Goodbye Tooth

Savannah lost another tooth last night. She is such a trooper. Once her tooth gets so loose she just can't stand it, she goes to her Dad and lets him pull it out. She has two more that are loose, but she'll keep them in there as long as possible :)

Pinewood Derby

This is Chance with his friend Jayden from church

Chance went to the Pinewood Derby last night. He wasn't able to "officially" participate because he has crossed over into boy scouts and the awards were for the cubs only. He did race against the other 11 yr. old that had a car there and won. Afterwards, they had a derby event for everyone - adults, young men, and the boys. Chance raced in that and beat everyone, including the Bishop and young men's president. He even beat Jayden, his best friend, who was the champion of the cub scout pack. It was the fastest car in the ward - too bad he didn't get one of the pretty trophies. He added a couple of stickers to that shiny black paint job - a "Psycho C Racing" sticker along the side, 2 UNC logos and the number 50 of course in honor of the great Tyler Hansbrough. He was very tickled with the car. A big thanks goes out to Grandad who helped Chance build an awesome car and to Daddy for getting the wheels on and helping with the final touches.

Iditarod/Iditaread Finish

Here Chance is showing his "Three-peat" sign for Lance Macky's win

Here are the kids with their certificates for finishing the Iditaread

In homeschool we began studying about the Iditarod in February so that we would know what was going on when the race started in March. We made a neat little lapbook for it with most of the info we learned. We also participated in the "Iditaread" which is where each of the kids pick a musher to race against during the Iditarod. The kids read books while the musher runs the race. One page = 1 mile, so the kids work hard to read at least 1,131 pages (books on their grade level) which is how many miles the southern route is this year. Savannah picked a rookie musher - Jen Seavey, while Chance went up against Ryan Reddington who is one of the grandsons of the founder of the race - Joe Redington, Sr. It was a really exciting thing to do. The kids pressed hard and each one finished their pages before their musher crossed the finish line in Nome. Chance finished about 7 hours before his musher (12 days, 7 hours) and Savannah finished about 4 hours before hers crossed (13 days, 21 hours). I was so proud of how diligent they were. We rewarded them by taking the family out to Chuck E Cheese last night for pizza and games. The Iditarod was awesome to be a part of - it's lots of fun and so exciting to check on every day. We were cheering for Lance Mackey who ended up winning for the 3rd year in a row - he reminds us of Dale Earnhardt - just a good ole' boy. The race officially ended today as the last musher crossed the finish line. We can't wait to do it again next year!

Welcome Spring Gift

Well, we woke up to about 6 inches of snow on top of what we already had. We went out late in the afternoon to shovel the driveway and let the kids play a bit. So here's a few pics of the start of spring here

Happy Spring!

Just wanted to wish everyone a Happy First Day of Spring. For the past several days we have had some beautiful sunshine and toasty 20 -30 degree temperatures which was putting us somewhat in the spring mood - we even saw a little bit of our grass in the back yard as the snow slowly began melting away from the fenceline. However, after about 6:30 pm it has been snowing non stop and looks to give us a pretty good little dump of snow (on top of the foot or more we already have). I guess in Alaska, you always bring spring in like a lion, huh? We did get to see our neighborhood moose this morning and not that I'm an expert on moose, but she looks to be getting bigger in the belly and is expecting. We still all get so excited when we see the moose around here. I'm sure the novelty will eventually wear off. But anyway, all of you that are enjoying the buds on the trees and the starts of flowers, send a spring wish our way. Maybe we'll see grass sometime in April or so :)

Fun FHE

I just thought I'd post some pictures from our FHE last night. We read over the "Stripling Warrior" story from Who's Your Hero Vol. 2 (I absolutely love those books). We did the "Helaman's Stripling Warrior Boot Camp" idea in the book and was it a hoot! BJ was the drill sergeant/Helaman and the kid's got the biggest kick out of it.

The pictures above are when they are learning how to be STRONG by doing an obstacle course

Here they were learning to "OBEY with EXACTNESS" while playing a game of "Helaman Says"

They did a TRUST fall into their dad's arms off of the ottoman to learn to TRUST in God continually

And walked with a book on their head to "WALK UPRIGHTLY before God"

Addison was not happy with it though - she didn't think that Daddy being a drill sergeant was very funny at all.

She was quite happy by the time we ate our ice cream sundaes for our treat though :)

Picture Tag

Well, my wonderful sister-in law, Erika (love ya Erke!), has tagged me for this 6th folder, 6th picture thing, so being on the laptop, this is the one that I got. This is Addison on her first Christmas. The kids were so excited in opening their presents that Addison ended up with a massive pile of wrapping paper all around. A baby's dream! She had a hay day in that paper! I can't believe she's almost 3 years old now - she's still just as beautiful and just as high maintenance!

Arrow of Light and Ice Fishing

During the "Blue and Gold" Banquet at Scouts last week, Chance was able to receive his Arrow of Light badge which is a highest accomplishment in cub scouts. He was also able to officially "Cross Over" into Boy Scouts. They had a really neat ceremony before Chance crossed over, where the cubmaster was dressed up like an Indian Chief, and presented him with an arrow (complete with authentic arrowhead and Eagle's feathers on it) which represented the path he would take that would lead him on the course to Eagle Scout. They had built a wooden bridge that he crossed over to meet the boy scouts on the other side and then he was given his new neckerchief. The troop here really put a lot into it and made it very special for us all. Chance's first outing with the scouts was this past Saturday, where he went ice fishing. It was very cold and snowy that day, but he and BJ had a good time and learned some tips for the next time they go.