Sunday, May 14, 2023

April 2023 Photo Dump

 Here's another photo dump for our fans. We had a fun April celebrating Joseph's 10th birthday, but other things were also going on, and I wanted an excuse to post fun/cute pictures, so let's get started!

We've been finding these billboards nearby advertising Albuquerque.

Visit Albuquerque? I think it's a sign (pun intended).

They keep popping up! 

I found a lot of cute pictures of Eden, so excuse me while I clump them together.

Eden is all dressed up for picture day!

Eden is wearing my favorite pajamas when I was her age.
And pajamas under them too apparently. 


I took this photo solely to capture her pretty layered hair.

A bed for her dragons. Her many many dragons.

Eden got new bows and wanted to put all of them in the bows. All. of. them.

All right, moving on! We've been continuing to go to the dojo for kung fu. Elijah really has been improving his concentration, so proud of him!

Sneaking a pic.

Bringing whatever activities keep the kids quiet and busy.
Eden made a rainbow out of bears.

Sneaking another pic from above!

Kids are still full throttle at school!

100th day of school for Eden!

Gardening for Eli.

Fancy STEAM day for Overland.

I was in charge of one of the den activities (the day happened to fall on Joseph's birthday 🙄). I ended up teaching kids about hand washing, healthy eating, identifying fruits and veggies, and asking how they help with meals at home. It was fun, but glad it was over! Here are the scouts playing outside just before the meeting started:


In my Easter post I showed the cute bunny Eli made with Legos. Well, it could also turn into a bird! Eli named this one Pretty Bird after the bird I had as a family pet when I was little.



Noah is looking less and less like a baby. Those cute little baby cheeks are disappearing, but look how handsome he's becoming!


These two love going out with their hats together. Their shirts happened to match today!
Let's a-go!

There was a big birthday party three kids in Eli's class threw and I thought it was a brilliant idea to combine class birthday parties! We went to a bounce house and had fun running around with Eli's classmates.

Crawling in the dragon.

Sliding out of his mouth.

The best slide! No, really, it was so fun!

Go sports!

And a zipline!

Trying to jump as high as he can over these things.

Dared him to dive between those two "poles". He did pretty good!

Taking breaks in between.

One of the big rules of the place was only one to two people could slide at one time. Near the end, it became more of a guideline.

Sliding with Carter.

 
Then Christian, Eli and Ciello went over and over again.


The big picture at the end.

Pizza and cake!

Something fun (and time-consuming) that happened at the end of April was the Pinewood Derby. Since our pack is parent-led, we had to sign up to help with certain things (campouts, fundraisers, etc.) and I did pinewood derby because it sounded the most fun. It definitely was a lot of work, but it seemed to all work out in the end! Here are the photos from the event(s).

Elijah's design (technically he was supposed to do all the cutting/sanding/painting,
but we wanted his design to come out great...and it did!

We got the Mario from a car we already had.

What was funny was Activity Days at church happened to have a Pinewood Derby less than a week before, so Eli got to test his car out beforehand. I wasn't there, but they seemed to have fun. 

"Most cuts" from Eli's AD car.

"Most futuristic design", which was funny because Joseph made it into an arrow
and put cave paintings on it!

One more photo with the wheels on.

To start out the Pinewood Derby weekend, we had a movie night with "Herbie: Fully Loaded". I was in charge of buying all the pizza and I had no idea how much to buy. All the scouts were invited along with their families. The person in charge of the event said ten pizzas should be enough but I didn't think so and bought 25 instead. Sure enough, not a lot of people showed up and people got totally stuffed since there was so much pizza. Oh well!


Getting ready for the movie!

My kids didn't really care for the movie and ended up playing outside instead.

The final weigh-in was on Saturday, then on Sunday, we set up the whole derby at the parish hall in a church some of the scouts go to. 

All the cars, and some were very creative!

I was in charge of buying all the trophies and medals.

The all-around trophies.

 
Eating the food before it was gone!

I'm pretty sure Joseph took the whole plate of watermelon 😬


Let's see how well Elijah does!

The races were a little hectic since all the dens were racing each other randomly.

The kids got in line for each lane until they raced in all six lanes.

Eli excited for the race!

This was a huge track!

Elijah didn't end up winning any trophies, but his car was voted "Best Overall Design" by his own den, so there's that! I didn't get a picture of him with his certificate and didn't save it from becoming a paper airplane, but I got a picture of it before I recycled the certificate. He got a medal to keep. Overall it was a chaotic yet fun event and very happy it's over. I still have to send in receipts for reimbursement though!


The end of the school year is nigh, which means we are moving so soon! That's crazy!