The problem with so much family together time is I want to take pictures of all of it...so I probably have 150 pics on my phone from this week—I’ll try to tone it down but we sure have been having fun. 

I did slip into the dentist to have him glue my crown on but there’s only ever a max of 4 other people in that office so I felt ok about it and other than that I really haven’t left this place for over a week now. We’re lucky though, I know it’s rough for some people, we’re just cashing in on the extra family time. Just today our governor issued a stay at home order effective Monday so Isaac will stop going into work and just work from here (even though it was just him in his office and way better internet...we’ll see how it goes) 

I feel like not much happens here but I try to check in with my folks and stay connected. I know Chip didn’t work this week, Grandma Cottam is finally doing a little better after her broken arm -and I’m super excited I got the story of why they went to the Salt Lake temple in on family search in her voice!)  & Harv survived a heck of a motorcycle wreck! Dang what a week right? 

All the while the boys and I a mess’n around on the cellar hill on a skate board. 🤷‍♀️

https://youtu.be/JR-mOe2cr44

Isaac loves to tear things apart...

So he’s working on a turn around spot-and then getting our gray water that was clogged and kind of nasty to tie in with the rest of our drainage and he wants to pipe it further down the yard so basically EVERYTHING is tore up. Whose kids play with sewer pipe 🙋🏼‍♀️ That’d be us. But hey we also had them working on the trench—so that’s a win! So here’s a picture onslaught:

Ug! I started to blog but since then I have put together “fun bags” for conference. We made a schedule this year for what we’re going to do each session and I only agreed to do fun bags for one session but still-now it’s 11:30, I know tomorrow is going to awesome but long sooo...this post might just have shorten up. 

Colt loves playing in the clay we even baked some in the oven. 

They made forts out of clay-kinda pushing into the driveway but who cares? We’re staying home. 



Cannons been riding a lot and he’s getting pretty good! Sethy’s quite the helper. 

Reading a book President Babble put together with stories from Isaacs mission. 

Colts getting pretty good on his bike! 



I love it when they read scriptures (and stories) together!! And teaching Colt to put lines in the carpet was a total win! Actually we cleaned rooms for chores Monday and they stayed clean all week because we were always outside! Win! Win! Win! Every night I have a batch of “mud clothes” to wash but it’s totally worth it!!   





This kid grunts and squawks until you let him ride something! He loves being outside. Isaac better be careful he’s going to become his little “arm monkey” (that’s what Grampa calls him and it fits) instead of mine! Whatever he’s a mommas boy! But it is nice when a get a couple minute break! 



Our minimal attempts at school work...

Garden & worms...





This is what happens when I shower. They found an old candy cane in the couch and gave it to him. Thanks guys! 

And we finally made some candy like Great (their Great great) Grandpa Frei would have requested in his Christmas package. 



Home caramels. Yum! 

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!