Cottrell Family: June 2010

Local Fun!

We have been able to go see some fun things by "Checking Out" passes to different museums and parks from our library. These are a few of our stops:

CUNEO MUSEUMS AND GARDENS

Construction on this beautiful mansion started in 1908, then stopped during WWI and was completed in 1918. There is alot of history here and houses the Cuneo family collection of fine antiques, paintings by world famous artists, tapestries, sculptures, silver, and porcelain.

The gardens were very colorful. They hold many receptions and weddings and summer concerts here as well.

Clayton thought the angel babies in the paintings on the ceiling were funny because they were chubby naked little babies with wings he said. They had alot of statues around the grounds.

Clayton also really liked the fine dishes and wanted a golden spoon to eat with. Don't we all!

Clay wanted me to take a picture of these flowers because they were his favorite and reminded him of peppermints.

THE LAKE COUNTY DISCOVERY MUSEUM

This is another museum we have been able to see thanks to our library who has passes we can "Check out" and go for free!

They have a whole children's department where there is lots of hands on fun.

I have mentioned before how much Hayden loves Paul Bunyan, so this was so fun for him!
The Museum had a special exhibit celebrating:

Golden Legacy: Original Art for 65 Years of Golden Books

These are two of my favorite pictures on display. I love all the Golden Books and seeing all the beautiful art and the books everywhere really made my memory go back in time to when I read each book, what room I was in, and flashes of reorganizing the old and now absent due to remodeling hall book closet we had growing up.

These were so amazing to look at. Each piece was hand carved and put together by a Charles Warner, who designed and constructed the folk art cathedrals which resembled ones he remembered from his childhood in Europe.

SPRAY PARK

This is a free spray park that the kids love to go to. Outside the spray park is a really nice slide and swing area and a outside stage area that kids can act out their own performances. We usually go with a group of friends, pack a lunch and get wet.

Fun in the Hot, Hot Sun!!

We had so much visiting Gr & Gr Cottrell's house in Louisiana, and one of funniest things was playing in their pool for hours and hours. Clay really took to the water and was diving like crazy and swimming really well. He had alot of fun diving for money with Grandpa C. He would do a big jump off the diving board feet first, turn completely around in the water, retrieve the quarter and then swim up to the surface using his own mermaid like technique. he amazed us all at how long he could stay under water and how deep he could go.

Sitting on the side to get his breath before going at it again.
Justin is fueling up with pizza, watermelon, and cold drinks. Perfect outside pool food.

Justin enjoyed the water as well in his floatation device, but other than that he loved walking around the pool everywhere and watching his brothers jumping and diving like crazy.

These are some of Justin's funny faces he pulled every time he watched either Clay or Hayden jump in!! It was like he thought they were going to crash hard because he squinted, and reacted so big at each jump and laughed when he saw them come up out of the water.

Justin is saying Jump Again!! A diving board in so versatile! We played How far can you Jump games!

You would think the boys would tire after being thrown in so many times by their dad, but this was always the face that came up along with tons of giggles.

Fun, Fun, Fun in the Hot, Hot, Sun!!!!

Teasing Mr. Alligator, You can't catch me!

Swamp Tour = Chance to feed Huge Gators right next to you...... a complete tour of the area with background spook stories from Captain Chris, our guide...... catch fish and see them jump at the top of the water ...... throw marshmallows at friendly crows that had a whole technique to not get eaten by the alligators when retrieving the marshmallow ...... hold a cute little Alli...... having it so hot that my M&Ms did in fact melt......see tons of smiles and hear "Whoa, that's so cool!" from our whole party!!

Here comes the big one da da .......... da da ...... da da ......

Do you see the size of this thing? Yes, that stick is connected to Captain Chris who is just off our boat that he docked to be able to HAND FEED this beast!! There is no zoom on this thing he was SO close and SO big I couldn't even fit him all in a single picture.

The boys were so excited to go, and were told to hurry and eat their treats Grandpa bought them (not a problem for Hayden who ate his before it was even completely purchased) before they melted. I thought I would be good with my candy coated M&Ms that I had to share with Justin. Umm not so much, especially in Hot Louisiana Heat. I'm lucky I didn't get them all over my pants or something.

Here is a mamma Raccoon of six babies called Rocky, who Captain Chris would put a marshmallow in his mouth and she would come and take it from him standing on two legs with both of her hands. This shack is made out of Cypress Trees that are naturally resistant to insects, decay, or shrinking. Cypress tree growth rings grow really close together, which makes the wood very dense. We were told Cypress tress were used all over the place back in the day and are still holding strong. Because it lasts so long and preserves it self even when it is submerged under water, it has been know to be called "Nature's Eternal Wood"

Here's our unbelievable hosts and guides for the down south country... Grandma and Grandpa Cottrell. We loved every minute of it! Thank You!

These are the hand held sticks equipped with a piece of chicken we were able to use to lure the alligators into jumping out of the water for us. Which they did with ease every time.

This is Justin getting mad at me after I had to take his hand away from squeezing our little Alli to hard. Captain Chris showed us the proper way of holding a alligator and well Justin was just not up to par. He went to Dad and who made Justin all better!

See good techniques. One hand under the belly held loosely, and the other around the tail held tighter. Good Job boys!! Captain Chris related the little Alli to a horse that has to get used to each rider who comes along, and can tell when a greeny is on top. Same goes with little Alli, they can tell if a crazy little Justin is trying to crush them, so holding her the same way each time is really important.

Just a Big Fake. But still cool enough, and real looking enough to go take our picture by.

We saw so many more neat things and Captain Chris was full of information and pictures to go along with his stories so he was legit. A couple of crazy pictures were: 1. A 25 foot alligator who had to be killed which our Captain was a little sad about. He thought they should have just caught him and put him in the zoo somewhere. 2. Picture of a Alligator dead with side of belly cut open and you could see and entire form and a human body which was said to be a very unlucky golfer. 3. A map showing the areas of land that was covered by water in Louisiana after Katrina and how high the water levels were.

I would be ready to go again at anytime, but next time I think I will get something like skittles to share with the boys instead of M&Ms. Whew that Louisiana can be a hot one!! Nothing that a good snowball treat can't fix, Right Gr& Gr Cottrell!!

Up and Over

Our Louisiana Trip for the Summer

This is our route to get us down south into the state of Louisiana, where Nate's parents recently moved to. We did the whole 15 hour drive in one shot getting there, but took two days on the way back stopping half way and relaxing at a hotel equipped with a pool for me and the kids, and a desk for Nate to study at for his final that next Saturday.

Our trip was traveling all day Sunday, enjoying every moment with Grandma and Grandpa Cottrell (especially their pool with diving board), and heading back Thursday with a Hotel night stay at the Pear Tree Inn in Missouri and arriving back safely home Friday night with time for Nate to do some additional studying.

Total miles traveled: 966 (each way)
States travelled though: Illinois, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi, and Louisiana

Our destination was to Desterhan LA to Grandmas house!!

One of the neatest things on our trip down and back was the HUGE BRIDGE that we crossed to get over the great Mississippi River.

Heading up...

getting closer...

The view from within the bridge.

How do they build things like this!

The car was oddly silently as the boys just stared outside while going through the bridge and once across both just screamed AWESOME... that was SO COOL!!

The boys were great travelers. We played trivia games, Animal guessing game, workbooks, drawing and of course we have a DVD player in the car and the Nintendo DS with the ever awesome Mario Bros and 40 other games thanks to my Dad and the game card he got for us.

I think I am done with the show Paul Bunyan for a while though, Hayden loves that Disney Movie that has short stories of Johnny Appleseed, John Henry, Paul Bunyan, Casey Jones. I think the boys watched that DVD over four times!

I was the designated crawler to the back seat to help kiddos with what ever they needed, and the conversation started between me and Nate. I sure he could attest to anyone that he is done playing the "What if" game of life with me right now. I think he had his fill when he replied "LF
(a nickname he has given me, short for Lacey Fay) just let me get done with school and then we will see what we can do about all you grand plans and wishful thinking"

I laughed at that and continued on crocheting and changed subjects to what he wanted to have for lunch. Men are always easier to deal with when food is in their belly! he he

Such a fun trip, which I will post more about soon!

Chicago Botanical Gardens!!

Being outdoors is always uplifting, but being surrounded by beautiful gardens and my family is that much better. The flowers are all bloomed in a variety of colors at the Botanical Gardens. Our plan for the day was to meet Nate for lunch, which doesn't happen too often just because his office building is about an hour and ten minute drive to get to, but it happens to be less then 5 minutes away from the Botanical Gardens. Nate was really busy at work preparing for some big meetings and for when he took some time off so Nate was coming just to lunch and then we would drop him back off at work, but he surprised me and got alot of his work done and took a half day so he could come with the family to the gardens. Awesome! The boys, and me were giddy!