The Pinewood Derby......

Dylan's Baja Racer. Mike and him worked hard and the truck did awesome. Dylan really wanted a truck instead of a car.

He was so proud of the truck....

 Dylan and Clive.

The boys and Sister Spendlove who is one of his awesome Scout leaders. We wanted Sister Dowse in the picture, but we could not find her and the racing was starting. Dylan has great Scout leaders. He refers to them as a his "Akela," which is the proper term for the leaders. The boys had made amazing looking cookies shaped out of car designs with their Scout leaders.

                                            
Dylan and Jacob.
                                                      
 The races were super close and all the cars were fast.  The representative from the Boy Scouts Association  who timed the races with the computer and announced the races, stated that the cars were some of the fastest he had seen and the races were the closest he had seen in a long time. Look how close they were near the end of the track.

The excitement at the end of the track as the cars are racing.

Setting the cars on the track for one of the races.

                                      

Dylan with his blue ribbon and nice stand that he received.

All the Scouts. It was such a fun night.

They asked that the siblings bring a banana to race and Tate had been so upset that Mike did not have time to help him make a Batman Pinewood Derby Car. He was so excited about the banana and talked Mom into helping him decorate it with Batman stickers.  He was so proud of the finished product and he was the only sibling who brought a banana to race.

 The sheer shock when the only banana won and he was awarded a trophy as the Top Banana. It was the comedy act of the evening. There is never a dull moment with Tate in our family. Everyone congratulated him and now he has even a greater ego.

 

Lately this has been his smile when I ask to take his picture.

The infamous cake.......

Dylan earned his Wolf Badge in Scouts (I have photos although I am  having trouble uploading them) and he also made the infamous cake for the Blue and Gold Dinner.  His Scout Master had emphasized that the boys were to make their cake for the cake walk and I had to work the night before the dinner so Mike helped him.  When I came home and saw the finished product I took a deep breath and wondered if I should bake another cake and then have Dylan decorate it after school after completing homework and his chores.  I decided to not redo the wonder cake since they had asked that the boys do the work.  When we arrived at the dinner I was shocked to see all the cute adorable cakes that the "boys/parents" had made. Many were obviously decorated by the parents and were beautiful.  For a moment I was embarrassed and then the thought came that Dylan had done the work alone and he was proud of his cake and so I proudly sat it in front of all the cute cakes hoping to get my pie pan back.  Dylan's cake won the award for the "Wildest Cake," and after the dinner Mike and I talked about how he thought the cake was fabulous and was proud that he had decorated the cake himself.  We all learned a great lesson about letting the kids learn from doing and not completing the assigned task for them since this is how they build self confidence. In the end, Mike and I were both happy we had not made another cake.

 It looks like a cat clawed through it with all the crumbling cake that had mixed with the frosting.

Landon chose his cake from the cake walk and he said it tasted good:) I also was able to get the pie pan back.

General Conference.......

Each General Conference the boys build a "tent" that resembles what the people built when they listened to the Prophet King Benjamin. From their "tent" they listen to General Conference. The idea came from Mike when they were little after we had talked about the tower King Benjamin had spoken from and how the people stayed in their tents to listen to King Benjamin. Every General Conference their "tent" is different and they use their imaginations to built the tent.  I was washing their bed sheets and the next thing I knew was that they had found General Conference on the Mormon Channel using the iPad and their "tent" became the bunk beds. It worked great and it is pretty remarkable now that we can watch General Conference from our bunk beds.

The reaction when I told them the sheets were clean and they would have to help make the beds. I told them the people in King Benjamin's day had to haul their "tents" and it could be worse.

Sawyer has moved back .........

Look at those great smiles! Dylan and Sawyer were great friends when they were little. Sawyer lived in our neighborhood and then his family moved a few years ago to Connecticut. He just moved back to Utah and Dylan was so excited to play with him again.  It has been a fun to watch them reconnect and they still have a lot in common.

Coloring Easter eggs.....

After the Easter egg hunt the original plan was to go to the zoo. The kids, however, changed our set of plans when they decided they wanted to go on a picnic and then come to our house to play and color Easter eggs.  We had a ton of fun spending time with friends and the kids decorated over 2 dozen eggs. I was only able to snap a few photos as we were all busy with coloring the eggs. Call out for Tiff to send me the other photos from her phone:)

 Tate was more excited about the Easter egg holder than he was about decorating the eggs!

Paul and Josh decorated most of the eggs and the kids wanted to color the eggs with crayons and markers instead of stickers.  Tate wrote his name in blue marker on one egg and he was finished with the process.  He carried the egg around for a few days.

Easter egg hunt.....

This year for the annual Easter egg hunt we met up with our close friends at the South Jordan Park and gathered eggs and candy.  The kids walked away with plenty of candy to last them until Halloween!

 Tate is in the white and green shirt.

 Dylan and Owen are discussing how they are going to get the "prize egg."

 Cute Ericka was more impressed with Miss South Jordan then she was the Easter Bunny!

 Our sweet and cute girl friends all ready  to collect their candy.

 Most of the kids together with Katie.  Dylan and Tate had gone to the park as they were not interested in a photo with the Easter Bunny.  Little Jacob could not take his eyes off the Bunny.

 A quick picture.  Notice Tate with his eyes closed and his mouth full of candy.