Back from the cottage

Where to start? Where to start? This post will surely jump around because it has been too long. Wednesday the kids and I headed off to Michigan early because of the storms that were traveling through. After a stop off for lunch and gas we continued and got to the cottage mid afternoon. Ellie went to Clubhouse and it was the talent show (the calendar was wrong otherwise she might have prepared something). Nick and I went to get some videos in town.
I was matched to a support seeker through Immerman and I got the introduction email on my way up to the cottage. After playing a bit of phone tag we got to talk on the phone for a long time. I really felt it brought me full circle. In talking with her I realized how far I have come in a year.
It was very weird being up at the cottage without Rob - never has happened before. The storms that happened Wednesday night were incredible. I stayed up to watch Arthur (cute movie) and when I was getting ready to head up the storm had begun and I had to stay up and watch it. Thankfully, the power only went out for a minute at 12:42AM.
Thursday morning Ellie went to Clubhouse for the carnival prep. I can't really recall what Nick and I did. When Ellie got home we had lunch and then headed to the beach. The water was gorgeous - nice and warm, yet refreshing. We stayed on the beach until early evening - went back to the cottage to clean up. Clubhouse was cancelled for the evening so I said we were going to go out to eat. We tried a new Mexican restaurant in town, Su Casa. They had the most amazing avocado - tomatillo salsa - so refreshing with just a bit of heat.
We had a lovely dinner and then the kids begged to get ice cream. We went to Nemo's and got ice cream and then Nick begged to go down to the harbor to eat - we did. We got to hear the concert was happening in the park and watch the boats. We went home and watched Rango.
Friday morning, Nana had to wake us up. Another huge storm came through overnight and this was the first one to wake the kids up. Nick woke up crying and disoriented and Ellie woke up asking why the storm had to be so loud? Ellie grabbed a bite to eat and was off for the final carnival prep at Clubhouse. Nick, Nana and I ran into town to do some grocery shopping for dinner. We got back just a few minutes before Ellie.
We had lunch and then were off to the beach. Water was warm again but with huge waves. As we were about to pack things up Rob arrived and said he would stay with them for a bit longer if I wanted to head up to clean up and get dinner started. Ellie was a great helper this weekend with food prep. When they came back she helped me with dinner salads and cutting the bread up. We had dinner and then we went down to the carnival on the village green.
The mosquitoes were ridiculous this weekend - probably from all the rain but truly a pain. We all had bug spray on and you could just watch them land on you and start drinking your blood. Poor Nick had about a dozen on his forehead. The carnival was ok - usual games but this year they were back to being stingy with the prizes. Ellie had 2 shifts, bean bag toss and cake walk. Nick wanted to help her with both of those shifts. We had some ice cream from the soda bar and then convinced Nick to join us walking back to the cottage.
We put in Secretariat (I recommend it) and we all stayed up and watched it. Ellie came home with the remaining desserts from the cake walk (cupcakes and cookies). Even though it was well past the kids bedtime we couldn't get either of them to sleep - too excited. Rob and I were able to watch the Katherine Heigl, Josh Dummel movie (can't recall the title) it was cute. We went up to bed together but I couldn't fall asleep. Oh...my email was hacked into -sorry about the spam.
Saturday we woke up and had breakfast. I honestly cannot recall what we did until it was time to hit the beach. Oh, I remember we tried to play tennis but it was soooo hot outside that we went to get ice cream for lunch. We went down to the beach after lunch and stayed until late afternoon. Ellie's friend, Jackie, invited us to come back down after dinner for a campfire and s'mores. We had dinner and then the kids and I ran into town to return the videos and to pick up s'mores supplies. Nick realized when we were walking through the store that he forgot to put underwear on and his pant kept falling down. We went down to the beach in our clothes but the kids were quickly wanting to be back in the lake - so we told them to just go in. It was a lovely evening on the beach - not too hot. We had s'mores and the kids swam until the sunset. We got bitten alive on our way back to the cottage.
We got the kids to sleep and then Rob and I went to hang out on the couch. Rob didn't last long and I wasn't tired so I stayed up watching bad cable. I went up to bed because there wasn't anything on tv but I could not fall asleep. Pretty bad nights sleep last night - I kept waking up and then not being able to fall back asleep.
This morning we all woke up to Nick's coughing. It has gotten progressively worse as the week ended. For the first time ever, he asked if we had his "puff puff" (inhalers) up at the cottage - he knew he needed help. I gave him his inhalers and we went down for breakfast. Ellie and Rob ran to Menard's to pick up a lamp for Ellie's room back at home (it was on sale and the sale ended today). We all went to the beach when they got back. The water was much cooler this morning but refreshing after the air began to get warmer. We stayed at the beach for a couple hours and came back and cleaned up. We had lunch and then we got the cars packed up. Rob followed us until we got off for our halfway washroom/gas stop. We stopped at Culver's for the washroom and then a bowl of custard, yum! Even though 780 said that only the express lanes were backed up...they were wrong. It took forever to get from about 25th up to Belmont.
We finally got home and unloaded the car. Rob went straight to a clients to work. We pretty much jumped back in the car to head to Mom and Dad's for dinner. Jo and T were there and the kids all missed each other. Mom had made a wonderful dinner - she has really perfected this bread salad - nice and garlicky tonight. The kids played for a bit and then we came home.
We put together Ellie's new light and she called Rob to see if he could pick up light bulbs on the way home. The kids went outside to play with the neighbors but Nick came in panting. We got them ready for bed and Nick kept asking for another dose of his inhaler (I had just given him both his inhalers). Should be an interesting night.
I am trying to keep my mind off the itching of these mosquito bites. I was just thinking to myself (before this past weekend) that possibly mosquitoes weren't interested in me anymore because I don't think I have had anymore than one bite this whole summer...but they made up for it this weekend. Happy to be home and able to stay for more than a couple days. Visualising my healthy and continually healing body and the new normal, Tree