A Court of Honor

This weekend has been a total blast, start to finish. We partied like we meant it. Then we rested up a bit and partied some more! I have lots of photos to share with you from our weekend, but I'm going to start with today's festivities.

It was an honor to celebrate with my sweet friend Wendy, and her husband Joseph, at their son Benjamin's Eagle Scout Court of Honor today. Some friends and I helped put out food for a little reception following the ceremony. They had a great turn out, and Benjamin did a fantastic job! I was so proud of him, and so very happy for Wendy.

Wendy is my quilting buddy. That was the common thread that very first knit together our friendship. I insisted that she use one of her amazing quilts as a tablecloth today to display Benjamin's scrapbooks and scouting memorabilia, and I'm so glad she took my advice. Doesn't it look fantastic? She keeps this one on the back of the couch in her den, and I keep wondering if she'd notice if it went missing one day.

My beautiful and talented friend, Wendy, and her accomplished boy!

Benjamin and Garrett, his master of ceremonies. There is something so inspiring about seeing boys reach this level of scouting, and it is such an honor to acknowledge and celebrate the amount of hard work and dedication that it takes to get there!

Of course, I will now be showing you a photo of the food spread, because that is what a good German woman does. :-)

My friend took this picture of me, and it cracks me up because I totally look like I am sprouting from a tray of pineapples and strawberries.

Wendy MADE this cake. With her bare hands. Hayden took one look at it and said it looked like The Cake Boss had done it. Agreed! :-) She read about a new technique where you freeze frosting, and that is what she did to make the elaborate eagle emblem. She has some mad baking skills, and more patience than is fair for any one person to have!

She also made this quilted eagle banner. Wendy's mom did the embroidery work for her. Wendy and I actually bought this eagle last year when we attended a quilt show together, and she made a plan at that time to have this project completed by his court of honor ceremony. I'm so proud of her for finishing it. This is a work of art! I know Benjamin will treasure it forever. LOTS of work goes into something intricate like this.

The cake table display area.

My sweet girlfriend. Wendy and I have made an art out of meeting up at Starbuck's to solve the world's problems. I love our coffee dates, and I hope there are lots more quilts, and lots more celebrations in our future together.

Hannah, and her favorite official Eagle Scout!

Congratulations to Benjamin on a well deserved and long awaited day. I'm so blessed that my family was there to share in a special memory with treasured friends.

Tracking Things Down...

This year marks the 100th anniversary of Boy Scouts of America. To mark the occasion, BSA is offering four historic merit badges. Each of the four badges follow the requirements as stated in the 1910 scouting handbook. The badges are distinguished in that they are rimmed in gold thread. These four badges can only be earned this year, and all requirements must be completed by December 31st.

Max and Hayden recently attended a workshop to begin work on a few of the badges. This was significant for us because these are the FIRST merit badges we've earned in our scouting career!

Max completed all the requirements for the tracking badge. He's a regular bloodhound. His favorite part was making plaster casts of animal prints, including a raccoon and bobcat. This week he received his patch at a court of honor ceremony.

Much to my dismay, he also received, at the very same scouting meeting, a marshmallow launcher. Everett won it in a drawing and gave it to Max in exchange for a box of popcorn. God bless Everett.

No fabric patch can compete with that.

I wasn't sure exactly what this household was missing, but now I'm pretty certain it was a cross bow that catapults confections all over the living room. I will confess that the mystery of a marshmallow gun is completely lost on me. (Although I am completely enamored with the tracking patch.) What I don't understand is who will go around and pick up all the marshmallows? They will get picked up, right?? Before the dog eats them, or they melt in the sun and ooze into my carpet? Is this an outside toy? Because, believe it or not, the boys actually told me today that they didn't want to play with it outside because they didn't want to get their marshmallows dirty.

?!?!?!

We have one spanking new merit badge to sew proudly on a uniform. We have two more merit badges in progress. And we have a question.......

Did boy scouts have marshmallow launchers in 1910?? And does Everett's mom want to come over to pick up marshmallows?? :)

Project Hope and Other Reasons to Smile

Everyone has talent, but some people seem particularly gifted in one specific area. It is exciting to see what happens when those people wholeheartedly dedicate that talent to the Lord to see what He is able to accomplish through them. A really great part of my visit to Arkansas was seeing how my Dad has found a "perfect fit" in his retirement years. He has joined forces with a couple other visionary men to form Project Hope, a local food bank. The vision is simple really; to provide food to area soup kitchens to be distributed to the hungry and hurting in the Hot Springs area, where pockets of desperate poverty exist.

They have about 2,000 square feet of warehouse space, which is blessedly becoming more and more well stocked.

Several large items, like freezers and a fork lift, have been provided by donations from local churches and other organizations.

A boy scout installed a restroom in the facility as his eagle scout project. I had to take a photo to show my boys what an outstanding job this young man did. The bathroom is much more "upscale" than the rest of the facility as far as being decorated and modern. This young man obviously found it important to not only provide function, but also to make it extremely nice for the people who spend time at the food bank. It was quite a lesson in going above and beyond!

Since March, Project Hope has distributed over 53,000 pounds of food. It is said the most expensive food is the food that doesn't get used, so they really research what people will realistically prepare and eat. They constantly strive to learn the most effective way to distribute the food to the agencies who actually hand it out to individuals. They look for new ways to raise community awareness and educate people about who they are and what they do, always with the hope that with increased visibility will come increased support. Then of course, they actively search for the food and raise the funds to purchase it. That is how my Dad serves.

If the food bank buys a pound of food for one dollar and is able to sell it to a soup kitchen for forty cents, they need to come up with sixty cents to fill in the gap. My Dad loves to talk to people, especially about things he is passionate about, and he has a magical way of making that passion contagious. He now spends his day sharing the exciting news about Project Hope with groups in his town, raising funds that are used to make a visible, immediate, dramatic impact on his community.

In case you can't tell, I'm a little proud of this guy, as well as Ted and Charles, who are also in the business of projecting hope, in Hot Springs, Arkansas. I just had to share.

And speaking of feeding the hungry, that was a tall order here on the home front this week. The boys are heading out to a boy scout camp in Colorado for a week of primitive camping. In case you don't know, "primitive" is camp speak for not showering and peeing on the ground. It is also code for eating out of a backpack. They do not plan to take a cooler, so I was charged with the task of planning easy camp meals with dry, non-refrigerated ingredients for a whole week. The good news is that they can drive right up to the campsite, so the weight of the food doesn't matter since they won't have to carry it for great distances. So, off to the Walmarts I went with the hopes of smuggling some healthy nutrition into those packs.

NOT speaking of nutrition, look at what I found. Ahhhh.....it is so reminiscent of car trips in the 1970's. Now, I'm rather a purist when it comes to cheese, meaning I like for mine to actually contain dairy products and be a proper degree of cold. But, who doesn't love an orange squiggle on a Ritz cracker once every few years??

Dinner last night was a hoot, and I wish I would have taken a picture of their plates. Since I don't tend to cook with many dried and packaged foods, I wasn't sure what my kids would like. So, I bought one each of several different things to try. I came home and cooked it all at once (had every pot and pan in my kitchen in service!) and served sampler platters with a bite or two of each item for them to try! I don't want to risk packing food they don't like since I know they will be exhausted and starving after long days of hiking, rafting, fly fishing and rock climbing. They tried Ramen noodles, prepackaged spaghetti, and vienna sausages for the very first time. Some of the items on the sampler platter were major "misses", but I think I got enough hits to pack a bucket with a week's worth of rations. If all else fails they can eat numerous peanut butter sandwiches. With a squirt of canned cheese as a chaser!

The local attire is as wacky as the menus lately. People have been tromping through my house wearing new hiking boots with shorts or swim trunks, trying to get them broken well broken in. It's a great look in this hundred degree weather.

So, I'm off to pack beef jerky, jiffy pop, and summer sausage into a camp trunk. I will say that I think of things a bit differently now, and I hope the good Lord always reminds my conscience to give thanks as I am privileged to fill my cart at the Walmart.

And eat real, honest to goodness cheese, right out the refrigerator.

Cub Camp, Wrapping It Up

Camp is officially over, and we had a fantastic finish.  It was a fun week enjoying old friends and making new ones.

Our troop was responsible for flag ceremony on Friday.

Max got to go on stage and call the ceremony for the boys.

The egg drop is the spectacular event of the final day.  Because really, what says big celebration like throwing things out of a cherry picker and watching them smash on the ground?  This is boy entertainment.  Each troop pampered and padded an egg in hopes that it could survive the fateful fall.
The boys all cheered as each egg was launched, but the real crowd raisers were the cantaloupes and watermelons.

These lucky leaders had the coveted job of opening each egg container and searching through the innovative packing materials (peanut butter, jello, spaghetti, marshmallows, bubble wrap, etc.) looking for survivors.  Our egg was not among the fortunate.  :(

No camp is complete without an opportunity to roast s'mores.

If you cut the bottom off a plastic milk jug it makes a perfect holder for a whiffle ball.  The kids had a blast playing a variation of ultimate frisbee with the jugs.  The object was to get your ball in the goal by passing it across the field to your team mates without the opposing team stealing the ball.  You can't run with the ball, you can only toss it to each other.  Also, you can't touch it with your hands, you can only catch it in the milk jug.  This is such a simple game and I'm already planning to save my milk jugs to make one for home.

Throughout the week, each camper was awarded a bead at every activity station.  They also had the chance to earn special gold beads at archery and the riffle range.  At the end of camp they each got a leather fob with all their beads on it as a memento.  This was a great group of kids to hang with for the week, and I'm glad we made some memories to share!

Cub Camp, The Home Stretch

This is what my den looked like ten minutes ago...
...and this is what it looks like now...

Despite creating a slightly awkward decorating dilemma, I grew to greatly appreciate this little pen.  The only problem is that it doesn't have a lid.  A certain small someone has figured out the pen system, and she's all about the jail break.  I put her in the pen and turn my back, and she is out of the pen and six steps ahead of me before I can even start walking.  I need new running shoes.  Or a lid for my pen.  

Seriously, life just got so much harder. 

Cub camp is drawing near an end.  Oh, have mercy.  There are certain people living here who are over tired and over done and who have been falling apart and having fits way too easily.  One more day is all I can take.  Getting there is the entire battle.  Once we are at camp, things go smoothly and we have a great time.  Here were the highlights of the day....

Pop!  Pop!  Popcorn!  Foil packet popcorn pouches popping over hot coals.  The sweet souls who volunteered to hoover over those coals all day deserve a medal.  It was all kinds of HOT.

The rain gutter regatta was a huge hit.  The kids decorated boats and sails, then raced them down the gutters.  Since we were the last group of the day at this station, I tried really, really hard to ignore all the little boys who were actually drinking water from those gutters with their straws.  The old water that had been blown in and touched all day long.  I promise I didn't yell at more than seven kids.  Or maybe seventeen.  Camp is gross and that's just a fact.  You just go with it.  You learn to roll like a sweat bead.

The boys earned a forester badge after a two day forestry stint.  Today we went on a "hike" (more like a wander) to identify several kinds of trees.  Did you know two rings represent one year's tree growth?  Sanding this limb made the rings stand out.  We will do some more sanding at home then spray with an acrylic finish to be able to see the rings even better.

Tomorrow is the last day of camp, and we are celebrating with an egg drop.  We have to come up with some way to protect our troop's egg from breaking as it is dropped from a cherry picker.  We'll see which cracks first; the egg, or the mom on her fifth day of camp.  :)

Cub Camp, Take Three

This morning my boys were invited to a dollar movie at the mall with their friend Brad.  I met up with them after a rousing viewing of Space Chimps and coaxed them into Pottery Barn Kids en route to the food court.  The boys kicked back while I fell madly in love with something called an Everywhere Chair for Miss Emma.  The boys had it made in the shade while I debated slip covers and tallied my budget for unnecessary toddler furniture.  I left the store empty handed because I didn't have time to wait in line at the loading dock today, but I'm heavily flirting with the idea of rearranging my entire schedule to return tomorrow.  After all, an everywhere chair would come in handy almost anywhere.  :)

After our mall tour we raced home for the whole camp tee shirt/ camp tote bucket/ camp cooler / camp lawn chair extravaganza, which looks a lot like three unconcerned, laid back, easy going boys wandering in circles around a wound up, fast talking woman who is speaking way too loud while pitching things in buckets and coolers.

Temperatures are still on the rise this week, as is cub camp enthusiasm.  Hannah snapped this picture of us today as we were ready to peel out, and just as I was reminding the boys not to give me ugly squinty eyes in the picture.  Notice I'm the Squinty.
Each boy is required to wear a hat because of the heat.  They attach fabric to their caps and that is where they pin all the totems they trade throughout the week.  The little collection of trinkets grows day by day. 

Archery is one of the most popular activities.

Part of the fun of camp is plopping down in the shade to guzzle some gorp.  Gorp is camp sustenance.  Everyone in the troop brings a fun ingredient (fruit loops, cheesy crackers, pretzels, Skittles, etc.) and we dump it all in a huge trash bag to mix it up.  Then we dole it out to the kids to munch on all day, every day.  Gorp is gourmet scout snacking at its best. 
One of the most clever stations today was how to build a campfire.  First you make a protective fire ring (marshmallows).  Then you lay the kindling (thin pretzels) in an "A" frame.  A sprinkling of tinder (coconut) is necessary....even if you don't like to eat the tinder!  
Next you pile on the fuel, such as wood (large pretzel rods).  Whoola!  Fire (red hots)!  Notice that it is lots of fun to roast a marshmallow over the fire.  :)Fire safety standards require you to completely cover the fire when you are done with it.  So, crumbling a cookie into fine powder worked well for that purpose.
While the boys snacked on all but the coconut tinder, a real live boy scout demonstrated the real deal.
There were sponge races to cool off after fire building.
Dinner bell.
And for dessert, homemade ice cream made in a coffee can.  It took lots of rolling to get it frozen!  I had to swoop in for a sample.  Vanilla ice cream is my very favorite dessert.  It was delicious!  :)
Tomorrow Buzzard is working from home because his car is going to the shop.  I have to be up early to drop him off and to take Hannah to an appointment.  My Mom is coming to stay with the baby, and I have no idea where the poor woman will sit.  My house is a complete wreck, and although I desperately want to tidy things up a bit I simply can not will my legs to stand up and take a step.  I'm so dog tired that I can only look at the volcanic mess erupting from the camp totes and coolers and wonder how I will ever stuff it all back in tomorrow to head out once again.  We're on the downhill slope now!  It's cub camp or bust....perhaps with one small layover at Pottery Barn Kids.  :)