Dec 19: Merry Christmas...Cub scout style

Tonight was our cub scout pack Christmas party. It was a pot luck dinner plus parent/son cake contest. Yours truly was asked to be one of the judges for the cake contest since Travis didn't enter this year. It was a slight challenge, for a non-chocolate lover like me, but I muddled through it and even think I decently judged the chocolate cakes. One of the other judges pointed out to me that she didn't like several of the other flavors, but i did, so we balanced each other out. It was a lot of fun judging the cakes overall!

And today's picture, shows what Jay looked like for the entire dinner. All the little boys thought he was so funny!

Pinewood Derby time again

Saturday was Travis' cub scout pack annual pine wood derby race.

His car is #1

Cool new aluminum track this year


1st place!

This one is close!

Pinewood Derby's are tiring!

Mr. 2nd place! (1/100th of a second behind 1st place!)


All his treasures in one place

Camp McNeill

This weekend, Jay and Travis headed a couple hours away, to go to a cub scout camp. They went last year also, so they knew what fun they were in for!



Those clothes (hot mess that it is) would not come home, nearly that clean looking!


pirate ship




Travis and his buddy Holden


Dino bones. He declared that he made this for Jay. What a pity for me.


Kind of hard to make out the detail on this, but it is a dino skull


The campers!


Raft racing


They had a great time!

Pinewood Derby, climbing and bears...

Yesterday, was Travis' cub scout pack Pinewood Derby race. This is his second year participating, and he was so excited. I have to admit, it is pretty fun to watch. It's a lot of work for the kids/dads, so I think I have the easy part of the deal though. Jay and Travis went to help out Friday night with the setup and such and then Saturday was race day.
There were this many cars in Travis' group (Wolves). I forget the actual number,feel free to count the cars in the picture though :o)


Lots of excited little boys

The little brother was determined he was going to take down the banner thing

There it goes!

Travis did not win anything this year, but his good buddy won 1st place in their group, and Travis cheered loudly for him and gave him lots of high-fives and celebrated Holden's accomplishment as if it were his own. I think that made me more proud than if Travis had won. What a great show of good sportsmanship! Some of the dads could learn a lesson from a group of 7 years olds I think.

Riley made a discovery yesterday...that by using the step stool, he can climb, yet one more thing in our house...the furniture!
**disclaimer...yes, he is wearing a wonky outfit. His pajama pants seemed so much more comfy for naptime than his jeans, and well, he never quite made it back out of them! So please excuse the tacky outfit!**
Must get the stool just so...

Hoist chubby booty up...

Tada!


Riley loves the bear...

Little bear that Riley had before he was born...and who I grabbed from his room during our quick stop home the day he was lifeflighted to Duke and who I tearfully brought to his bedside when he was 6 days old, and who stayed at his bedside, traveling up and down the interstate with him, for 107 days, and who traveled back to Duke in September to keep him company, and will travel there again next week, has now become a much loved companion to Rileybear. And he loves to "love the bear". And carries him around with him, and sleeps with him, and bear has now begun to travel around with us.

(note in the picture above, you can see "Souza" written in sharpie marker on the tag on the bears bottom...a forever reminder of his stay in the NICU as well - also, he's digging at his belly...a sure indicator that within 10 minutes, his bag would have to be changed, because it was leaking...sigh)

Travis has an assignment to collect and display 100 of some sort of collection, to bring into school this week in honor of the "100th day". He chose this year, his shark took collection, and today, he spent time arranging them in preparation of the 100th day. Good thing his daddy is a diver!


And it wouldn't be Sunday night without a picture of Travis and Misty would it? Here they are, snoozing in my bed (beside me actually)

Dec 14: and the winner is....

Tonight was the Cub Scout Christmas Party and Father-Son cake contest.

I know there were at least 47 cakes there, maybe a few more, as they were assigned numbers, but once the tables began to fill up, they were no longer in number order, but I know the numbering went up to 47 at least.

There were ribbons for creativity (1st,2nd,3rd place), originality (1st, 2nd, 3rd place) and Best tasting (1st, 2nd, 3rd place)

Travis didn't win any ribbons for his cake.

Because HE won the GRAND PRIZE TROPHY!!! Best Looking Cake!!

and there was NO getting rid of that smile


He was SO proud. SOOOOOOO Proud. He skipped up accept it, and talked into the microphone and everything. Mom cried. Not that he won so much, but how proud and excited he was over winning. He and Jay worked so hard on that thing for hours and hours.

Dec 13: cakes EVERYWHERE

This afternoon was completely consumed with Jay and Travis cooking and decorating cakes for their Father-Son Cake contest that is tomorrow night with Cub Scouts. They decided to make a USS Yorktown cake, since they just went camping on the USS Yorktown (an aircraft carrier) in South Carolina last weekend.

So, after a trip to the store to buy multiple cake mixes and icings and icing colorings (I did color the icing for them, but that was the extent of my help), the cake baking began.

Hours later, the cakes had all been baked and cooled and cut out, and now the decorating began.


My kitchen looked like a cake massacre for the majority of the day!

Snack break for Travis...cake making is hard work!

The final product!



I don't know if they will win or not, but I know they worked hard for hours today on it, and I am proud of them regardless! There are a couple little airplanes and helicopters of Travis' that they will put on it when they get there tomorrow night. I'll be sure and take picture of the truly final finished cake then!