We spent last weekend at Pocono Lake in Pennsylvania with some friends from the kids’ school. Here’s a recap!
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I absolutely love lakes. Besides the swimming, which I’ve always loved, there’s also the nostalgia factor. When I was little my family used to occasionally visit my great grandparents in New Hampshire in the summer and spend time at the nearby lake, so lake swimming always reminds me of childhood.
We picked the kids up from school and hit the road for the lake on Thursday at noon. Thursday was actually Wes’s birthday! What a big guy – 2 years old now. Sniff!
(By the way, if you missed it, here’s a Wes + Mama update from a few weeks ago: Wes is almost 2!)
Matt made the kids bacon, eggs, and fruit (in the shape of faces, just for fun) before school on Thursday in honor of Wes. Wes is still at the age where he’s clueless about birthdays, but Riese was super excited and very generously helped him open his presents. 😉
Anyway! There were 11 of us on the trip – 5 adults and 6 kids. The majority of us arrived at the lake in time for dinner on Thursday (paired with a side of intense kid chaos – they were all AMPED after sitting in the car half the day).
Our friend Katie, whose husband Mike’s family owns the place where we all stayed, ordered a couple meals for all of us from Balducci’s so dinners would be easy – brilliant idea! Totally going to do this next time we do a group trip because it was so nice to just heat dinner up vs. try to cook with kids in the mix. Way less dishes to deal with, too! She just ordered it here in Virginia and brought it with them in the car in a cooler.
Thursday’s dinner was Balducci’s fajitas: chicken + steak, veggies, rice, and some guac, salsa, cheese, and sour cream on the side. Very yummy!
It was a beautiful night and the kids needed to get some energy out so we ended up walking down to the lake to check it out. Of course the kids (and therefore a few of the adults) ended up in the water!
Each house has their own dock, and the whole area was very wooded (not very developed at all) which we loved. Apparently the house where we were staying has been in our friend Mike’s family for 100 years!
Everything smelled so fresh – we loved it.
Thankfully the kids went to bed fairly easily and the adults got some chill time each of the evenings. We ended up playing cards, which I loved – I don’t play cards nearly enough and really enjoy it!
On Friday morning, we all had a quick breakfast before hitting the lake. Pancakes, egg muffins (from Balducci’s – similar to this egg muffin with veggies recipe of mine), and fruit hit the spot.
We spent the majority of Friday down at the lake, which was lovely. Riese is really into swimming (with her floaties – need to do some swim lessons…) these days and the two of us had a blast pretending to be mermaids and swimming around together while some of the others were pirates and pursued us on paddleboards/kayaks. 🙂
I also swam across the lake just for fun (I had my goggles with me, thankfully)!
Wes was into playing at the little sandy beach, but not so much the water. Oh well!
We came back to the house for lunch – I had fajita leftovers – and for a few of the littlest kids to nap (including Wes).
Interlude for some bubble fun:
After awhile, we went back to the lake! This was my favorite afternoon of the trip – everyone was hanging out together on the dock, the kids were happy, we had some cold adult beverages and lots of snacks and life was good.
That night for dinner we had spaghetti and meatballs and veggies, also from Balducci’s! I thought I got a photo but apparently I forgot to – oh well. It was yummy and a big hit with all the kids. And so easy and again almost no dishes to deal with most importantly!
Some storms came through on Friday evening, so by Saturday morning it was much cooler out and after breakfast we decided a hike made more sense than swimming.
There were some trails nearby the house (about a 10 minute drive) and it was really nice to be out in the woods! Everything was so fresh smelling from the rain.
The kids did really well, too. Wes has endless energy – he walked the whole way!
The highlight was this cool rock crossing we got to do. The rocks were mostly wide and flat and the water was probably only a foot or two deep so it was perfect. Only one kid fell in (and was quickly retrieved and shockingly unfazed by the whole thing). 😉
Wes definitely wanted to go for a swim and was displeased when we didn’t let him, but mostly all the kids did really well out there!
We had leftover fajitas again for lunch and then it was naps for the little ones + some screen time for the older kids so everyone could chill for a bit.
I actually took a nap with Wes because I was exhausted (he was up at 5:30 that day, oof) and for once I actually felt way better post-nap! (Not always the case – does anyone else often feel worse if they try to nap? I usually do!)
After we all rested we got everyone back down to the lake and unfortunately about 10 minutes after we arrived we heard some thunder. We started slowly packing up, hoping it would pass, when suddenly it started pouring and legit HAILING! What the heck?!
We ended up all sprinting back to the house in the rain and hail carrying crying children, so that was exciting. Total bummer we didn’t get to have one last afternoon at the lake!
After getting all the kids cleaned up and dry, we instead built a fire and had s’mores before dinner! We put a candle in Wes’s marshmallow and sang him a belated happy birthday which was fun.
Here’s the “adorable well behaved children” photo version that was not at all reality (and this is actually a photo from the previous morning… only one missing is Wes who was still asleep). In actuality it was kids running around wild with sharp pokers and marshmallows and chocolate everywhere, but we made it work and no one got hurt!
Dinner our final night was a grill night! Burgers + hot dogs + corn + zucchini. Yummy and very summery! I went back for half a hot dog after this picture:
We drove back to DC right after dinner on Saturday – it’s just easier driving when the kids are mostly asleep and the roads are empty, and we wanted to have Sunday at home to reset before getting back into the weekday chaos.
Wes took forever to fall asleep so it wasn’t the easiest drive, but it was much quicker than the drive up and we were home and had the kids transferred into their own beds by 11pm.
A huge thank you to Mike and Katie for having us! Such a fun weekend with our wild crew. Until next time!
