eagle - board of review

Jared had his Eagle Scout Board of Review last night. He passed! WA-HOO!
Congratulations, Jared! We are proud of you!

canning galore

A bit of what has been occupying my time lately: canning. A ginormous batch of tomatoes from G&G Vawdrey yielded 6 qts of tomato juice and 11 qts of salsa. I was so busy with those that I forgot to pick my own tomatoes to add to them. So, the next day I gathered my own tomatoes and did 7 pts of diced tomatoes. My jalapenos have been going crazy, so I decided to try making a batch of jalapeno jelly. The best way to serve this is poured over cream cheese and eaten with crackers. It has a bit of a bite (hot), but is mostly sweet. Six half-pints of this is more than I'll probably use, but it looks good in the jars! I've also done a bunch of pears and peaches, so my quart jars are all full. Its a good feeling.

merit badges & advancements

A recent Court of Honor awarded Ryan 9 new merit badges! About half of those were "required" badges -- like Environmental Science, Swimming, Communications, Citizenship in the Community, and Emergency Prep. He tied with another kid for the most merit badges of the evening. Woo-woo!
The evening also brought much needed rank advancements. He is now (officially) a First class scout.
Jared received three more merit badges, including nuclear science and chemistry, but we forgot to submit his card for the fishing one -- oops.
The scout sash is long, so we might as well decorate it! Good work boys!!

9 eleven - 10 years

We visited NY about 3 years ago and went to Ground Zero. It was just a huge construction site. A very sobering construction site. Across the street there was this little church tucked away from the busy street. Herein lies the real memorial to 9-11. This little church housed the many volunteer firefighters and medical personel who worked so bravely and tirelessly to help save lives and recover bodies. Amazingly, only one window was damaged during the whole ordeal of the towers collapsing. Visiting this church was an amazing experience.

As I said, the area of the twin towers was a huge construction site. There was a large pedestrian walkway across it with signs like these hanging from the rafters. I took a picture of this one - Reflecting Absence - because it was was powerful to me.
I thought of not just the absence of two very large buildings, but the absence of so many ordinary people who died that day in such a senseless and selfish act of violence. I'm certain their loved ones miss them terribly. I also thought of the absence of feeling safe and secure as a nation, now realizing that we are vulnerable.

Today its been 10 years since that calamity. When things like this happen, it seems people always remember where they were or what they were doing when they heard the news. I do. For example, I remember watching the first space shuttle launch in the library at my elementary school, I remember when the Gulf War broke out that I was in the basement of the Widstoe building in a science lab at BYU. Today I remember that when the twin towers collapsed I had just taken Jared to preschool at Mrs. Shauna's. When I got home, Mark called from work to let me know he was OK and to tell me what had happened. I watched the TV for awhile -- those images are burned in my memory. Jared even has a faint memory of that day. I just thought it was interesting that 10 years later I am now taking Matthew to preschool at Mrs. Shauna's... while giving my older children a history lesson.

preschool

Matthew is off to preschool! He started today and was SOOOO very excited to go to Mrs. Shauna's. No, the picture doesn't show his excitement because his mother forgot to actually take the first day of school picture on the first day. This photo was taken on another day and we were in a hurry so as not to be late -- therefore, the doom and gloom look. But trust me, he is loving it!

squishing tomatoes

Over the Labor Day weekend we got a ton of tomatoes from my brother. We brought them home and pulled out the "squisher". Matthew absolutely loved this thing. Put the tomatoes in the hopper, turn the crank, and watch the pulp and juice come out one end and the seeds and skin out the other end. We did enough tomatoes to make a HUGE batch of salsa and about 8 quarts of spaghetti sauce!!

toothless

Jacob finally lost a top front tooth! Better yet, he wiggled it and wiggled it and finally pulled it out all by himself!! Wahoo!