Mountains. And rain.

Rain, rain, go away.

We were able to salvage a little bit of the day and spend some time outside. Thankfully.

We are in the Poconos to visit with some old family friends. My mom met her best friend, Susan, in middle school and they have remained close all of their lives. When us kids were growing up, we had annual trips with the "G" family, including long weekends in their mountain house in the Poconos (they live in Jersey normally). Susan and her husband, Vinny, have two kids that are right around the same age as my brothers and me, so we made perfect playmates (when we weren't all fighting).

As we all got into high school and college, the visits to see each other became more and more infrequent until we weren't doing them at all. Last year, Susan and my mom decided that we needed to start getting together again. And so the Poconos trips started up again. We had so much fun together last August that we are now aiming to do this every year. So this year was our second annual gathering. :)

We woke up pretty early and spent much of the morning lounging around the house. Finally, we decided that we had to get out for a bit, and the rain had let up enough so that we could.

My brother, Trevor, on his ATV.

Tessa, enjoying her time off of her leash. She doesn't get to do that at home. She loved it.

Doug (Susan's son) and Michael down by the lake. The lake is on the G family's property. You can also see their two standard poodles in this photo, Indy and Sashi. Tessa, too.

The fountain in the middle of the lake.

My other brother, Tyler, on his ATV.

Michael and me (and Tess)

Doug went out in the paddle boat to try to fish in the middle of the lake. Apparently, Indy and Sashi always HAVE to go with him. If he leaves them on the shore, they bark, whine, and cry the entire time he is out there. One of them will actually try to follow him out there, get scared, and then they have to get in the water to rescue her. Ha! Obviously easy to just give in and bring them to begin with.

Michael in the G family's gazebo next to their lake.

Pretty view of the lake and some of their property.

More property. We took a short hike through some of the trails with the dogs.

We spent some more time around the house, just hanging out and talking together. My brothers, their girlfriends, and Michael took a trip to the grocery store to pick up some more beer and a few things for dinner. We all watched a movie (Shooter), and then we started making a delicious dinner. Susan had some frozen stuffed shells, and we also made additional pasta with meat sauce. I put together some fabulous garlic bread, and we also had salad. Yum. And then Susan busted out an apple crisp that was pretty damn good as well.

Vinny and Nina (Susan and Vinny's daughter) arrived just in time for the majority of us to sit down and watch the presidential debate with a couple bottles of wine. :)

All in all, a good day, even though the weather has been less than cooperative.