The Event of the summer

My family has been going up to the lake condo now for about 3 years.  We love it! This year was particularly of note because it made one of my Dad's dreams come true.

About 3 weeks before the trip my Dad sent us an email that reads:

OK girls, get ready.

On July 18^th or 19^th, the four of us will hit the skis and the water at the same time.
We can call it the ‘Quad’ or anything else you like.
To make this work smoothly, we will all need to be prepared mentally.
Visualize yourselves getting up. It won’t be like a regular event.
It will probably be quite a bit slower, and we will be dragging in the water longer.
So, see yourselves keeping straight, holding tough, and getting up.
Do this many  times between now and then and we will succeed .
We will make history together !
Love to all,
Pops

It was such a random email that made us all smile.  Although the dates were incorrect, through several emails we got all the logistics down. Have to envision everything correctly, you know. So, we all started visualizing "The Event".  The sad part was my older sister Nicole wouldn't be there because of her work schedule, so it was just the younger three daughters.

Now, I L-O-V-E boating.  There is nothing better.  However, it has been a while since I have tried my skills as a skier.  It's just like riding a bike though, right? Right??  Because, I did have mad skills. Before.

So, we went out. Kelly and Heidi's hubbies accompanied- one for driving, the other for documenting. This one is going down in the Pettingill History Book.

Mandy, Kelly, Heidi.  Boating babes on the back platform.

 Getting the courage to get in the water.  It was cccccold.  But there were actually some warm pockets of water that were very comfortable. 

 Heidi and Kelly.  Two of my three beautiful sisters.

 The whole gang's ready.  Now to just unwrap ourselves from all those ropes!

L-R Mandy, Heidi, Neil, Kelly. Unwound and ready. First attempt... failed.  Dad went down after about 5 seconds.  Someone wasn't visualizing good enough! HA!

 The best part, I think, was the hilarity that insued from all the tangled ropes and marking places and trying to make everything even.  Heidi's rope needed to be shorter because she's on a wake board.  We didn't have enough skis.  So, that put me in her wake.  We ended up shortening Kelly's rope too so she didn't run into Dad, and put him on the end.

Mandy and Heidi getting ready for attempt numero dos.  With all the squinting I think I should have kept the sunglasses on.  The second time Heidi wobbles making her wake go crazy and so we both go down.  Fail numero dos.

 We got this one.  This is it.  The third time is the charm.

 Watch out Busch Gardens. Next year we will perfect the pyramid.

 I am concentrating on Heidi's wake.  I'm pretty tough though, so I got it.  We had a good long ride around the lake. It was truely awesome!

Now, experiece "The Event" first hand.  

A special thanks to Kye for being the photographer/videographer and to Tim for being the awesome driver. He never ran any of us over.