Bear and Bug Get Brave

edited to add: If you didn't already know, you can click on pictures to see them larger. You are hereby forbidden to do this on any picture that features any portion of me from the neck down. Thanks.

This past week Bear and Bug got the chance to sit in an enormous floaty-thingy while being hauled around Great Pond behind a friend's motor boat. It's a ton of fun unless you wind up with a sadistic boat driver who deliberately steers you into waves and boat wake. Then you tend to get dumped into the lake a lot. Which can also be fun if you're in the right frame of mind.

Bug was fairly concerned about the being dumped in the lake part. She basically wanted to go about the speed you would achieve if you tied a thousand butterflies to the tube by gossamer ribbon and politely asked that they fly around the lake using only one wing each.

Lucky for Bug, a sympathetic mom was piloting the boat. Dads tend to think it's a riot when kids get dumped off the tube. Moms tend to consider things like lasting emotional trauma. This mom promised to abide by Bug's request to go "only slow."

This is right after she climbed over the back of the boat and into the tube. She's still not sure, but I promised her we'd stop immediately if she didn't like it.

She decides that she might like it a little bit. Possibly.


Actually, she thinks it's kind of fun. Bear made a big show of being somewhat bored by the whole thing. (Preteen, remember?) When she goes on the tube with her friends, they go much faster and catch air. However, Bug refused to try it with anyone other than Bear, so she was stuck going s-l-o-w with her little sister. Oh, the horror and indignity of it all.


Wow! Suddenly Bug understands why everyone makes such a big deal about tubing! It's fun!

Yee-haw!

Poor Bug will never be a poker player, will she? Everything this kid feels is right on her face.

One of Bear's favorite parts comes after we stop and cut the boat engine to change riders on the tube. She likes to jump off the tube in the middle of the lake like a hotshot and swim back to the boat.