Cottrell's Ausgust

Boy, it has been busy around here and I haven’t caught my breath YET! With more craziness around the corner I need to regroup this week and remember to BREATHE!

Something crazy happened that I am going to want to remember so I will mention it here. Our less-than-a-year-old fridge stopped working and we tried everything to start it up again…reading the instructions, tripping the breaker, checking online forums, CALLING Sears…….The Sears guy told us we had done everything possible and that we had to wait for a repairman. So we went 10 days without a fridge and this happened a few days BEFORE Cousin Camp. We did bring up a small fridge for milk and eggs and we did keep our old one out in the garage for emergencies. But for 10 days this was a big pain. So the repair guy finally comes and fixes it in 30 seconds. There are 2 buttons on the front that you hold down at the same time for 30 seconds and that is all it took. Why this was not spelled out in the manual is crazy! And why didn’t the guy on the phone know to tell us this??? We were just glad that it wasn’t something major but we sure felt dumb for “suffering” for so long when we could have fixed it ourselves!!! HA!!!!!

Our furniture finally came in and that set things in motion like looking for lights and drapes. I love what I picked out for both! I was dying to try the chevron treatment above the fireplace mantel …you can see how it turned out. I love it. I used silver vinyl which I graphed and cut out myself. It was not really easy to apply, even using transfer paper….but I managed and love the look. We also painted around the fireplace as you can see.

 The middle pic is the couch where the piano used to be. I love the painting (from Pier 1) and the arc lamp. I mostly used red and lime accents but pulled in a little teal so it doesn't look so flat. The chair in the 3rd pic is a recliner. And you can't see it well but the ottomans feature a gold/gray snakeskin type fabric. They are way cool! Wish you could see the lamps better. There are chains hanging from the one on the left. And the little one features a clear glass base filled with scrunched up silver wire. I also adore the lime throw i found that has pom poms along the edges. The side panels are from Penney's and have a subtle tone on tone diamond design.

The first Cousin Camp turned out really FUN! Next year I will know to start sooner than 4 days beforehand! This made that week pretty crazy…especially because Mark and I ALSO built a karaoke stage in the playroom downstairs! We didn’t know what we were doing covering it with carpet from Home Depot but it turned out great…..(AND the kids LOVED it!) Then it was back and forth to Toys R Us trying to find a decent and affordable karaoke machine . The stage is portable so we can store it and put the recliners back in that space. The curtains also come down leaving the brackets in the ceiling. Yes, that week was nuts. 

 Cousin Camp officially started at 5 pm on a Friday. We had t-shirts for all the kids as you can see:

 Then we went to the backyard for a picnic and carnival. I had 8 different games which the adult kids manned. The little kids earned a prize for playing and tickets according to how they did with each game. Grammy was the concessionaire and was set up at a picnic table loaded with (cheap) prizes. The kids had a ball “buying” stuff, especially 4.5 year old Isaac who kept finding tickets and made quite a haul!!! 

 (Thanks to Stephanie--- and Luke's party long ago for the idea to do a photo booth!)

After a bedtime snack of Angry Bird graham crackers and milk we bedded everyone down in the playroom on sleeping bags. We told a few (true) stories and let them play with flashlights for a while. I slept with the kids which was good since 6.5 year old Austin got up crying during the night saying he wanted to go home. That made for a nice little moment for me to hold him on my lap for a bit and then he was fine.

The activities on Saturday included:

-painting wooden frames to hold their Cousin Camp photo

-a scavenger hunt in the backyard with activities like throwing water balloons, walking across a bridge over crocodile-infested water, spitting Skittles, and sucking M&Ms with a straw, etc.

- a service project which consisted of making birthday cards for a bed-ridden woman in our ward (whom Mark has home taught for the last 24 years) and visiting her and singing to her.

-an hour of quiet time with a movie after lunch. (We watched Babe)

-Then we went back out to the yard to play in the water. I had a slip n slide plus 2 sprinkler toys set up. We also had the wading pool we used for the carnival’s duck pond which worked well for loading water blasters! The kids had a ball and grandma LaLa was a willing target and got drenched! We moved the sand table from the deck down to the yard and this kept 2.5 year old Keira happy! Other than forgetting to give the kids popsicles, it turned out to be a fun activity. 

-The last thing we did was decorate the fronts of little photo albums and add pics from the carnival photo booth.

 

 The annual trip to San Diego was a fun week and this year Eileen got to go with us. The condo at Mission Beach was a little better than year’s past, so this worked well for all of us. A typical day went like this: eat breakfast/ walk on the beach/ drag chairs and boogie boards back to the beach for several hours/ eat lunch/ go back to the beach/ go for Jamba Juice and self-serve frozen yogurt/ go back to the beach/ grill chicken for dinner/ take a walk on the beach. You can see why I was able to read 3.5 books in one week….it was heaven! That and reading them while eating homemade chex mix with my feet in the sand. The guys took their own boogie boards this year and had a blast. Eileen even had a wet suit and tried it. By the end of the week Austin also got on a board….with Tahni shadowing him the whole time. 

 Other memories include the caramel popcorn which Mark made several times/ hamburgers at In n Out/ seeing the San Diego Temple at night/ spotting dolphins right beyond the breakers/ listening to Mitt Romney’s acceptance speech/ eating Brent and Eileen’s tacos al dorado/ and also going to a fun little Mexican place across the street for tacos.

One day we broke the routine by going to Disney Adventure Park. We had a fun day even though it was pretty hot. I was glad for a fountain where we could splash water on ourselves!  A few memories: Eileen got her first ever Mickey Mouse hat/ Austin got a Perry Platypus stuffed toy he wanted/ the mid-afternoon milkshakes were delish/ dinner was expensive!/ everyone got wet on the river ride.

August was a great month and September is going well too…..more on this next time! Love to all!