Scouting

Last Wednesday, February 29th, our Troop had a Court of Honor. Nathaniel and William each got the Music merit badge. Nathaniel also received his Life rank.

(Nathaniel pinning the Life pin on me.)

Nathaniel had his Life Board of Review January 4, 2012. He has been working really hard to get where he's at, especially since he was a little 'behind' when we moved to Maryland. (Long story short, his last troop, while they did a lot of activities, failed to mark things off and didn't supply a record of many of the things that he did while there, so he had to redo a bunch of things.)

Tonight he is meeting with the Scout Committee to give his Eagle Service Project proposal. I'm very proud of everything he has accomplished. He still has a couple of merit badges that he needs to finish, but hopefully he'll have everything finished and be able to earn his Eagle before the summer is out.

William is a First Class scout. With four boys in Scouts, their progress tends to go in shifts. Andrew is turning 11 this month, so we needed to make sure that he finished everything he needed to to get his Webelos badge and earn his Arrow of Light. And Nathaniel, of course, was trying to finish his Life rank, and now we're involved with his Eagle Project. So for the last couple of months, William and Noah haven't gotten as much 'extra' help for scouts. But William will be ready for his next rank soon, and now that Andrew will be coming in to scouts, we'll be working with him to make sure he is able to make his first three ranks in the next year.

Noah, because he was already in a cub scout pack for four months before turning eight and joining our church pack, already has a lot of things done towards his wolf rank; that's why I don't feel too bad for not doing too much with him as he still has a whole year to finish his rank.

Scouting keeps us busy, but I think it's important. And it's pretty much in my blood, so hey, might as well do it and try to do it well. :)

Chess Tournament

This year Noah started going to chess club and he's really enjoyed it. He gets to stay after school each Monday. His best friend Jackson is also in it. So every Monday Jackson's mom and I take turns picking the boys up from chess club.

On Saturday, Todd took Noah to the Charles County Chess Tournament at Westlake High School. Noah's was in the Kindergarten to Second Grade division. He had a lot of fun and even came in 3rd place! (His friend Jackson came in 2nd.) That's pretty good for not really learning how to play chess.

In chess club, they just let the kids play, but they don't actually teach them how to play chess; they're supposed to already know. And we don't play often at home. So Noah did an awesome job without any coaching or knowing any special strategies. Maybe now we'll actually start playing with him more, and helping him to learn more about chess. (Although, we'll have to learn to, because he probably already knows as much as I do about chess. I know the rules on how the pieces are supposed to move, but that's about it.)

Abigail's recital

Abigail had a recital January 28, 2012.  (I know, I'm a month behind, but hey, I'm getting it posted so that's something.) Abigail has been taking lessons for the viola since around August of 2011. (In school they don't get to start playing an instrument until 5th grade; Abigail is in 4th grade.) But there is a lady in another ward that shares our building who teaches violin and viola, so we signed Abigail up to take lessons with her.

I was so proud of how she did. She loves playing the viola, and I think part of it is knowing that most kids her age don't play an instrument yet. I know for me, I find it hard to play or sing by myself in front of people; I'm much more confident when someone else is playing/singing with me. So I'm always proud to see my children get up in front of others to share their talents.

(PS- I took pictures at the recital, but none of them turned out very well. Surprise, surprise. :( But I thought I would add a nice picture of Abigail. This was taken my my neice, Miquelle, and I love it. If only I could take pictures like a 15 year old. Lol!)

Noah's 8!

We celebrated Noah's 8th birthday on Friday at Pump It Up. It was Noah's first time at Pump It Up, and he really had a lot of fun. Of course, I forgot to bring a camera, but I did remember to pull my phone out after a while. Unfortunately, that's when Noah was mostly inside the boxing ring where the boys got to whack each other as much as they wanted, so the pictures aren't very good.

Noah's birthday was on Sunday which also happened to be Fast Sunday. He was actually kind of excited to fast for the first time. He wasn't able to open up his presents from his birthday party on Friday or Saturday because of other things we had going on, so he got to open them Sunday morning.

One tradition that we do in our family is that the birthday child gets a bag with some of their favorite food in it. This was something my dad always did for us when we were growing up. There were eight children in my family, so it was really nice to have something that was just ours. There would be some things that we requested, but other things treats that were just added. A few years ago I told my children about it, and they said they wanted to start doing it as well. So the kids usually get to pick a favorite drink, cereal, candy, ice cream, etc.

Noah wanted Fruity Pebbles, marshmallows, gogurts, carmel candies, orange Crush, Cookies n' Cream ice cream, Doritos and something else I can't remember. Usually what happens on a child's birthday is that everyone starts being really nice to the birthday child since they're hoping the birthday child will share, but Noah on his own just started passing out marshmallows to people. He shared the most out of any of the kids, and no one even asked him to.

Noah is a very special boy. He is so sweet (he does have non-sweet moments like every child) and smart. We are so happy to have him in our family.

Lillian's prayers

"Dear Heavenly Father, please bless Mommy, and Daddy, and my Nathaniel, and William, and Andrew, and Abigail, and Noah, and my Sophie, and me. And Ari and Tanner (cousins) . . .and Santa Clause."  . . .?

PS: She normally has clothes on when praying, but thought I'd get this picture anyway.

New Year's goal

My New Year's goal is to take more pictures. I never think to get the camera out, and I never carry it with me. I got the idea from my sister, Debbie, who has that as part of her resolution of blogging something & posting a picture every day.

I call this my New Year's goal and not a resolution because I already made a resolution, and this is something extra that I just decided to do about 5 minutes ago when I actually posted on my other blog and, once again, realized that it would be nice to have a photo with it, but I haven't taken any since, oh, maybe Halloween. (Now that I think about it, I don't think I took any at Halloween either.) Maybe a picture a day would be a good idea . . .