best raingutter regata ever

 The first thing that makes this the best raingutter regata ever is the fact that we (parents) didn't have to build a boat!  Second thing, we didn't stress about possibly having to build a boat because we didn't even know they were doing the regata at pack meeting until the day before when we got a reminder flyer on the door!  And the third best thing is related to #1 -- Jacob built his own boat!  And the other factors that make it the best ever are: totally cheap to make, its refreshment inclusive, and it actually sails down the gutter with only kidpower blowing!  And the best overall factor to make this the best ever raingutter regata...it was fun!

 As you can see from the pictures, Jacob built his own sailboat with an empty juicebox, straw, paper, and duct tape. Kudos to the cub scout leaders for coming up with this awesome raingutter regata!

 I refer to these 3 boys as the 3 musketeers because they are the mainstays of their very small bear den -- Jacob, Stanton, and Brayden.

green dragons #7

 This is Matthew's first soccer game ever!  He's number 7 on the green team -- the Green Dragons.

 Soccer at this age is so funny to watch -- they all run around in a little pack trying to get the ball.

He's loving it!

sprained ankle

Ryan did a lovely number on his foot playing backyard football with friends.  It happened on a Friday afternoon and I finally decided to take him to instacare on Saturday afternoon when he still couldn't put any weight on it.  The bruises were nasty looking and of course it was very swollen.  After x-rays they called it a bad sprain and put him in a splint.  After nearly a week on crutches with the splint, things weren't looking much better, so we headed to the sports med people.  More x-rays determined there still weren't any fractures, just a very bad sprain, and they put him in a huge walking boot for four weeks.  The boot beats being on crutches for sure and he's getting around much better.  Sure hope he heals up quickly. The picture (from the wimpy phone camera) just doesn't do his injury justice.

random photos

 My boys love legos.  This is Jacob with his swimming pool and high dive and Matthew with his two "ships".  I decided to sort the legos by color into drawers this summer.  It was a pain in the neck.  But, it definitely accomplished my end purpose -- more creative lego playing time!

 Jacob's hawaiian haystack -- a work of art! Even better, he ate it all!

back to school

 We got an extra week of summer this year because school started after Labor Day for the first time ever!  I can't believe Jared is in high school now -- wow!  He rides the bus this year and school starts really early in the morning!  I almost forgot to snap a picture of Ryan before he jumped into carpool!

 Last to leave in the morning are Jacob & Matthew.  I can't believe Matthew is in school now-  my kids are growing up so fast! The boys are all excited for a new school year so it wasn't hard to get everyone out the door on time this morning.  I hope they have a great year!

timp cave

 This is the "heart" of Timpanogos!  We celebrated Labor Day weekend by meeting up with Alan, Heidi, & the kids for a hike and tour of Timpanogos Cave on Saturday.  We had an afternoon tour time and we thought it might be hot, but instead it turned rainy and cool -- perfect for a little hike -- except the part where we get wet!  We did take along some rain gear, so we survived well.  The cave is always amazing! And it was fun to be together!  This is Matthew getting warm after the cave tour.

 Before we left the canyon, we had to throw a few rocks in the water.  This is Jacob & Rachel searching for some good throwing rocks.

All that hiking, touring, and rock throwing worked up an appetite, so we headed down to G&G Vawdrey's for pizza.  Yum!

ryan's eagle project

 I was so excited to have found an eagle project for Ryan a couple weeks ago -- abacuses for the school district.  Each first grader in our district  (there are about 6000 first graders) will have their own abacus for math this year. Each elementary needs about 100 abacuses, and so 100 abacuses equals an eagle project.  But when we called the person in charge, she told us that all the abacus materials had been distributed, so we were out of luck.  However, she mentioned that she would like to keep Ryan's name and number in case anything happened or if she was able to secure more funding and more materials.  So we left it at that.  Then just Saturday afternoon she called Ryan and asked if he still needed a project, because she just had two hundred of the abacus materials returned unfinished by someone who was unable to do the project.  Could he take one hundred and have them done by the end of the week (because school is starting)? We jumped on the opportunity and threw things into high gear!  Ryan hurried to print out his paperwork, get things filled out, and collect all the necessary signatures.  We picked up the materials late Saturday night, and we were ready to begin on Monday.  Monday evening we worked on them for FHE.  This is a picture of Ryan putting the skewers into a plastic sleeve.  This was the one assembly part that worried me most -- I didn't want anyone to put a stick into an eye!  (Thankfully all went well.)

 Next came the beading -- 10 pony beads on each of 10 skewers.

 Then you put the top of the skewers into another plastic sleeve and secure them with hot glue and yellow duct tape.

 This is me cutting the duct tape to fit the abacuses. The duct tape had to be cut and then notched in two places with a knife.

 On Wednesday, he had a bunch of friends come over to help.  The kids worked for about 3 hours and we got a lot accomplished, but we still had tons to do.

 On Thursday, Heidi and Ethan came over and helped glue and put binder clips on the edges.  They spent a couple hours working hard and we got even more accomplished!  That night, Ryan, Mark & I spent a couple more hours putting the last of the binder clips on the abacuses and fixing anything that got messed up along the way.  By Friday morning (today) Ryan was able to deliver 100 abacuses to Layton Elementary!  Wahoo!!