Court of Honor

At last we had Chad's Eagle Court of Honor on Sunday an entire year after Chad completed his project.  It's just as well that we waited so long, though, because now we got to share the evening with Chad's friends Steven, Jared & Ryan.

The cake.  I thought it would be simple yet elegant.  It turned out that it just bugged me the whole night because the top tier was slightly tilted.  So, that's it.  From now on, if I have to make a tiered cake for a wedding or anything else, I'm renting one of those awesome cake stands where you put each tier on a separate plate and it automatically keeps them straight.  It will revolutionize my life for sure.

Jared, Ryan, Chad & Steven.  As you can see, I am the only mom who is not domestic enough to sew merit badges onto a scout sash.  I told Chad he was pretty lucky I sewed his little league patches on his game shirts back in the day.

Jared and Chad's display table.  Chad's was slightly sparse because there are just so many things you can carry when you also have to bring a picnic dinner, two cake tiers, a book full of primary program songs and a backpack full of sacrament meeting entertainment to church.  Luckily, Jared's dad put together a fabulous slide show that covered  prettty much all of Chad's hobbies and hopefully embarrassed him as it was intended to do. :)

Sam and Chad reading over Chad's letters of recommendation.  I didn't know I would get to read them.  Awesome!

Chad giving Sam his eagle pin.  Believe me, Sam deserves it.  No dad ever worked harder to get his child to the eagle rank.  Unfortunately he expended all of his energy and I think Aaron may be on his own. Ha!  So there it is, one down and one to go.  Thank goodness the rest of the kids are girls.

It is raining in my house!

It seems that the monsoon season has finally arrived in New Mexico and look what joy it has brought to my bedroom ceiling.  Whoever said that Spanish tile roofs were sure to last for 100 years is full of bolognie.  We had to put a huge laundry bucket filled with towells under this particular spot and you could hear the melodic sound of drip, drip, drip all night long.  I remember when I was a little girl and I used to sleep in my grandma's attic on rainy nights.  The sound of that dripping was quite cozy.  Not so much this dripping. It was more like Chinese water torture.  So now we will be spending yet more money on home improvement.  (We've already replaced the hot water heater and the swamp coolers this year.)  Sometimes I wonder if home ownership is all that it is cracked up to be.  Sure, we don't have a house payment, but we might as well with all the repair bills.  How am I supposed to pay for lessons at Ultimate Dugout people? :)  Anyhoo, does anyone know any great roofers who don't have a two week long appointment wait list? No? I didn't think so.  I just can't help but think that if Sam and I were Charles and Caroline Ingalls, we could climb up on the roof, cover the leak with a seasoned bear hide and then shingle over the hide with wood squares we had cut from the trees down by Plum Creek.  Those guys rock!

Snow Bunny

Amber decided this was her year for snow boarding, so she helped herself to all of Chad's equipment.  She is such a hoot!  The other day Chad said, "Hi, Dude!" and she replied, "Hi, smokin' hot dude I wanna' be."  She really likes her brothers.  Good thing one of the sisters in this family does. :)  Amber is a total tomboy.  All of her best friends have been boys and when I ask her if she ever plays with girls at kindergarten, she tells me no because, "they only want to play dumb princess games".  Should I be worried?