The cottage experience

We are back from our first experience as cottage owners. It was exciting, overwhelming and yet relaxing. I am so excited to go back, we really do love it out there.

 Listening to the birds and crickets and the occasional boat is such a change from what we are used to here in the city. 

Right now we are one house in off the main drag (in the city) and if I dare leave a window open at night all we can hear is cruisers and motorcycles all night long.

Ahhh the peace, it was amazing!

The mess that greeted us, that is another story. I'll get to that.

We were all a little perplexed.

Well except Ethan. The fact that there was a gravel driveway and tons of dirt to play in made his day.

Once we hiked down to the beach everyone loosened up and we were ready to survey all that was left by the previous owners then it was off to my parents cottage up the road for Canada day dinner.

A run through their sprinkler and a few rides on the bikes took us away from the mess back at our place, by this time beginning to seem a little daunting.

OK, I am sure you are now dying to see how bad it was. Enough with the distractions already.

Well one more...I had to keep the kids busy and out of Dave's hair so he could rip stuff apart and clean out junk.

My dad and Phil and Em got right in there with Dave and they tore out a few sheds a few freezers a few decks (insulated and saturated with animal pee) and a chicken coup, a rabbit house, a pigeon coup and loads of terds and feed left to rot.

Phil found a little frog in the mess but we were all afraid to get too close, the stench that was rising from the debris was nauseating. 

Wonder why we bought this dump?

Well this is the view out the patio door from our bed. I layed and layed and dreamt the place was cleaned up and non stinky. 

The guys kept plugging away and the pile for the dump grew and grew.

It is looking much better now but there is still massive amounts of work to be done. All the gravel in the yard has to be removed. The old owners layed plastic down over the old lawn and then added the gravel. All their pets then used it as a litter box so it is one huge saturated stinky mess.

Dave did dig us a fire pit though so we could roast wieners and smores, mmm.

One persons left behind junk, another's treasure. Kaitlyn and Ethan helped me sand and paint this heavy old piece.

Reclaimed things.

And here is the growing pile of garbage. It is enough to fill a double car garage and this is only half of it.

We sure have our work cut out for us.

There are a ton of other photos as well. Ones of the interior and the whole process. For those click here and work your way backwards a few (6) pages. I uploaded then in reverse order.