Cub Scouts Crossover Ceremony, Field Day, and Baby Chicks!

We got a new game - Apples to Apples Jr. We invited Evelyn over to play it last Friday. 

It's a 4+ player game, but we play with 3 people since sometimes that's all we have! It's a fun game.

Parry Gripp is creating a video for his new song: Star Cat. He asked for kids to illustrate the song and then he puts all the illustrations into a video on YouTube. This was Nico's submission.

Tuesday morning Allicia and I made ocarinas out of clay. The kiddos love to watch me play the video game Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Usually every Friday morning, Avery and Ivy and I are playing Zelda downstairs right after the big kids go to school. Ocarinas are like flutes. It took me a few tries to actually form it well enough for it to make a tone. I had to move the mouthpiece once. It finally worked! Testing our ocarinas out while the clay was still wet gave us white lips!

The placement and size of the holes was somewhat random, so the sounds it makes aren't scale-worthy, but it DOES make sound! 

Tuesday evening was Nico's Cub Scouts crossover ceremony at Kathryn Albertson Park. It was the last time he'll wear his blue shirt and scarf, so I took a picture.

After arriving, the scouts gathered on the lawn for a few announcements.

The Bear Den giving their monthly report of what they did.

We walked along the path to different stations. At each station, an older scout or two would do a reading. I wasn't able to hear what they were saying, but I think it was regarding the character of scouts (honesty, loyalty, etc). At each station they got another colored ribbon to make a tassel for the bookmark they received earlier.

Along the path we eventually came to a bridge. All the parents crossed first, and then each den "crossed over" and graduated to the next rank. Nico moved up from Bear to Webelos (We'll be loyal Scouts). They ceremoniously removed his blue kerchief and replaced it with the Webelos plaid kerchief.

Nico received all the rest of his badges.

He received another "Baloo the Builder" badge accidentally, so he has two now.

His next uniform will be a tan shirt, green pants and a different kerchief clasp. We'll pick those up from the Scout shop in a few weeks.

Wednesday night my cousin Jamie graduated from High School. She was valedictorian and gave the speech. We were all very proud of her! She did a great job. Nico and Guy came straight from swimming lessons, so Nico didn't have his glasses, and he had to wear his water shoes. Oops! Should have thought ahead.

We sat next to my parents and my Aunt Ellen, and Jamie's family. There were a lot of people there!

Today was Field Day. Nico asked Guy if he would volunteer today and Guy was able to! I emailed his teacher to let her know and she wrote back and said "Yay! Thank him for me, please!" He was at the parachute station. Here's a few pictures he took of Nico being pulled under the parachute by some "sharks".

Merek was in his Field Day group (Group A) and so Nico and him were able to do all the different stations together, even though Merek is a grade ahead of him. Guy allowed them to both be "sharks" at the same time under the parachute.

Guy told me he ran into the librarian. She recognized him from when he read to Nico's class, she said "I don't know your name, but I know you're Nico's dad! You can come back any time to read to the kids, you were the best!" Guy says next year he'd like to volunteer more at the school.

This afternoon Allicia and I went to Boise Fry Company for our birthdays. Her birthday is today, and mine is coming in a few weeks, so we traded and bought each other lunch! After lunch I took Avery with me to give Allicia the afternoon off. We ran to Whole Foods and then to the library for a little before we went to pick up Ivy from preschool on her last day.

After school, Guy and Nico came home together, then we gathered in the main house to hold baby chicks. 2 days old, just arrived yesterday from a farm in Caldwell. The more you hold them, the less they are afraid of people. They gave their older chickens away before receiving these chicks. They have 10 of them though they ordered 6. If any of them end up being roosters they will have to get rid of them. Cock-a-doodle-doo!

This is Sapphire.

Guy holding 4 at once.

You guys, we leave for Arlington in 2 DAYS!!! Nico's last day of school is tomorrow, then we are OFF TO WASHINGTON! Stay tuned for a mega fun update next week!

Here's a video to end this week, snippets from our various adventures!

Mother's Day, and Pokemon

On Friday after school, Nico's teacher texted me this picture and said Happy Mother's Day, she also said "I love this boy!" I sure do, to!

Saturday was a laid back day. We labeled some more product to ship to Amazon, and the main house had "Odd Saturday" again, where they invite friends over for games and food. Nico and Guy have been participating in that when it happens. Then they cut out early so we can make pizza. My movie choice was "Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day". It reminded me a lot of the Wimpy Kid movies, funny. It has Steve Carell in it.

Sunday Nico let me open the gift he had brought home from school on Friday. He joked that I had to wait until after church, but I convinced him to let me open it before church. It was a clay plate in the shape of his hand. I love it! I put it on the kitchen windowsill.

At church they had a photo booth for mothers and children for Mother's Day. Here's ours.

Swimming lessons on Monday. His class is much bigger this time.

On Tuesday we tried something new. We went to the Pokemon League at the library after school. They had a bunch of tables set up with mats to play Pokemon on and a bunch of Pokemon decks available to play with if you don't have your own. In the picture, Nico is playing with one of the facilitators. The rest of the kids you can see off to the right on the floor, they're going through their binders of Pokemon cards and trading them with each other. Nico didn't bring his binder, so he didn't participate. He will next time! If Nico signs up to be a "Pokemon Trainer" online, then he'll get free prizes for coming to the club at the library. We will do that! Nico and I, and Nico and Guy have been playing Pokemon at home this past week. He also brings his Pokemon bin (which holds all his decks for playing) over to Merek's house sometimes when he visits.

That evening, Nico didn't have Cub Scouts, so Guy and Nico were able to come with me to Liz's graduation (Bruce & Rory's mom). She graduated from U of I with her Bachelors. It was exciting to see!! We sat next to Papa and Grandma Salisbury, and Bruce and Rory.

Walking back from the graduation to the parking garage. Guy found some coffee at the reception so he grabbed some. Nico went for some chamomile tea.

On Wednesday I sent Nico to swimming lessons with... a bath mat. It did not do a very good job of drying him off. It was way too small. Oops. At least he's smiling. Guy sent me this picture and "Towel too small".

Today Nico had a field trip. His whole class rode the city bus downtown. Nico has been researching the US Bank building, and his classmates are all researching downtown buildings too, so they took a walking tour of downtown Boise all day today. They stopped at the Grove plaza to eat lunch. It was a mix of rain and sun, so I sent a hat and an umbrella with him. They were supposed to catch the bus back to school, but they MISSED it! The class walked all the way back to Adams from downtown. Wowza! Lots of exercise today.

I asked him to tell me a story about today:

"We went to the Zion bank and we went to the US Bank." Cool what did you guys do there? "We just looked at it and then we, the only place we went inside was Zions bank because it's really famous because it's the tallest building in Idaho."

I called the landlord of the house across the street, and she said she still hasn't heard anything about their specific move out date. She told me their lease is up at the end of June, and then she will spend the next month painting. I told her we're willing to wait for it, so she asked me a little more about us. I told her where we're living now, and that Nico is going to Adams and we'd like to stay in the district. She mentioned the rent would probably be going up (out of our price range), but she said nothing has been decided yet and to call her in the middle of June. Currently lawn care is included in rent, so I asked if she'd be willing to drop the rent if we took care of the yard and she said the owners have had bad experiences with letting tenants do that in the past. I'm hoping they will make an exception for us, but I'll wait until June to touch base with her again and talk about all that.

Still hoping beyond hope!

Bike Rides!

Last Saturday we spent the morning packaging up some product to ship to Amazon. That afternoon, while Guy was out running errands, Nico and I went for a bike ride. But first, a picture of Leafy the Cabbage.

Pictures by Nico.

This bike ride was on Friday. Guy and I and Nico went for a walk / bike ride. Nico was on his bike and Guy and I walked. Check out the green! It won't stay green for long!

This picture is from our bike ride on Saturday. This time Nico told me he wanted me to choose where we went, so I chose to stay in the neighborhood and head west. We ended up biking by our old place on Krall street, then turning around and coming home.

After we arrived home, we implemented an "open door" policy, it was the first time we tried it. I kept my door open and all the kids could choose where they wanted to play, whether the Clubhouse or the main house. Ivy hung out with me in the Clubhouse for a while but then settled next to Nico who was on their couch with their Tablet. Evelyn ended up downstairs watching Guy play video games.

Saturday night it was Guy's choice of movie, he chose a newer MST3K episode.

Monday we were invited over to someone's house for dinner and games, after Nico was done with swimming lessons. Olga and her husband are from Russia, and Olga is the kids pastor at our church. The pastor and his wife were also there, as well as the music pastors. Incredible food, including ice cream. We didn't have time to play games, though, since it was a late dinner and we had to get Nico home to bed.

Nico woke up this morning with teddy bear hair. It looks like teddy bear fur. He wanted to keep it like that for school but I made him comb it. Actually, I combed it. I pulled on it so hard he said, "Ouch! Watch out, that's me under that hair!" That is a quote from Three Stooges. Except instead of hair Shemp says "nail". Nico expertly adjusted it for the situation, and he didn't miss a beat.

This afternoon we went for a bike ride. Evelyn came with us. We stopped at Municipal Park for a bit.

Tonight was the book fair party at the school. Guy took him over there for a little bit after work. They bought tacos from the taco truck and Nico played on the playground. He said he wanted to buy a book but he didn't come home with anything.

That's it for this week!

Nature Walks, and Semaphores

I was in Pullman until Saturday, so last Friday after school Guy took Nico to the Discovery Center.

Then Guy sent me a video of Nico doing manual Tetris on the light board using stop motion filming! Here it is:

Saturday was my trip home from Pullman. Guy and Nico had a Cub Scouts adventure at Deer Flats in Nampa, ID that morning, and they had a lot of fun. Guy said later that he wished he could go back and Nico piped up and said, "Me too!"

Just one other Cub Scout from his den was there, so it was a small field trip. 

Guy and Nico hung out with Jeff and Allicia and the kiddos that afternoon, and then started making pizza late, which was just in time for me to enjoy it, too! I arrived home at 7pm. It was Nico's choice of movie and he chose Three Stooges.

Nico's Cub Scout den leader is trying to help Nico get all his badges so he can graduate from being a Bear at the next pack meeting. They met at the den leader's house on Tuesday, and they all went for a hike so they could get some badge requirements taken care of. Guy and Nico came home Tuesday night and told me the good news - Nico will graduate from being a Bear! He will then be a Webelos. (I think that stands for We'll be loyal scouts).

He is now in Level 3 of swimming lessons and he LOVES it! 

He checked out a book about flags from the school library, and there's a section in the back about semaphores. So he practiced semaphores for a few days.

Nico put his glasses on Yoshi, and told me to take a picture and send to Daddy and say, "Nico has turned into Yoshi."

Nico is a published poet!

Tonight after dinner Nico and I went for a walk while Guy was at band practice. I let him choose where we went.

The trail ended in a neighborhood so we walked back to our house through the neighborhood. He talked about wanting to be an explorer and a traveller. Then we talked about where he would want to live and he was trying to find a way for us to move somewhere that would allow him to continue going to Adams Elementary, but also allow him to ride the bus to school and be closer to Grandma Russell. 

I contacted the landlord of the house on our street that we're wanting to move into this summer. She told me that nothing is set in stone yet with them moving out, and when they do move out she will take a month to paint and clean the place up. Since I do know that they are moving out, it would likely be July that the house would be available. I will call her in a few weeks to check in. Nico continues to say that he wants to move into a small house because he doesn't like big houses. 

Here are some snippets from this past week!