A busy weekend

We sure had a busy weekend.

The first Saturday in December the boys scouts always do Scouting for Food to collect non-perishables for the local food bank. So, we kind of cheated. W just calls relatives and asks for donations of cash, then we hit Costco. This year he ended up with about $35. On Sunday his whole pack meet at the food bank to turn their food in and take a quick tour. They estimated that the 3 boys that were there had about 100 pounds. Then a couple other boys brought in food the next day and that ended up being another 30 plus pounds. For 7 little boys, they sure do put a lot into what they do.

We also went to the kids workshop at Home Depot on Saturday. I'll tell you. It amazes me how much H enjoys hitting that the first Saturday of the month. As soon as he hits the front door, he's jetting over to the workshop area. This month was an art easel. They were actually able to do 2 project this month. So W did a little football peg board and H did a football stool for their 2nd projects. And I didn't know this, but the guy running the thing said you could make a non toxic paint for their projects. You mix Kool Aid with enough vinegar to make a tempura consistency. Well, I don't know why it would need to be non toxic. I mean really, it smells like Kool Aid, ughh. Anyway, as you can see, all three boys had fun. That's such a great program. It's nice to have something inside that's FREE to get the family out of the house.

The museum down on the pier was also running a program with the power company to coincide with the anniversary of our the little breeze we had last year. It was pretty neat. They had a lot of stations for the kids to check out. As you can see, W will be prepared if we have a little flooding. H really enjoyed climbing in the raft behind his big brother. W was able to make his own storm game (traced from a monopoly board), both boys enjoyed trying their hand at translating and sending Morse code. They had a really good electricity exhibit. That was a table set up with power lines, a house, fences, a car and several figures that could be moved around to be the ground between the power poles and metal plates on the table. I was impressed to see that W paid very close attention as the guy showed different scenarios of accidents that had happened. D and I actually learned something. Of course we had always hear that if you crash into a power pole, you don't get out of the car. However, if the car is on fire, you really don't want to stay in it. So, the guy explained that the ground can be electrified up to 30 feet away at different voltages, similar to the ripples a rock makes when you drop it in water. So, if you have to get out of a burning car, you keep both feet together and jump as far away as you can. Then to avoid having different parts of you body in different "ripples", you keep your feet touching and shuffle slowly away. That way your body is never bridging between two different currents. Hmmm, I'm just going to hope for no fire. I can't imagine having to jump with the boys. I think W's favorite part of the day was making rope. And he had to be the most patient for that activity. There were several kids in line when we got there, but he did a very good job of waiting. And thankfully there was a padded bench there and H decided to take a little nap. When it was W's turn he ended up getting a little help from his dad. It was a neat process. Basically, the twine is threaded between D and W through hooks on the 4 corners of the stand between them. Once they have 4 double sets of twine, W started cranking on the wheel in front of him, twisting the 8 strands of twine into 4. Then D hooked a carpenters drill with a hook into the cross you see him holding and cranked along with W as a woman helping out held the cross and walked toward W as the strands became a rope. Then the guy would whip the ends. I had him show W how to do the whipping though, so he was able to sign two items off in his cub scout book!!

After that we went to Rogue for dinner. Sorry, no photo's of that. I mean really, who wants to see my kids eat...Even though we had a ton of things to do at home, it was nice to get out and do some things together. And you know what, there would have still been a ton of things to do had we stayed home and actually done a few things.

Tuesday H and I had lunch with S and MandM. We went to Rio. D and I had gone there when we first moved here and I was still pregnant with W. I remember it was good, but for some reason we never went back. It was so good. They had a menu with smaller order, but we decided to go with the regular size since it was only $2 more, and it's always nice to have good food left over. Well, mine was so good, I had no leftovers. And I now have a new favorite cheese. I think she said it was horchata?? I'm pretty sure I've heard of it before on food channel.

It looks like we are supposed to have a little bad weather this weekend. I think I read 60mph winds (come on, is that worth worrying about??) On Sunday it may get down to 20º. So I have to tarp my jasmine so it doesn't die again this year... The big thing is there is suppose to be snow in the valley on Saturday, probably rain here. We are heading about 2 hours south for wrestling Saturday. Between the high tides and high surf from the winds, there may be flooding just as we hit the halfway point on the way down. I don't know which sounds worse, driving in high water or driving in snow...Anyway, this tournament isn't suppose to be nearly as competitive as the one we went to a couple weeks ago here. And W has really showed some improvement this week. He not nearly as inclined to just flop over on his back. He was so funny at practice the other night. He was grinning the whole time he was getting his butt kicked. At one point he had a big grin, was almost pinned and saying "ouch, ouch, ouch". What a goof.

I hope everyone has a good week. Can you believe it's almost Christmas??? We still have to do our shopping!!! Yikes