Another week...

Ok if we can survive Isaac trying to save the world singled handedly...we'll make it. Its just in his instincts and blood to invite people over. The introvert it me is totally digging the social distancing. I love it. But he's like "Oh you have to go to work with your mom? Wanna come to my house instead?" AHHHHHHHH I mean he asked me...afterward. I try to...well I used to try to keep the blog positive. And there's no need to keep score but lets just say I have several examples.


I hate board games. We NEVER played them growing up. But I do recognize they would count as a wholesome recreational activity. Thankfully I played a little with my cousins when we were at BYU...ug

And then there’s trying to keep Sethy out of it-no small task. 

But when we’re about as loosey goosey as possible with the school side of things I think it’s good for them -even if it’s just counting out the two dice! That’s great practice for Colt and Tan...then trying to strategize...anyway we’ve played a lot of Settlers around here (and Ps I’m who you want to play with—I’ll trade Colt and Tan anything they want 😂 I drive a little harder bargain with Isaac and Cann since they are actually trying to win.)

Getting Dressed: The boys in their church clothes-Seth in some hand me down braves shorts the Bakers gave us. We still dress up for church at home but we don’t exactly get faces washed. Whoops.

Last week the boys gave talks. Cann’s the only one who wrote his down but when I saw that “usually” I knew I wanted it documented😉) Colt talked about the allegory of the olive tree -the movie we’d watched the night before- and Tans talk was on “be nice to other people and not be mean” 

Great job Troops!

Monday Isaac got to go help our neighbors butcher a cow. Serious. Brad used to work in a Butcher shop though so it wasn't just hey lets go hack on this thing. Their friend gave them a whole cow. So they shared with us. So nice. The boys went too but they just played. No help. Their kids wanted our kids to go so they would get to play instead of help. It worked. :)

I’ve been wanting to update the pics in my living room so I took these...

Then this happened...Tanner!!

He grabbed it off my bed (I thought it was still in the case but he said it was just on the bed -he was going to let me take his picture for ice cream and Cann was game for popcorn-always a bribe 😉 so I believe that I could have had it setting out but still-they were being all crazy wild and I was changing a poopy diaper and he went running by and I said “don’t go in my room” totally ignored-like usual. 

Anyway he grabbed it and came running out and said “say cheese” then one of the others -I'm guessing Colt came around the corner and yelled “ahhh” (totally normal around here it’s just what they do) well he heard the “ahhh”  and he jumped and tossed the camera. All of this is Colt's story mixed with what I heard from the other room.  Colt came in and said “Mom I think your camera is broken” I didn’t think it really would have been-cuz at that point I didn’t know it had been tossed on the wood floor. Anyway then he brought it to me in two pieces. I got mad. Probably more mad than I should have--especially considering that I've wanted a new one for a long time anyway. But Oh well. I apologized shortly after.
I guess I won't update the pics on the wall quite yet after all.
Moving on.
THIS is my favorite part of home school. We’re actually doing chores!!!!! I help them--I get a lot more out of them that way. But its great! I love them helping around the house. I love it. Its not a lot but I'm happy about it.

They really want to get a few of Kilmer's heifers once he gets them weened. They basically just want to babysit a few calves. “Hobby farmers” I think he’s nuts! His excuse is to teach the boys responsibility. I’m not sold—(I guess we know when I’ll buy a new camera.)  I know how dang much work cows are—but he wants all of that to be the neighbors responsibility. Today he was looking at them on Craigslist. Heaven help me! 

Here they were fixing the barn. At least they were outside! 

We’ve been loving being able to get out!! 



And Colts been begging since Christmas to be able to make green slime. Outside for the win!! 

In our continued Spanish flu history lesson we found out that my great Grandpa on the other side (Charles Walter Cottam) had a 1/2 brother that died from the flu. He was 14. We found this in memories section of family search for Leila Cottam. 

And it sounds like they all had it. 

This little Seth, he’s kind of a character and he’s Super helpful! He pulled a full two quart jug of Gatorade off the counter yesterday—at least my cupboards are white so I could easily see where I still needed to wipe down. I’ve mopped twice and am still finding random sticky spots. 







They were burying  the burn piles! Yay! 

I take too many pics...or maybe we have too much fun that I think all needs to be documented. Either way! 

Cannon took this one of Seth and I toward the first of the month. I found it on the SD card —the only part of that camera that survived. 

My little mommas boy—right in my arms is right where he likes to be! I obviously love it too, but sometimes it would be nice to be able to do something with two hands...oh well they’re only little once! 

Ha and I thought last week was madness

Buckle up I think this is the new norm for a while. They canceled school for two weeks but...I doubt it will only be that long...
Saturday because the temple was closing we made a quick trip. We took a guy named Blue that's in our ward with us and I did the initiatory for his Grandmother and Great Grandmother. That was pretty cool. The boys were troopers. They really are great about that long drive and pretty much nothing for them to do. (Ok I pulled out the tablets but still.)
We did make a point to touch the temple.

Can I have too many pics of my kids at the temple? Na. We had to do this last one because it looked like Hyrum and Joseph were in a snow ball fight. Ha.

Sunday Home Church was a pretty cool experience but YIKES trying to keep these kids from climbing the walls (or making me want to) is no small task!!
Colt was just being obnoxious (he's 6...so he's CONSTANTLY being obnoxious-at least I survived it with Cannon so I know it will go away eventually) anyway he  said "Hey mom, you can put on the blog that me and Cannon are hilarious."
Sure.
Done.
Home school it is...project one write you teachers a thank you note. ...Probably should've been MY writing asmt. We took pics of the notes and sent them to the teachers.

School? Yeah right we mostly just play!

But! This was cool. We talked about why school was canceled and then Cannon looked up the Spanish flu and we learned a little about it but then the coolest thing was we found an old letter that my Great Grandpa had written my Great Grandma during WW1 that talked about it. It was really cool. We also learned from those letter that he had quite a sweet tooth. We tried to make some old fashioned pull taffy in honor of his sweet tooth. This was our best batch...but we didn't know it. I thought it was too sticky and going to ruin someones teeth so they each got one little piece to suck on and I threw the rest away. Since then we've tried too more times and cooked it to death--TOTAL FAILs...we basically made suckers. Oh well. Today we watched Ky's girls on a YouTube teaching Kami's class how to poach an egg-the boys LOVED it! We tried to do a similar thing with the pull taffy and what they learned about their Great Great Grandpa but but there wasn't enough space on my phone. And we ruined the taffy anyway. Maybe tomorrow. And we should totally make caramels instead!

One of the flops....

We go outside any chance we could but its been pretty rainy. Its starting to green up around here though!

Social distance and Isaac invites people over. Just a couple friends from church...and the neighbor boy who could hear the squealing and new something fun was going on.

Tanner really wants to ride the motorcycle so he was trying to learn to pedal. After a digger and scratched up face he traded the pedal bike in for his trusty little balance bike.

Tan often requests pics of him and Sethy...I oblige.

Oh Colt has wanted a shirt with a grenade on it for weeks now, I kept telling him NO you can't wear things like that to school. But with no school he got do make his own for our own little Art class.

Today they were looking outside and drawing whatever they could see. Cann has also been making some weather observations. I tell you what I LOVE LOVE LOVE being able to mix church and state. He did the weather observations then I let them watch a youtube video where some guys were trying to pin down the date of the First Vision. We emphasized that it doesn't really matter when it happened but it does matter that it happened but then let them watch away. It was really cool because one of the guys used Weather Observations that had only started to be recorded in 1820 to come to his conclusion. That helped Cann take making our weather observations very seriously. ;)

We've slipped down to the church a couple of times. A little basketball a little kickball some massive chair forts. The usual. Speaking of kickball we used to always play with Sis Johnson when she served here and she came back to see us before she finished her mission next week. Well really she had a meeting that's why she was in town but whatever we'll take it, it was really fun to see her. We love all the missionaries but...some we REALLY REALLY LOVE!!

Oh and I LOVE LOVED LOVED listening to Colt teach Tanner what he knew about piano. It was awesome.

We had to skip lessons because yesterday Cannon ended up sick. Poor guy slept all day. But he seemed fine today so that was good.

I don't know, other than that we're just kinda plugging away. Next week: Round 2
But we did pick up packets of work from the kids schools today.

Isaac would like to to go Utah but I'm not so sure given the situation. We'll see what happens.

Coronavirus madness!!!

I’m panicking to be quick tonight! With everything shutting down who do you thing is trying to squeeze in a temple trip? Yep! Isaac! It’s good...and crazy all at once! So all of the sudden I’m scrambling—

I wrote down a few things in the week then tonight I finally figured out the picture trouble! So here it goes—the quick version. 

Sunday night I got stung by a wasp that made me a lot more sympathetic to the boys and their panic about them! 

Tuesday evening Tanner woke Seth up and I yelled

threw clenched teeth “that is 100% your fault and I am 100% furious” and he looked up at me with those big blue gray eyes and said “I’m a hundwed pewcent sowwy mom.” It was so funny I just started laughing and said “ok I forgive you but you still made a ton of extra work for me.”

Wednesday Isaac went with the YM so I had to take Cann into Children & Youth. We didn’t have anything else to do so we went to Waffle cone Wednesday— Tanner said “I’ll buy EVERYONES...mom I just need you wallet.” He’s just a character!! 

Oh yeah and volleyball was fun last week but it’s embarrassing how sore I was afterward! Yikes! I’m not young anymore!! 

Ok so some quick pics

Man they learn quick

Our “date” towing our neighbors car. It quit and they coaster into our driveway—mostly we did our little service project to get it out of our driveway🤫

This little sicky I was so happy to see him smile I took this pic (still sick eyes) 2 seconds later he puked all over poor little guy! 



He and I did NOT go to church! (That’s a big deal around here but the poor little toad Fever and was just miserable) 

Monday evening I had a much needed power nap and woke up to Isaac rallying the troops in a floor cleaning project! It was awesome! 

We put together a little bookcase-I had good help! 





Colt lost another tooth—he looks SO different!!

They talked about Nephi at Children and youth then built bows and the younger boys got the extras-they were pumped and we had a fun project yesterday. (No school) 

Yesterday was beautiful we got OUTSIDE!!   



And I even got to drive Grampa’s tractor.



It was fun! 

After some cleanup we got out the motorcycles—that didn’t go so well for Colt! Isaac was sprinting to keep up when he let off the throttle and they and the motorcycle went you know what over tea kettle!! 



Poor Colt-he try’s to like them but he hates the motorcycles! But the rule is—you have to get back on at least once! 





And today we bid farewell to little green—a moment of silence please—of course they drove it to the junk yard. One final ride! 

And we got some books out to fill up that bookcase. 

I think the mess is worth it! 

That’s all for this go around!!