He's a Boy Scout Now

Tonight was Ankeny Pack 87's Blue and Gold Banquet. It was wonderful to see Matthew receive his Arrow of Light. It was hard earned because he missed almost a full year of Scouts last year and had to do much of the work on his own with his Dad rather than with his Den. (Which Ken reminds me is much more fun (the den stuff, that is)!)

The five boys in the beige shirts moved onto Boy Scouts today. The other five boys did not (and so were still wearing their Cub Scout shirts). If you click on the picture it will get bigger and you can see how very cool the Arrow award is. (Ken said, "my Arrow award was just the patch"....so someone went to a lot of trouble to make this special!) Ken indicated that a dad in Matthew's troop is quite a wood worker and perhaps he made these. The other Den of Weblos had different awards (also very cool). This will be something that Matthew will treasure as it is displayed on his wall. He received all his belt loops, pins and badges today (all at once). Kinda too bad, since the only thing he can wear on his Boy Scout uniform is the Arrow of Light patch. (The other things were supposed to go on his Cub Scout uniform, but since he didn't get any of them until today that isn't going to happen. I told him we can make something to display his achievments in.)

Matthew's last moments as a Cub.

Initially I typed, "This was one of the first things Matthew and Ken did when Matthew was a Tiger. They marched in a parade the church had to celebrate its anniversary." Then I looked at the next picture and realized that it must have been near the end of his Tiger Cub year, because his Den-mate is wearing his Wolf scarf. (His mother was more on the ball.)

This was Matthew with a former classmate and fellow scout. His mother is a dear friend. It was hard to be at "the" Blue and Gold, when it wasn't St. John's Blue and Gold. Enough said. Proud of Matthew tonight and look forward to the day he earns his Eagle. (Can't believe that next year Joel will be wearing the same uniform! I still have the hat!)

(Believe it or not, we put a down payment on Boy Scout camp today.....another milestone to achieve this summer...CAMP, and I am not talking Day Camp folks.....he will love it, I will be a worried wreck.) Enough said.

A cure for the winter blahs!

I have started to feel very blah! I just don't get as much done as I would like and my outlook is less cheery!

It is hard because the Des Moines area is at near record snowfall and much colder than usual. I went to my Faith and Friendship group and I certainly felt like many were of like mind -"spring, spring, we want spring"! Luckily we have been pretty healthy, but many of my friends have had sick kids for months on end - yuck!

I am trying to nip the blahs in the bud. Yesterday I hired my favorite sitters (ok ONLY sitters) and went for a walk around the block before getting to work. I tried to soak in a bit of Vitamin D and fresh air. I also have arranged with a friend (who was looking to make a bit of extra cash baby-sitting) to watch Anna for a few hours on Tuesday mornings. I am hoping to feel less behind on everything by getting a few hours of paid work done during the week!

My newest idea is to start planning my garden. The seeds pictured above were purchased today for $2 at Walgreens today. I need to grow about one large zucchini to re-coup my cost. Anna and I went to play at a friend's house today and did more garden planning. My friend K* and her family are going to garden with us this summer, which is fantastic. It will be fun to share our adventures in gardening with someone and K* really has a positive outlook on life which inspires me. K* has books on organic pest control and companion gardening so we had a great time discussing strategies to beat my squash bug enemy and the blight! (small pleasures are all I need in the winter - squash bug strategies, who knew that could make a gal smile?)

Feel free to share any other blues-beating ideas in the comment section!

My weekend in pictures - Sunday

Carolyn's First Reconciliation

Carolyn had her First Reconciliation today (Sunday). We had planned to put Joel and Anna in the nursery so we could both share in her second sacrament. Unfortunately between church and reconciliation, Anna slipped and hit her head. She lost conciousness briefly and tried to choke on the cookie in her mouth, cried and then got sleepy. Does this sound familiar? If not, it is because maybe I didn't blog about when the same thing happened this summer at the pool. I have never had a child do this until Anna and now she has done it twice - in 8 months!!! This summer we had a CAT scan, which was fine, and by the time it was done she was acting normally. Today we had a phone consult with our favorite pediatrician (thanks again Dr. B) and he advised that we could watch her. After a little nap, she was back to normal again. Praise the Lord!!! Hopefully this was the last of these incidents, because even if Anna is doing well, it takes about 10 years off my life. No more tights on tile for Anna!

Anyway, Ken stayed with the other kids while Carolyn and I went to reconciliation alone. Carolyn wanted to hurry to go to do her confession, but of course the priest asked us not to cue into long lines. Of course there were lines everywhere and Carolyn wasn't very patient! But finally she got to go and was as happy as a clam. It was fun to see all my little religious ed. students dressed up so nice and singing their "I'm Sorry Song". ("when we say "I'm sorry"...it is a happy time for everybody......" you get the idea, sweet sweet sweet)

After Carolyn's special celebration we went home to check on Anna. Ken said she woke up "acting perfectly normal". We decided to have a quick trip to "Girl Scout World Thinking Day". The older girls had crafts and snacks for the younger girls who had made posters about scouting in different countries. (We had South Africa.)

When we got there our leader warned that "the food was interesting (not in a good way), but try it". So we did....MISTAKE. Let's just say if you are in Kuwait don't eat special balls made out of chickpeas that are created by Girl Scouts from the US. I actually think they were rotten, because I am a big fan of the chickpea and these tasted BAD. I took a tiny bite (as did Carolyn) and we threw the rest away. Anna ate the whole thing, which made me think, "look...maybe they weren't so bad"....until Anna threw the whole thing up in my hand. Given her head trama, you would think I would worry more....but you didn't taste the chickpea ball - it was THAT bad. I think if I had eaten an entire chickpea ball I might have had a similar outcome to Anna. I know you must think I am crazy going on and on about these chickpea creations....but they were THAT bad. I will remember them next year at "World Thinking Day".

BTW, I remember going to the same function when I was a Brownie....let's just say it is a bit more thrilling when you are 8. Carolyn and Anna had a grand time. Anna frequently wanted to make sure she had her book (the passport for the event). Carolyn made her rounds in the short time we had, because she is a crafter to the bone (must be genetic....although I am not sure where I got the gene from as my mother isn't crafty) Maybe my dad will leave a comment telling everyone if his mother was crafty! I know she was excellent in the kitchen and she probably didn't have much time to craft since this amazing woman raised my dad's family alone when his father died in my dad's infancy! (I know I got a little off topic....sue me....I had a rough weekend!)

My weekend in pictures - Saturday

Joel had his last basketball game. Guess who took this picture? (If you guessed it was Ken and not me, you are right. I will give the guy A for effort - he did take 4 pictures, but this was the best of them. I guess 5 year old boys aren't the easiest "targets".)

Here is Matthew at his first camp-out with his Iowa Cub Scout troup. I know they had a snowball fight and stayed up late and had a great time. Ken is charge of Cub scouts so this is all I can tell you. Ken took all 4 kids during the day and then he brought Joel and the girls home for Joel's basketball game. Then he and Joel returned to stay over-night. Both boys needed tooth-picks for their eyes the next day. Carolyn was very sad not to get to "camp-out" (which was inside the building above). After she finished being sad, we put Anna to bed and painted her nails and a beautiful canvas for her bedroom. The next morning she got to make a special peach-puff pancake. She did say, "this is better than camping-out" at one point. I hope that is how she remembered it.

The good the bad and the snowy

The good is that Anna is napping again this week. My approach of starting with quiet time, then tucking her in has worked! (I didn't really plan to work it that way, but once I noticed that it was working, we have tried it ever since. Of course Anna is still a bit sick, so that might make her more tired, but I am hoping naps are back for awhile.) I would have taken a picture of her sleeping, but didn't want to risk waking her up - I am not that crazy! This is her "helping" Joel make his Valentine box. This was after she dumped the box of colors over my back while I was laying on my stomach helping color a Pokemon. You can see why I need this kiddo to nap.

The bad (no picture) is that Anna has been sick since last Wednesday and Ken has been gone for 2 weeks. (Actually Carolyn and Matthew have a bit of a cough too, but still are able to go to school. Tummies in the house also are only so-so!) I am a bit stir crazy and ready for adult communication! Luckily Ken comes home tonight. Also bad is the fact that my work computer is in Omaha getting a once-over and I can't get one of my software programs to work on my home computer. Hopefully I will have that resolved before Saturday! I need a break from my lovely children (it is true - so sue me!)

The snowy...Yes we have snow almost up to our mailbox. We have been blanketed in snow since before Christmas and haven't seen grass ever since. We still have Christmas lights on our bushes, because we can't take them off - they are buried. We couldn't even use them since the week before Christmas when the original burying occured.

When it warms up I am going to live outside (figuratively speaking of course)! I am already making gardening plans, which is funny since Ken saw our garden spot last weekend and said that there is at least 6 feet of snow on it, since the church shovels its parking lots into the area. A girl can dream though, right?

Quilt of the month club - February

I believe this month's quilter is S.S's niece. The person is going to college next fall, so I am just guessing. She sent different background fabrics to different quilters, green representing college, purple for nursing (her major) and pink representing love. I received the green fabric and accented with her other color choices. She wants her quilt to be called, "Loud Mouth Quilt" and asked for phrases, words, quotes or fabrics related to the theme (in my case college). This was VERY fun to make. It is a challenge to piece letters together. I speculate many others will applique, but I am not really good at that yet. I had seen pieced letters on a web-site and was excited (maybe nervous) to give it a try.

The square looks better in person and says, "THINK" "GROW". I had a 3rd word in my original design, but was afraid the letters would get too small to work with effectively. I think I made a good choice. The letters are supposed to be a bit "wonky" (in other words, not all symetrical and the same size) which is a good thing, because I think that is the only way I can make letters!!!

Lest you not think this was really a challenge, the bottom middle of the W has 8 1/2 square triangles and the K is 14 pieces! I really enjoyed making this square! I think I might have to make my kids pillow shams with their names on them.....after I get their quilts done - of course (and the 2 baby quilts and confirmation quilt....which is almost done).

Joel is Six!

Our Joel is now six. He celebrated his big day on Friday and had a great time. It was very nice the Ken was able to get in late on Thursday night so he didn't miss our celebration.

I thought the picture below was so fitting of our life. Here is Joel trying to blow out the candles while I make sure that Anna DOESN'T (it isn't her birthday, but more importantly, she has a cold!) In case you can't tell, Joel's cakes are 3 different planets...I believe one is the moon, not sure which one!

Valentine boxes (A.K.A. are you crazy trying to decoupage with a 2 year old)

Joel is my first child who has had the assignment "build a Valentine box". The other kids always made their Valentine collectors in class. I have wonderful memories making Valentine boxes.....one year I even had a babysitter help me make a box that looked like a girl.....I loved that box. Anyway, we had great fun building Joel's box last night. Anna REALLY wanted to help, so I told her that she could make her box when Joel was at school the next day. (She held me to it!) Joel's box has a Pokemon theme (my idea, but only because he didn't think of it first). He really worked hard and commented, "I really like doing this", which I guess shocked him, since he isn't much of a "color pages" kind of guy. He let Anna be in the picture with him!

Here is Anna with her box (Dora theme) and my box....which she helped me decoupage. It actually went very well. I decided everyone in the family was going to make Valentine's for everyone else, so I needed a box. Of course, as sure as I was that Joel would like a Pokemon theme, I knew I needed a fabric box. We took all the little scraps that are too small to sew with and glued them all over the box. It was fun to work on the project with Anna. I realize that she is following in Carolyn's footsteps and that she is going to be a crafter. I can tell that this has only just begun.

Speaking of Anna, better go check on her, since the sound in the monitor informs me that she is no longer in her room (but close enough that I can here her). Matthew is lucky....I locked his door!

Quiet Time

Matthew gave up his nap pretty early and went on to have "Quiet time" until he went to Kindergarten. This never worked so well for Carolyn or Joel, since the other kids were around etc. Well, we are trying it again. Anna isn't wanting to nap, but I can hardly stand the thought of no break in the day, especially when Ken travels. Plus then she is crabby by 5 (and I probably am too).


The picture above is Anna playing Little People. It isn't really quiet time, because I use the baby monitor and when I finally didn't hear playing today, I knew she had left her room. Anyway, after a potty break, I tried laying her down. I don't hear anything now, so I better go check!


I am going to really give the Quiet Time idea a valient effort. Wish me luck.

Matthew's invention

Matthew came home and Monday and let me know that his orginal "invention" project was not going to work, because a chemical that he needed was $31. I sort of remembered him talking about an invention, but never so concretely, so I asked him, "when is this project due?" To this he replied, "today or tomorrow, but Mrs. Long said we can have until Thursday, since we don't have class until then".....woah....hold the phone. Anyway, after asking him when he thought he was going to get started on this project and reminding him that usually projects of this nature take a bit more planning, he proceeded with his new idea. He wanted to make something that melts the ice that freezes on a leaky window when it is very cold (less than 15 degrees). I did help him a little bit, but he did the experiment himself and was pretty scientific about the whole thing. BTW. Despite the extension offered by his teacher, I made him finish the project and turn it in on time....be responsible and all that! I also taught him the important rule of never mixing chemicals...when he wanted to see if mixing his "melters" would give an improved product. I am hoping this lesson sticks even if nothing else does. I told him how deadly toxins can be created by mixing comman household chemicals. Since he wants to be a scientist someday this is important, don't you think?

Here are the items Matthew tested for their ability to melt ice.

These are the items Matthew tested for absorbency.

The final product. Matthew combined the 3 most absorbent materials and soaked them in salt water, then let the water evaporate. Matthew wanted to know if I thought he could patent the invention, so no one could steal his idea. I said, "let's start by finishing the assignment and worrying about the patent another day".

Thought for the day

A friend sent this today and it fit my morning perfectly. I don't know the original author.
Thought For The Day:


Women are Angels.

And when someone breaks our wings....

We simply continue to fly ......... on a broomstick...



We are flexible....