John's Wolf Award

Well, February 23 was the Blue and Gold Banquet, which is basically the annual birthday party for cub scouts. It's the most special pack meeting of the year and it happened to be the pack meeting when John would earn his Wolf badge. For those of you who aren't real familiar with scouts (and I've decided you either need to be a scout, a scout leader, or a scout mom to sort out the difference between den meetings and pack meetings and cubmasters and cub committee chairs and oy vey!)... anyway, for those of you who don't know, the Wolf badge is a pretty big deal. These boys can earn smaller awards just by completing an activity in an afternoon (and these awards are given at the monthly pack meetings), but the Wolf badge is a bigger deal. They give you one year, from the time you turn 8, to earn your Wolf badge. John did it in 6 months... but I'm not bragging. ;) Anyway, the timing was good because the Blue and Gold is such a big event that it was neat that he received his Wolf badge then. So here's a little play by play of the evening (the theme was Chinese New Year, and the leaders who planned this really had fun with it):


First, the boys got to make their own Chinese yo-yo's as we waited for people to arrive:






Once the program got started, one of the leaders came out in this costume:



...to introduce the Chinese Dragon.



All the scouts helped make this, and they had fun parading around the audience.



Here's John hearing about the story of Mowgli and the wolf pack.




See the Chinese take out box on the table? They gave each boy their awards in a take out box. Cute idea! John earned several awards, but the biggest award was the Wolf badge. Mothers get the honor of handing this to their sons.

John is usually quite serious on occasions like this (hmm, I wonder where he gets it?)



Now it's time for games! All the kids got to play the Chinese Dragon game (John is right in the middle of this picture - he turned his head at the last second):


The little kids got to be part of the dragon too, but they had a hard time hanging on to those bigger boys. It was like the dragon kept losing its tail!


Chris is at the end, and Ben is 6th child in.



The dinner was in a different room, and it was all decked out in twinkly lights and chinese lanterns, etc. Since this is the Chinese year of the rat, the centerpieces were squeaky plastic rats with balloons tied to them.



They served delicious Chinese food for dinner, and while some people tried eating with the chopsticks they gave us, I went straight for the fork. There were so many fun little touches, like these dinner place cards with our names in Chinese:


It was a fun evening and John is so proud of himself. His leader also gave him a real wolf claw on a leather necklace. He barely took it off for two days straight. :)

Update: as of 3/9/08 he's worn it just about every day. I should take a picture of him with it on. He LOVES it!

The Ever Elusive Ben

Even though this happened at the Blue and Gold Banquet too, I think it deserves it's own entry. When I was taking pics of the boys with their Chinese yo-yo's, Ben's kept unraveling and so he started waving his around like a ribbon. I got several pictures, but every time his face was blocked:

I made a comment to Brian about how I couldn't seem to get a picture of Ben's face. Well Ben heard it and, much to his mother's annoyance, decided to start hiding his face on purpose:

I finally gave up. A good 15 minutes later, it was time to start settling into the chairs so they could begin the meeting. It was taking awhile for everyone to gather so we decided to get a pic of Ben, thinking he had forgotten the game. No such luck. He was weaving, dodging, and in general doing anything he could to keep us from getting a good shot:

Isn't it funny how adults tire of games so much quicker than kids do?? Finally, Brian puts on his Dad Voice and tells Ben to knock it off.

Ben complied...

... but he wasn't too happy about it.

This just cracks me up. Ben never stays mad for long though, and here's the proof:

Book Blurb: The Diary of Mattie Spenser

I've decided that whenever I finish reading a book I liked, I'm going to post up a blurb about it on here. This one, The Diary of Mattie Spenser, by Sandra Dallas, was excellent. As I was reading, I kept forgetting it wasn't real. I loved it. I also read The Persian Pickle Club by the same author and loved it too. I'll definitely read more by her. Anyway, here's what was on the back cover of the Mattie Spenser book:

"No one is more surprised than Mattie Spenser herself when Luke Spenser, considered the great catch of their small Iowa town, asks her to marry him. Less than amonth later, they are off in a covered wagon to build a home on the Colorado frontier. Mattie's only company is a slightly mysterious husband and her private journal, where she records the joys and frustrations not just of frontier life, but also of a new marriage to a handsome but distant stranger. As she and Luke make a life together on the harsh and beautiful plains, Mattie learns some bitter truths about her husband and the girl he left behind and finds love where she least expects it. Dramatic and suspenseful, this is an unforgettable story of hardship, friendship, and survival."

Snow!!

Who remembers it snowing here last year? (This was Jan 07) The kids and I were sitting around the table eating breakfast when Brian called to say there was snow at an intersection only a few miles away. So we got ready real quick and drove over there. At first, I thought it had all melted, because I was getting close and didn't see snow anywhere. Then suddenly everything was covered in white. We found this little park which seemed to be the center of it all. You could go a quarter mile in any direction and not find even a trace of snow. It was crazy! The boys were late for school that day, but it was worth it!

This was right before we left and the boys were COLD! Can you tell??? ;) They each decided they wanted a souvenier piece of snow, which we put in plastic bags and stuck in our freezer when we got home. We still have the snow, but it gets smaller and smaller all the time!

Brian's Train

Brian has always loved trains, me too actually. Our very first apartment, in Galesburg, IL, was a stone's throw from one of the many train tracks to be found in that city. When a train went by, it was so loud that even someone talking to us on the phone felt like it was coming into their living room. We loved it though. Our next apartment was much further from the trains, and we missed the sounds of it.

Brian has always wanted a model train, but without sufficient space or funds, we never got one. Until this year. Brian finally has a starter set, and he plans on setting it up in the workshop. He's working on building a table, and has ordered a few more trains from eBay (where else?). Anyway, this is video of his first train, which he got for Christmas.

Hee hee. Here's a close up of the engine:

And here's the man himself. Doesn't he look so happy? :)

Disneyland!

Last August we took a trip to Disneyland - we actually won tickets on the radio (thanks to Jenny for calling us when she heard Brian's name!). It was such a fun trip, and Chris still asks when we can go again. :)


We drove over on the first day, and got to the beach in time for lunch. We spent the rest of the day there and got quite a bit of sun.

John and Ben had a blast playing in the waves. After awhile they got quite bold, and would walk out as far as they could and then "ride" the wave back into shore.

Look at that cute boy! Chris loved the beach!

This was the start of the pier...

...And this is a view from the end.

This is by the pool at our hotel. The trip package included two nights at the Grand Californian Hotel, and from here you can see California Adventures in the back.



This is the view from our room. See Bear Mountain? In the foreground, you can also see the track for the monorail.



Our first day at Disneyland - we're still pretty red from the beach!


John and Ben on the monorail. We rode this several times, but this was when we got to ride up front with the driver. It was cool!

Ben's favorite ride!

Oh my holy! Chris is driving! (Okay, it's just Autopia, but STILL!)

Strike a pose!


In front of Rabbit's house.

Back at home, displaying their shell collections.

John's Bobcat Award

Since we don't exactly have a digital camera right now (unless you count the one we borrow from Brian's work on occassion) I'll be posting up some of the more important pics we already have. This is when John earned his Bobcat award in scouting, back in November.

This pack meeting was held at a member's house, and they have horses, goats, chickens, etc. So as part of the activities, the kids were able to pet the animals. Here's a few of Chris and John. I promise we don't neglect to take pictures of Benjamin! He had fun looking at the animals, but wouldn't go in.

That's all for now!

Donna

A Blog is Born

...And that's better than another boy, let me tell you!

We've been inspired by Blake and Leeanne's blog. Even though they're sooooo far away, seeing pictures of them regularly helps us feel a lot closer. So we've decided to do our own little blog and hopefully stay in touch with people better. Feel free to leave comments so we know we're not just sending this out into the big ol' void. That's all for now!

Donna