My dad had to quickly introduce us to the pool table/ping pong table, which dad eventually fixed during the week. See one thing about my dad is he can't sit still idly by and do nothing when there is stuff to fix. So we quickly made a list of stuff he started to fix and the first one was the pool table.
Then on to Friday night when I made my first meal, white chicken chili. My good friend Jessica had made this amazing meal for us that I wanted to replicate. I went to the store, bought what I needed, and put it all together in the crock pot and boy did it ever smell so good. Time for dinner and I served it up and Joel was setting it on the table and he dripped a spot on to his finger which he licked off as he was coming over to me and said is it supposed to have a bite? To which I responded no and tasted it. Boy, it set my mouth on fire and I said make sure you put sour cream in it. Yvette's family all loved it but the rest of us could barely eat it. Turns out that I put jalapeño peppers in it instead of chili peppers. So it became a running joke to make sure Michelle isn't cooking or we will definitely lose some weight this week.
We mostly just rested for the first couple of days to recoup from the drive down. Fourteen hours in a car was a bit much. Melinda came down on Friday and we went to the aquarium on Sunday and it wasn't big, but it was fun to break out and do something. Each night it seemed like a ping pong, pool table or air hockey game was going. Lydia and Seth loved running around with their cousins and there seemed to never be a quiet moment until they all eventually crashed.
Sleeping was somewhat of a challenge but it all worked out in the end. We all took a drive down the beach to try to see the wild horses but we didn't see any. But we enjoyed some waves and cold water.
My dad discovered a new game called Catch Phrase Scrabble. He was so fun to play with. Between his descriptions of the words/phrases and his body movements we laughed a few pounds off. Clay really loved to see Papa first thing in the morning, dad could always get a good smile or coos out of him. Lydia, Seth, and Chloe enjoyed morning time cuddles with Aunt Yvette and afternoon cuddles with Mimi.
It was cold and windy most days but we made the most of it. Allyson and Andrew were mega helps to us with the younger kids. We got to play games a lot because they kept their eyes on the kiddos. Adam and Alex spent their time playing hide and seek, dolls and doctors with their 3 younger cousins sometimes playing mediator between the three. I always had a good relationship with my cousin Stacey. Lydia and Chloe are the same age apart that we are and so I am happy for their relationship and how much fun they had together since Lydia is surrounded by mostly boys.
