More Awards

Ashton received a very distinguished award.  Every year, each teacher picks a boy and a girl from their class to receive the Citizenship award and they are awarded a trophy at the end of the year.  Ashton was chosen from his class.  He is such a good boy and very polite.

He also received a trophy for top grades!  Such a smart boy!

Calvin also received a trophy for top grades!  I'm so proud of these boys!  They worked really hard.

More Scouting...

Ashton received his Wolf award in scouting.  He did it 6 months early.  He worked really hard to get the award.  For those of you who don't know, scouts receive one of these awards every year as they progress through cub scouts.

Calvin was also awarded many arrow points.  Scouts receive an arrow point for every additional 10 goals they complete after they receive their badge.  Calvin now has 10 arrow points just for his Bear!  That is huge!  He worked really hard as well and now is ready for Webelos!

Calvin's Musical

During the month of May, Calvin participated in a Musical.  It was really, really good!  It was music throughout the decades.  A group of students were assigned a decade and performed one song from it and the dressed the part as well.  It was really cute and lots of fun!

 

Calvin was in the 1950's group and they sang "You ain't Nothing but a Hound Dog".  They danced and sang and did a great job!

Here is Calvin in his 1950's clothes.  He looks the part very well.  He even slicked back his hair.  

Happy Birthday Calvin!

 We celebrated Calvin's 10th birthday in May.  He loves a good party.  For his birthday he wanted cake balls.  So that is what he got!  A few years ago he asked for lemon cake balls, this year it was chocolate.  And they were yummy and rich!

Calvin also wanted a monster for his birthday.  He opened one present before school and that is what it was.  He was so excited and sleeps with his monster every night.  He has started a small clan of monsters in our house since then.

We had the cousins come over for a small party.  And we loved every moment!  We had to push things along pretty fast because the boys had scouts right after the presents were opened.

 

Calvin is a great boy.  He is very good with his sisters and they just love him.  He is very creative and is always coming up with things to make.  He is also very smart.  The lowest grade he received all year in school was a 96%.  And he was so disappointed that he got such a low score!  Funny kid!  He also plays the piano and viola and does so excellently!  Things just come so naturally to him.  We are glad that he is a part of our family!

Cub Scout Cake Contest

This past February, Calvin and Ashton participated in the Cub Scout Cake Decorating Contest.  It was suppose to be a Father and Son contest, but with Ben working all the time, it was my turn to help out.

The theme was Native Americans.  Calvin and Ashton came up with the design and did it themselves.  I just supervised the baking and frosting making.  You can't go wrong with chocolate!  

They actually won an award!  They were pretty proud Scouts!

A Day at the Park

Right now I am playing catch up. So this is a post about a day that we spent in the park back in February.  We walked to the park near our house and had a picnic and played.

Daisy enjoying the ride, while Lacey sleeps

Calvin and Ashton

Caleb

Carson

Daisy

Caleb and Lacey

Carson

Caleb

Carson

Devin and Lacey

My Two Cub Scouts

I have 2 boys in Cub Scouts once again! Since Ashton has turned 8 years old, he is now officially in Cub Scouts.   

In December, he received his Bobcat badge.  I love it when boys join Cub Scouts because they are always so excited and enthusiastic about everything.  Ashton is no different!  I could not sew that badge on fast enough!

That same month, in December, Calvin earned his Bear badge.  So that month, I was pinned twice!  I was one happy momma!  How many Scouts get their badges from Santa?  :)

I will have to say one thing about the Cub Scout program here.  It is incredible!  I have never seen anything like it before.  The leaders are so organized and go all out!  It has been such a great experience just to watch.  The whole pack, or unit, just received a special badge for being so outstanding!  Amazing!

School... Again?

Here are my younger boys getting ready to head off for school.  

Calvin is a 4th grader this year and is such a good student.  He already received his first progress report and he had mostly 100%'s.  I think his lowest grade was a 98%.  His teacher called and said that he finishes his work twice as fast as the other kids and then helps her tutor the kids who are struggling.  She wants him to get tested into the GT Program (gifted and talented).  He is nervous.  

Ashton is a 2nd grader and is very kind to everyone.  His teacher has told me over and over again about how respectful and polite he is.  I think that his favorite part of school is walking to and from school with his brothers and cousins: Chase and Colton.  Ashton and Chase love to make up little songs and dances.  They are hilarious to watch!

Devin started Kindergarten this year.  He is in full day (that's all they have here) and he was way beyond ready!  He has a great teacher and loves to show me his sticker for the day.  He is in the same class as his cousin Colton.  He gets his homework for the week done in about 5 minutes!  He's a quick learner and has started piano lessons.  He is following in all of his older brother's footsteps.

 The first week of school, I would get up Lacey and tell her it is time to take the boys to school and she would just reply, "Again?"  We have all adjusted to having school and scouts and everything else.  We are all super busy!

Calvin's Latest Project

All the boys have been acting out their own "Indiana Jones" adventures.  Calvin, being so creative, decided to make a satchel for all the treasures they find.  He did a great job designing and putting it all together.  I just sewed what he told me to sew.  The full description and more pictures are located here.

Calvin's Birthday

In May, Calvin celebrated his 9th birthday!  He is a wonderful boy and we are so glad that he is a part of our family!  His favorite toy was a sling shot.

Calvin's Treasure

As many of you know, we love going to yard sale.  If fact, our kids save their money and find their own little treasures to buy.  Calvin found this k'nex roller coaster set and bought it for a couple bucks.  He worked diligently and followed all the instructions, and before we knew it...a huge roller coaster was sitting on the kitchen table!  He can really put those things together!

The roller coaster was about 3 feet high!

Super job Calvin!

Easter Egg Hunt

The Town of Queen Creek has a giant Easter Egg Hunt every year.  So we decided to attend!  Everyone had so much fun and gathered a TON of eggs!

Everyone waiting for the festivities to begin.  The baseball field was full of eggs!

Lacey munching on candy before the hunt begins.

To this day, Lacey is still scared of the Easter Bunny because he made an appearance here.

Daisy was a trooper, but by this time, she had enough!

Lacey wanted to open every egg before putting it in the basket.

She was finally getting the hang of it.

On your mark, get set, GOOO!

I guess it isn't much of a hunt when there are this many eggs!

Devin loved it!

Is Calvin to cool to pick up the eggs?

Almost, but not quite.  :)

Ashton collected a lot of eggs too!

Caleb and Carson were too old to participate in the egg hunt.  But they enjoyed all the other activities and the other boys shared their eggs with them.  We have loved going the the QC Egg Hunt every year and had to do it one last time before the big move to Texas!

Just an average, typical day

Sometimes life seems to go by quickly and the typical daily activities just get passed by the wayside.  Days turn into weeks and then months and, well, you get the picture.  Since we are going to be moving next month, we have been reflecting on the past four years of living here and how much we have loved it!  

Just recently one of my aunts asked me what are some of my favorite memories of my childhood.  I immediately thought of the little things that my parents probably thought were insignificant, but they are the things that I treasure the most.  The first thing that comes to mind is one time when we dug up our garden and before we turned it into rows, Dad hid gummy worms under the big dirt clods.  I still remember him running into the house and telling us that he found something outside in the dirt.  We were all so excited and ran outside as fast as we could!  And we all thought we scored the biggest treasure in the world!  

Or when Dad put the sprinkler under one of the trees during a winter freeze and when we woke up that morning to a tree full of icicles!

Or camping for that one week up on the rim and immediately following it with the Ward campout.  Boy, were we dirty!  And I will have to say that us girls were pretty fast with that .22 single shot.  You brothers better watch out we were pretty competitive!   

So with that being said, Ben and I often talk about what our kids will remember from their childhood. Hopefully, they remember the good stuff.  :)  I decided to take a few pictures of our normal activities.

Our neighbors will probably be the first to tell you that we have a noisy house!  With a houseful of kids, that's probably a given.  But I am one of those "mean" moms that make their kids practice music.  Our piano is playing beautiful music all the time.  (Or maybe it's only beautiful in our minds.)    There is always someone practicing the piano, so that means that the other instruments have to practice in the other rooms.  Both Caleb and Carson are in the advanced orchestras at their schools.  Caleb plays violin and Carson plays cello.  Their dream is to have a Richardson quartet and play at weddings and other events.  They already have music picked out for my unmarried brothers weddings.

Caleb practicing his violin.

All of our boys faithfully do their homework.  There are those time that they slack off and want to play instead.  So I just tell them that they don't have to do it and for them to tell their teacher what their decision was.  Then they beg me let them do their homework early in the morning.  Funny kids.  But I will have to say that they take pride in their work.  When they have a project due, they want to do it good.  They even get out my stamp pads and paper and make it fancy!

Calvin doing homework.

Ashton doing his homework.

After school just wouldn't be fun without something to eat!  Don't you remember how hungry you were when you got home from school?  Well, as soon as the boys walk through the door, they tell me how hungry they are!  So even Little Lacey takes advantage of the good food!

Lacey eating her sandwich.

Not very often is Ben home in the afternoons, but he was this day!  And when he is home, he always feels the need to work on something, or fix something.  I personally think that he just wants to get his tools out.  :) 

Dad working hard.

And the boys follow right in his footsteps.  Ben should be proud!
The boys are always wanting Ben to make them something.  It's usually a wooden sword, or a guitar, or a rabbit cage.  The list goes on and on.

Caleb helping Devin sand down his sword.

Devin working on it himself.

You have to use tools to cut up junk to throw in the dumpster.
Isn't that what you do?

Manly tools = lots of sparks

There is always some kind of rough housing.  It's all meant to be fun and games...but there are those times when it gets a little too rough.  Well, to be honest, it usually always gets to rough and someone ends up getting hurt or crying.  Some phrases you will always hear me say are:

"Boys, it's getting too rough." or 

"Settle down boys!" or

"You know that every time you don't listen to me, someone always gets hurt!"

Carson and Caleb sword fighting.

Sometimes, a few of us take naps.  And it's usually not me.  :)  Although I can dream, right?  Ahh!  The silence! 

Sweet Daisy sleeping away.

And then we can't forget to eat some more!  Did I mention that we go through a lot of food?  Well, we do and I don't think it will slow down any time soon.  :)

Caleb eating some more.