lunch we went for another playground visit and a quick swim. Since the wedding was at 4:00, we had to hurry back to get ready. The next thing you knew, we were at the steep hill to the wedding. My Pa was the minister who married Brian and Sonia. Tony, Sonia's son, asked Santa to give them two shiny rings for Christmas. To his amazement, he got them! I was amazed to see that Santa gave the rings. He went to find them just for Tony. I can't believe that Tony would do that, he must be pretty special to do that! At the wedding there were "oohs and aaahs" when Brian told the story. I have a feeling that there might have been a few tears from the story. We got pictures taken and then went to the reception at the pavilion next to the pool.

The reception was like a party with music and dancing. Evelyn and I got our faces painted and got our wedding clothes all dirty. Actually, Evelyn's face was stained PINK! I had a tiger face and a new friend with it. This little boy was scared of me at first because he thought that I was a real tiger. Then he got used to it and wasn't scared anymore. Believe it or not, he followed me around. People enjoyed playing Corn Hole, soccer, and even baseball. I loved the fact that there was Sprite and Grammy brought cranberry juice to mix in. It was SWEET! Evelyn learned a new word from Uncle Aaron about the "fizz" in Sprite. It was effervescent!!!! She loves saying that new word. At the end of the wedding we all danced to the music. Mila helped Evelyn learn a new dance and she's still talking about it! Unfortunately, the DJ had to go to West Virginia so the music ended. We went to bed after 11:00 AGAIN!

Our last day we had to get up at 7:30 for breakfast at 8:00. I was exhausted and could barely move. I wasn't even sure I wanted anything for breakfast because I was so pooped. After breakfast we got to go the playground without parents, just with our cousins. Then back to Brian's cottage for some more playing with family and friends. Mom left us there and went to pack up. When she returned we went to a spring. We drove with 10 people in our car and it was PACKED. One of us went in the back and sat down on some of the luggage. We were all on top of each other. At the spring, we had to walk only a little ways to it. The water was extremely cold. I only stepped on rocks. I was speechless when Tony, the smallest of them all, went ALL the way in...face first and his whole body under the water. He definitely deserves a prize for being so brave! We only stayed for a short while because a storm was on the way.

When we finally got back, it started to sprinkle and then it poured down rain with booms and bolts of lightening and thunder. We gave hugs and fast kisses to everyone before running to the car for shelter. That was the good part. Here comes the bad part. On top of the car was this bag that wasn't waterproof. It got everything up there soaking wet...even Evelyn's suitcase. By the end of the trip we were all quite hungry so we stopped for Chinese in Montpelier. Poor Mila had to drive for another 3 hours. We loved having her on the drive!!!!

Thanks for the great memories!
Rolling out-
Jacob