Eagle Court of Honor

 William had his Eagle Board of Review back in January 2020.  We planned to have his Court of Honor a few months later when our neighbor, Jace Bishop, had finished up his last few requirements.  And then COVID hit the world and changed everything.  It delayed Jace from finishing up and then there were strict regulations in place that would have limited our gathering (gatherings were limited to 50 people, we couldn't use the church building, and the heat was unbearable to hold it outside).  When the governor allowed gatherings of 250 people (and the weather was cooling down) we jumped at the chance to finally honor these boys and their hard work.

We were crazy enough to do it on Lydia's birthday (but that was the day that the park and pavilion were available.) Lydia didn't mind though because we all sang her "Happy birthday" at the very beginning and she got to hang out with her friend, Kora.

The evening turned out so nice!

Kes Andersen (the Teacher's Quorum advisor) drove out 2 1/2 hours to be there and speak.  He gave an awesome analogy of a Golden Eagle that he once found who had severely damaged his feathers by going after a small rabbit. One bad decision had prevented this eagle from behaving like an eagle.  Kes challenged the boys to always make choices that will enable them to be the Eagles that they are.  It was a great talk!

(The Eagle's Nest)

Jerry Weise (a local judge and Jace's most recent scout leader) did a great job conducting the meeting and presenting the boys with their Eagles.

William presented his mentor pin to Tyler Darrington who was one of his first scout leaders as a Deacon. (Tyler was working that night but William walked over to his house a few days later to present the pin).

I wish I had taken more pictures afterward but I was too busy chatting with everyone.  I'm grateful to all those who came out to support William!

Happy birthday, dear Lydia

I gave Henry and Lydia a budget earlier in the week and they were in charge of planning a “party” for Lydia’s birthday (for their math lesson).  We went to the Dollar Store and they worked together to get stuff for her birthday.

Lydia was so excited all week long about her birthday.  She gave us the countdown several times a day.  She was so excited for Friday!  She picked out her breakfast (Reeses Puffs), lunch (Cafe Rio), and dinner (pizza, jello, and her favorite chips—cheddar Ruffles).  She loved opening all her presents at lunch time and have everyone sing to her at the court of honor.

We had so many treats at the court of honor that we did Lydia’s cake on Saturday.  She chose carrot cake and it was delicious!

6 going on 16

This morning Lydia told me, "I feel weird today.... like I'm 18." Slow down little girl!  I already can't believe you are 6!! Lydia is so fun, a great conversationalist, super confident, and super sweet.  She has told me several times that "Corona is good and bad." She tells me it's bad (for all the obvious reasons) but that it's good because everyone gets to stay home with her.  She has loved playing with her brothers so much during the past several months.  She says the funniest things at the most random times (for instance, the other day she went outside, looked at her brothers, and said, "What's up my diggity dogs!?") 

Lydia loves school and has all sorts of plans for the future--from plans to buy a hamster with Henry to plans to open up her own restaurant.  She loves her cousins and friends.  She is just too much fun!  Happy brithday sweet girl!

And now on to our annual interview.

What is your favorite...

color? magenta
food? "Oh that's so hard to decide! I'll do one.  Dinosaur chicken nuggets."
toy?   my bunny (the one I got when Rachelle was born and recently pulled out of the attic for Lydia to play with)
show? "easy! Frozen II"
animal? dog
book?  The Crayon Man by Natascha Biebow 
song? Into the Unknown (from Frozen II)
primary song? Sunbeams

What do you like to do?  play on the trampoline
Who is your best friend?  Piper
What do you want to be when you grow up? a teacher (she also said "teach my kids")
Do you have a boyfriend?  "uh, no, I don't"

I am - a girl
I am afraid of - sharp knives like the ulu knife

I like - pizza

I like to eat - dinosaur chicken nuggets

I don't like - asparagus 

I know - how to say "Cafe Rio"

I want to be - nice

I like to watch - YouTube

My hero is- Mom

I cry when - someone is mean to me

Mom gets mad when - we don't behave

Mom is happy when - we behave

I can't wait for - my party today

Something Mom says to me - "be nice!"

Something Dad says to me - "let them play their games."

My favorite place to go is - Cafe Rio!

My Mom makes me laugh - when she tells a joke

My Dad makes me laugh- when he's funny

I know my mom loves me because - "I'm so funny"

I know my dad loves me because -  "he just love me" and "I'm the only girl in the family"

School days

School is starting out virtual this year.  We are hoping that we can get in person at some point.  I decided to pull Henry and Lydia out and just homeschool them instead of dealing with trying to do online elementary school.

I decided I needed a special t-shirt to commemorate this year.

We played hopscotch to learn our numbers for math (Henry can't help but join in on the kindergarten fun).

The first few weeks we hopped on once a day to online learning so that they were still enrolled in the school.  This way the school still got the money for our 2 students in case school opens up second semester.

Lydia had Mrs. Cochran and loved doing the morning routine with her class.

Even James joins in with Lydia's learning when he isn't "in class".

Alex enjoys attending class in the fort outside.

Lydia loves doing Henry's history lessons with him.  We learned about the early Native American Tribes in Nevada and made a decoy duck out of paper.

Henry enjoys using our old school desk (from Grandpa Allred's house) but I'm not sure he knows how to sit in it properly!

Another day for history we painted rocks like petroglyphs.

School is so much better when you can lounge on the couch.

We read Charlotte's Web (Lydia cried at the end) and so we made some watercolor magic webs and they each wrote a word that they'd spin in their web.

When the weather is nice sometimes we pack up our school stuff and do school at the neighborhood park.

We learned about apples so we did a taste test and took a field trip to the orchard for apple picking and apple cider donuts!

Henry did a study of Italy so we learned to make gnocchi.  It was delicious!