Behind the boat

 So here's the final post people................and it's some of the shots we got from behind our boat.
Grandpa got this wedge and it was a hit for the kids.  It was next to impossible to get the kids off of this thing no matter how hard my brother in law tried.
So the kids felt safe on this.
Great shot of my nephews who had a blast on this thing.

 Here's Masaru with his two cuzzies on the wedge having a blast.

 These guys were almost inseparable the whole trip.

 This is my favourite one of Masaru.

 This is my favourite one of all of them.  Proof that they were loving it and how safe it really was..................since most of them aren't even holding on.

 We went to find these sand hills one day and so in order for all of us to go and adhere to the rules we had to take all of these guys behind us so only 10 of us were on the boat,  well Emiko was on there too but does she really count as a full person?

 It was like another one of our floating circus'
People were waving and smiling as we went past them.
I would've found it entertaining as well.

Here's Uncle Chris and the little kids on the wedge.

 Here's some proof that I was there.
Emiko LOVED the boat.
So any opportunity I got I either took her or asked Dru to take her on the boat.
It kept her happy the whole time we were moving.
She looks serious doesn't she?
But I assure you, she loved it.

Then we have wake boarding.
Most people had a turn wakeboarding.
Here's Yuki 'wakeboarding' with her father. Here's Takeshi wakeboarding with his father. So cute.

And here's Dru finally being able to wakeboard on his own.

Even though he hasn't been in over a year, it amazes me how he can just get out there and do this.
Have I ever said how sometimes it's tiring being married to a Nakaya due to all their mad ninja talents that seem to come so naturally.................?

There's our houseboat in the background on the right..............

Here's a better shot of it.

So that's all folks.
Aren't you glad I did it in four posts instead of just making this one GIGANTIC post?
You're welcome.

I"m really happy that no one was injured and everyone had a good time and was safe.
We prayed fervently every night for it to be like that then when we got home thanked Heavenly Father fervently that we all arrived home safe, sometimes being surrounded by water, even though fun, can be a hazard and isn't without it dangers.
I'm sure everyone has heard of a horrible 'lake powell' story and I'm glad to say that this year our family had no personal ones to share.
Always makes for a fun time.
I really love Dru's family a lot.  I think I've said it before but if I had to be away from my family, which I am, I'm really glad that I have Dru's family as my family away from home to love and support me and show me a good time and over the years they've scored an A+ in all areas.
Sorry you all cant' be married to a Nakaya, they're all taken now and all of us in-laws are lucky to have snagged them before anyone else could.....................am I right in-laws?
Give me a 'hell yeah'..............................boooooooyaaaaaaaaaaaaa
LOL
Alright enough said...................

The Blob

This thing is called the 'Blob' and it was a ton of fun for me watching and for them doing.
Well there were a couple of injuries and children who swore never to set foot on it again, but A+ for them giving it a go and I'm hoping we'll still be able to bring it down with us in years to come.
Other boats would stop and watch and one even came over and had a try themselves.
Fun times.
Here's my brother in law having a turn.
It took a bit of practice but then they finally got the best way to launch people.

I love these two shots of my nephew.

Here's Dru being launched and my sister in law took photo's while I took video.
She captured him in this ninja type pose.
I thought it was hilarious.

Then Masaru thought he'd give it a go.
After watching some of his cousins in tears he had strict rules before he'd do it.
He only wanted one of his twin cuzzies to launch him.
NO ONE BIGGER.
Smart kid.

Are these pictures not awesome?
And below is the video of him being launched.
I loved that we had this.
It made it that much more fun to be down there.
If you're interested I heard these are around $800.................................lucky our friend let us borrow it cause that's a lot of money to part with for a once a year piece of entertainment.

Lake Powell fun

So we brought Emiko's bouncer so she'd have something to do while we kept an eye on her. I'm glad we bought this as it was useful some of the time.

Here she is bouncing for all to see.

We did a lot of sitting around and talking, reading, taking photo's, eating and watching different boats go by and children play and laugh.
The children loved the canoe that their grandfather had and would take turns paddling themselves around the lake. It was great exercise.
Here's Yuki having a turn on the canoe.

 Here grandpa is taking the view in while getting some exersize.
I think I'm going to frame this shot of Dru's father actually.  Don't you think it's a great shot of him?

 Then we had this trampoline for the kids to play on.

 It helped pass the time in a fun way.

 Masaru trying to 'beat' the log.

 I wonder what they're discussing?  It looks to me as if Dru's got something shady in mind.

 To surprise Chris in an attack off the tramp.

 Success.........

When the weather was a little hot or kids were exhausted they would come in for a quick movie before heading back outside for more fun.
A couple of times I had to get Takeshi off the bed due to me NOT wanting him to fall asleep.
I needed that kid asleep at 7:30pm and not a second later so there was NO NAPS ALLOWED for him.
Then there was cliff jumping.
Here's Auntie Kristin and Tess jumping in with Yuki, which I'm very proud of her for doing by the way.

You'll have to turn your heads to the left due to the fact that this was my brother in law taking the video and I guess he doesn't know that turning the camera upright means tilting our heads when viewing on the blog.........   Ah also I guess he was still trying to figure out how to use our camera so just stop watching it after 5 seconds as the rest of the 40 seconds is him trying to figure out how to turn the camera off........
Here's Dad and Takesh cliff jumping together. Here's Yuki and Dad cliff jumping together. Here's Masaru cliff jumping with his cuzzies.

There's just a few of the fun things we entertained ourselves with while on the houseboat for the week.
I've got two more 'fun things to do in lake powell if you're a Nakaya' left to post and then that'll be it.
You should be excited..............I am ;)

Lake Powell

So with the millions of photo's and video's I took I had to figure out how to break this up or it'd be the biggest post I've ever done.
So this post is about Lake Powell and the house boat.
So here's a few shots of Lake Powell.
This is the view we had each morning waking up.
I know................stunning right?

Here's the other side of the boat and the view.
There wasn't a day that went past that the thought didn't cross my mind of how beautiful this place was and how blessed we were to be down here.

See that canoe?
That's how small and insignificant we are compared to this place.

The kids loved playing on these rocks.

Now you should be able to see the canoe better right?
Beautiful.

Here's the room that Dru and I stayed in with all of our kids.
Emiko was in that back left corner in her own little space.  Dru and I slept in front of her.  The two older kids were on the other bed at the front and Takesh was underneath that in a little nook on the floor.
It worked out great and we were happy with this room.
Dru told me when he used to go as a kid they'd just use the bedrooms as a place to put their bags cause they'd all sleep up top.
I remember sleeping up top the one year we went when we had zero kids.
I think it was really nice.
That's a long time ago though and my brain can't be trusted.
I think it might be nice to be able to sleep up top again in about 5 years!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here's the master bedroom.
Dru's parents slept in here and loved it.
His mother said she had a more comfortable sleep on this bed than her tempurpedic bed at home?
So it must've been nice.
They had sliding doors to the back of the boat. 

Here's the living/kitchen rooms.  It was really nice.  We had enough space for all our food and enough seats to be able to eat together nightly as a family.

Here's the other view of the livingroom/kitchen.
There were two other rooms that his sister and brother took.
Almost all of the other kids slept up on top of the boat at nights.
There were huge pods full of pads for them to use as well as chairs and a bar with a small fridge up there and a slide from the top into the water.

Emiko did average on this trip.
She required a lot of attention and it was tough for me to have a great time on this trip because of it.
She's pretty cute though right?
She did great at nights and the one good thing about her is when she wakes up she doesn't scream, she'll just sit there and play and talk to herself until you're ready to get her.
This was nice so that we didn't wake the boat up when she got up at around 7am each morning.
Last time I came I only had one child and I remember having a lot more fun.
This time I had four kids all of which I had to watch but two of which I had to watch like a hawk, it's draining and will take a toll on you.
I foresee the next few years still being hard, but hopefully not as hard as this trip was on me.

So it takes around 5 hours to get there from Bountiful UT and we all followed each other.
Once we got there we unpacked everything on the boat and sorted stuff out while the kids jumped off the back deck and swam and canoed while we got things ready.
So these shots are still in the slip (dock) where the houseboat is parked all year while no one is in it.



Masaru canoeing the kids around.

Takeshi took to the water like a fish man and had the time of his life. So adventurous and I love it.
Here they are swimming off of the back of the boat.

Then they decided, with their uncle/dad's help, to make a little floating circus while they waited.
I dunno I think Takeshi got the best seat in the house................
Once you've got things square, then you need to decide where you're going to go for the week.
So they backed the houseboat out of the slip (dock) and started slowly on their way int he general direction of where we thought we'd wanna be.
We had a smaller boat and so some of the other went on it ahead to try and find the perfect spot for our family to be.
Once they'd found it they left some people there then raced back to find us and direct us to where we were going to be. Then we go and park the houseboat there, anchor it off and hang out for the week.
Pretty cool right?