Grandma Cottrell's 90th birthday party!

So Grandma Cottrell decided to turn 90 years old all of a sudden and my mom and sister Heather planned to have a surprise birthday party for her.  Yeah, I know-she looks around 60 or 70.  In fact, when I was there I studied her face and I'm pretty sure that I have more wrinkles than she does.  I could hardly believe she was 90-she looks fantastic.  Grandma knew that Heather was coming into town for a visit but had no idea that Brenda and I were on our way as well as our brother Eric & his family, Uncle Grey, Aunt Linda and my cousin Kelly & her family to celebrate the big day.  We surprised her alright.  While Heather was visiting with Grandma at her home in Mount Baldy, Brenda and I came through the front door and I said:  "hey, my cars stalled outside...does anyone have some jumper cables I could borrow?"  She was definitely surprised to see us...

My sister Brenda's daughter Sydney ("Syd") and I became pretty tight after I taught her the joy of "bumping" (jumping) off of the furniture into my arms.  Brenda told me the next morning Syd's first words were "bumping!"  We really had to keep a close eye on her because she loved it so much that if I wasn't watching she would still go for the jump.  I hope that if she's "bumping" at home that she always finds someone to be on the other end. 

My sister Heather stayed the night with grandma and made her breakfast the next morning-cheese blintzes (her absolute favorite and quickly becoming mine)

 Here's grandma getting her birthday phone calls

 Ok, here's a gem.  Here's a pic of grandma and grandpa in the beginning stages of their life together.  I absolutely love this picture.  You can get a good sense of both of their personalities just from this one photo. 

Here are my Grandma's two kids:  my Uncle Grey and my mom.

 Ah yes, you must have some musical performances at any good party, I say.  Here are my neices and nephews (Matthew, Rebecca, Andrew & Marissa) playing a really cool medley of songs for Grandma.

Here I am tuning up my old guitar from my mission-I played "Grow Old Along With Me" by John Lennon for her.  

 We decided to enlarge this awesome picture of Grandma and Grandpa and frame it for a present-she loved it.

 It's close to the end of the party and people are getting a little goofy.

 Here's a pic of all the party goers...it was a great night

 Had to include a picture of the food table.  Grandma loves spaghetti from Vince's-so Dad made it happen.

This is hilarious-I love this picture.  My brother Eric is protecting himself from the evil spaghetti sauce.

 Ok, I had to put this picture in.  My grandma used to drive this mean machine-the mustang.  Now my brother Eric drives it and has put some time and money into restoring it.  When Eric arrived at the party he came in this.  I had to sit in it and listen to it purr.....I love this car so much.  Like Eric, I have the privelege of driving one of the cars that Grandma used to drive: the orange bronco- it is sweet.  There's not a day that goes by when I drive it that I don't think about how my siblings and I would pile in the back of it and Grandma would take us all over California to visit the sights. 

I love my Grandma and am glad that my sister Heather captured this moment.

I retreived this picture off of my sister Heather's blog.  Here's a great photo of my Grandma and my mom-you gotta love it.  I often look at my kids and wonder where the time has gone-it seems to be speeding up all the time.  Grandma has given an amazing example of living a great life and enjoying all of the ups and downs.  Happy 90th Birthday Grandma! 

Christmas once again...

Well it's already been a month since Christmas and I'm finally getting a chance to get these pictures posted.  Christmas comes and goes so fast every year so now we're back to the countdown...11 months until the big day again.  Here's a recap on the happenings at Christmas time for us:

Kate and her friend Monet decide to not wait until summer to have the traditional lemonade stand but decide a "Christmas Cocoa" stand would be appropriate for December...I think they made 24 bucks that day.

Here are the beginnings of the Christmas Eve party at Aunt Lori and Uncle Shawn's house.  Clayton looks excited...heh heh.

There's good ol' Danny Boy...aka Grandpa

                                                                        





 Every year we take a shot at doing the Nativity story.   Josh does the narrating while the angel "Emma" prepares to deliver the message.

 Sam and Casey as Joseph and Mary

 So here you have the shepherds with their "swiffers" or brooms or whatever those things are, and Chloe as one "wiseman" and below is the cute sheep that decided to tag along...

 This year Eli wanted to be a "cloud" (see next pic to get the big picture)...Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't remember any reference to any cloud in the story...oh well, he made it pretty dramatic anyway

The whole cast, including Clayton who was the lighting specialist

 A gift for the baby Jesus

 Our shepherd is worn out after all that mopping

 Kate shows off her new calendar she gets for a gift

 Kate just had to jump into the middle of this picture being taken

 Ah yes, the ginger bread house making contest...

 This is Eli and Casey's creation

 ...and mine and Heather's creation which started out to be Noah's Ark then...I'm not sure what happened

 Chloe and Emma's creation...check out that fishing pole...they're going for the big fish I guess

 Here's a picture Liam laid out for Santa on Christmas Eve

 ...and Christmas morning finally arrives:

...somebody looks happy

Liam was pretty excited about his ripstik...

 

This gift for Clayton was quite the project for Heather to accomplish over the few days she had on Christmas break before the big day.  Clayton has collected t-shirts from his scout camps where he's worked over the past 3 summers, along with some random t-shirts that we're meaningful to him.  Heather got an idea to make this great quilt for Clayton to take with him when he leaves for school next summer in Logan.  Clayton thought it was the coolest...

Ski day at Wolf Mountain

 This year for Christmas both Grandma and Grandpa Peel and Grandma Cottrell gave us a day of skiing for the whole family.  We decided to check the kids out of school on Friday and head up to one of our favorite ski resorts-Wolf Mountain.  The day couldn't have been any better, we had sun, great snow and hardly any other people were there.   The kids had so much fun and all did really well.  Kate has skied a few times but this was her first time of really grasping the whole skiing concept.  Yes, there were plenty of crashes but as you'll see in the videos below, she is a natural.  We had a blast...