Pinewood Derby

Landon and Cache

Landon and Brady

Landon cheering because his car is winning the race. :0)

Riley and Mackenzee waiting expectantly at the end of the race track to see who would win.

Landon accepting his Pinewood Derby award certificate.

Nice car Landon!!!

Mackenzee and Landon eating their twinkie cars. :0)

The scoreboard. Landon did pretty good this year. He won some and lost some....and had a really good time racing his car with his friends.

Pinewood Derby

Today was Landon's first EVER pinewood derby. He has been working on his car with his dad for over a month now and we just perfected it last night. :0)

The addition of Spiderman stickers was apparently a MUST. Sorry Perry! :0)

After weigh in, we found out that we were over the limit by .25 ounce. So, the drill came out holes had to be bored into the weights inside the car. Two weighs-ins and five holes later we were spot on and Landon's car was "officially" entered in the races.

Not too intimidating right? Chairs lined up alongside the steep downward slope of the racetrack.... :0)
Here are all of the boys {mostly} impatiently waiting for the races to begin. Cache, Reese, Brady, Landon, Davis, Brody, Paul, and the two new Hunzeker boys that I haven't been able to meet yet.
Thank you INSANELY SO to the cub scout and primary leaders who were brilliant as always. Mackenzee was elated to be able to build her own twinkie derby car and it kept her from freaking out over not having a derby car of her own. {Not that she had already done that several times this morning or anything...}

Landon lost his first race, won his second, and then lost his last race. I am so proud of him for being such a good sport and cheering on his friends as they won instead of pouting over his losses. In fact, all of the boys there were so good about the races and were so excited for their fellow cubs when they did well. Instead of a competition it was more of just a fun, good time for everyone. It was a really good Saturday morning.

Though there were awards for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th places, the other boys received some form of award as well no matter if their car won or not. Grandpa Burnham will be proud to hear that Landon won for best overall paint job. All of the boys loved the shiny metallic red paint. :0)

This year's derby is now officially over. I'm sure that next year Jaysen will have plans on making Landon's car run faster down the track. He was already talking about what could have been the problem with this one.....something to with needing more graphite. :0) Whatever....

So glad you had such a fun morning Landon! I love you!

And obey the law of the pack...

Last night Landon received his Wolf Badge in Cub Scouts. He worked really hard to complete all of the requirements, too. Because our wards split at the beginning of last year, we ended up without a cub scout leaders for a couple of months. So, Landon didn't officially get started until March, which meant he only had nine months to get it all done instead of 12.

He was just beaming last night when he recieved all of his awards. He not only got his Wolf Badge, but he also received a gold arrow and three silver arrows. After the awards ceremony, he was officially welcomed into the Bear Pack. As his mommy, they had me present him with his new manual and kerchief. Sadly, I didn't have my camera with me, so I dont' have any pictures to show you.

BUT! For those of you with scouts out there, or soon to be scouts...do I have some news for you! Two words....Badge Magic. Most of you know that sewing badges on a uniform is NOT fun. And, it seems like it's a never ending project. You'll get them all on, and then at the next den meeting they get new badges. Well, when I was at the scouting office I found this sheet of stickery goodness call Badge Magic.

You simply peel off the paper from the matching picture on the sheet and underneath it is the perfect sized shape for your patch. You stick the patch to the sheet and when you pull it back up, the stickiness peels off with it. Tah dah! Your patch is now a sticker. Stick it on the cub shirt wherever it belongs, rub it in good, and pop it in the dryer for about 10 minutes. It's stuck now...and no needle and thread. Hallelujah! Even better, if you need to reuse the shirt for a different child, simply take it to the dry cleaner or use Goo Gone on it and the patches will all come off and you can start fresh for the new kid.

Isn't it magical? It saved me...that much I can tell you. My son's shirt is finally finished....ten months after he started scouts. I don't have to be a slacker mom anymore AND, even better, he gets to display his patches for everyone. Which is what the boys like to do....

Cuz scouting patches....mean you are COOL. :0)

I've been pinned!

My son is now a Bobcat. Not a real Bobcat...in the cub scout program. :0)
I am clueless when it comes to scouting stuff. I' m a girl. SO, obviously I haven't had any experience in this kind of stuff. So, when my friend {who is also one of the den leaders} called to tell me about the Den Meeting, and that Landon could get his Bobcat if he finished the stuff in the book I was totally confused. You mean we're supposed to do some of this stuff at home? Yeah....Clueless. She kindly explained it, and so I was all set to get Landon in gear during Spring Break so that he could get his Bobcat at the Den Meeting.

I explain all of this stuff to Landon, and we started going over the little "pamphlet" that is attached to the front of the manual. It took a little time as there was a lot to cover. Part of me was truly sad that part of the required curiculum now contained 'How To Protect Your Children From Child Abuse: A Parent's Guide' because it shows what a truly sad world we live in. My kid is 8. He should be able to live in innocence and not even have to know that there are bad things in life like this. But, I understand the reasoning behind it. It's better to make them aware to prevent horrible things, than to keep them in innocence and have it be taken from them. It's just sad is all.....

Back on topic here! We went through the pamphlet...it took some time. Then we started to get into the memorizing stuff. After about 20 minutes of attempting to get both the Cub Scout Promise and The Law of the Pack memorized, Landon wanted to quit Cub Scouts. :0) Sigh. I'm sure he was figuring it was Spring Break and he just wanted to go off and play. So, I told him fine. I wasn't going to force it. I reminded him that all of his friends would be getting their Bobcat at the meeting, but if he didn't care, it was up to him. He was shocked that I gave in so easily, but merrily went on his way to play. I figured he would change his mind about wanting to do it all after the Den Meeting when he saw his friends getting their awards. Imagine my surprise when not 10 minutes later he came back to me and said, "Ok, I've got it this time." And said the Law of the Pack from memory! Kudos to you Landon. He didn't give up. {which is unlike my son...he'd rather take the easy road.} So, we finished up the requirements for his Bobcat and even got some of the requirements done for a few other areas in the Wolf portion of the book. So, we were all set!

The Den Meeting was last night. We played a few games and at the end they got to break the pinata they had made at the last pack meeting. Landon had the final hit to the pinata that broke it open {Sadly, he later told me it was because he could "kinda" see and knew where to swing. CHEATER! Melanie...we should have put that blindfold on tighter! It wouldn't have hurt him...too badly anyway.... :0)} Anyway, during the "awards ceremony" Landon was able to get his Bobcat patch {something else for me to pretend to know how to sew onto his uniform!} and unknown to me...the mommies get little pins too! I assume it's because everyone knows that behind every little boy who has accomplished their scouting goals is a mommy who helped him do it. So, Landon "pinned me" last night in front of everyone. It was cute.

AND...he saw that a couple of his friends got their little Wolf badge to hang their beads on. He immediately turned around and said, "How come they got those?" Yes, he is addicted to scouting now. I don't know if it's for the right reasons...but hopefully he'll at least learn something in the process of getting all those little beads and arrows. :0)

Thanks Jodi and Melanie for being such great Den Leaders! Landon is having so much fun with it thanks to all your hard work.