Summer 2018

We began the month of July with our traditional 3rd of July Fireworks by the Kalamazoo river. People have discovered "our spot" by the VA building so it was more crowded this year unfortunately. We still had a fun time though hanging out waiting for sunset and then enjoying the amazing fireworks they do every year.

We also had a fun picnic at the Bonnaire's house and the kids had a great time kayaking all over the pond. 

After spending the last two and a half years in Primary at church I was called as the new Young Women president. So one day I planned to meet with Cassandra Betzold, the previous president, so she could walk me through some of the expectations and pass along all of her supplies to me. I brought Lynnsey so she could watch Cassandra's little girls while I met with Cassandra. They are such sweet girls--just so adorable. Almost as cute were the baby kittens they had!

                                       

Kaya took part in one of the summer camps at the nature center again this year and she and her group made a giant tee-pee out of fallen logs and branches.

 The Potter Family Reunion was supposed to be held in Kentucky this year with Susannah in charge, but due to some financial concerns, she had to cancel. That was a bit of a relief actually because I was still doing classes for the BYU-Idaho Pathway program and I had been really concerned about being able to do my finals week during that week. But we still wanted to see everyone so we held the reunion here in Michigan. It was a fun time with most of the family here.

We went to a concert in the park with the Bramhall's who arrived a few days before the Utah groups.

 And we spent a day at Swain's Lake--always a favorite of the Bramhall's (and us).

 Once more family arrived, we went hiking at the nature center.

 And went miniature golfing.

 In the middle of all that we had an interesting experience with a wasp nest that we discovered attached to the fabric that hangs over our front porch. Unfortunately we discovered it because our mail carrier was stung by a wasp and because she was allergic, had to go to the hospital and wouldn't deliver our mail until we could locate where the wasps were coming from. I don't blame her--especially with the allergy. She thought they must be ground wasps that were hiding under the porch steps or something but after hunting around I found the nest and just about got attacked myself by a massive swarm of wasps. I managed to spray them all and the stragglers that kept returning to find their home destroyed.

 We had a really fun trip to Lake Michigan. It was a beautiful day, though the water was a little colder than was comfortable. Everyone had a great time though and it was a great way to wrap up the reunion.

 Finally, after ten months of the Pathway program, I finally finished! It felt almost like graduating from college but in reality, it just means that now I can take online classes from BYU Idaho and finish up my degree that I started so many years ago. It feels great to be working toward that goal again and as happy as I am to have my Thursday nights back, this was a great group of people to be in the program with.

 We celebrated the end of July with Spencer's 13th birthday! We have another teenager in the house!

Kendall designed and decorated the cake.

 August always begins with band camp. Lynnsey had an exhausting but fun week working on the new halftime show for the school year and having a great time with friends.

 We managed to finally squeeze in another zoo trip before the end of the summer too.

And Kendall and I embarked on an adventure that wound up lasting much, much, MUCH longer than I had anticipated it would. I have never been a fan of our blue kitchen cabinets--particularly when combined with the blue walls and the flowery wallpaper. It looked dated and dark and over the years I grew to dislike it more and more. Then one day Lynnsey burned her toast. And I mean, she really burned her toast. Like, it was on fire. And the flames burned a section of the paint off one of the cabinets. It looked bad. And it needed to be painted. But I really didn't want to go buy matching blue paint. So Kendall and I decided to undertake a whole kitchen painting project. We significantly underestimated the time and energy such a project would take. He actually left on his mission before we could get it done. He had been working so much before he left that he didn't have much time and once school and babysitting started for both me and the kids, I didn't have the time. I worked very sporadically and so for months we had a really horrible kitchen. I did finally finish it and will post more before pictures and also the after pictures in a future post. I just thought I'd include this picture of Kendall at the very beginning stage of the project when we were starting to realize after spending hours stripping wallpaper that we may have bitten off more than we could chew.