Family Crest

Shelly and her class were studying traditions, cultures, and exploring their own families' histories. She made a family crest which shows our tradition (soup for Christmas with the Fortiers), we come from European descent (flag of Germany), and we have our own culture (reading the Bible and other books together).

Hugs?

Shelly's monster or monkey or whatever it is looks like it wants a hug, no?

How Scouting Teaches Real Life Lessons

Its incredible to me what Archer leans in scouts. Beyond the Scout Law and Scout Promise and Scout Handshake and Scout Sign and where to put all the different patches on his Scout Shirt...

There's the part about getting along with other people, learning to help and sometimes learning to just get out of the way when you can't help. Tonight, there was Changing a Tire. A lull in the activity elsewhere spurred one of the leaders to offer his own car as the guinea pig and stand back while the boys tried their hands and changing a flat tire. (There wasn't really a flat. They took the wheel off and put it right back on again.) The most impressive part of this was that while the adults stood back and gave directions, the adults didn't actually touch anything.

The boys worked the jack to raise up the car, took the wheel off, put it back on and lowered the car back down to earth. There was no fighting for a turn (everyone got one, even Shelly and E), there were no hurt feelings or fingers or anything else, I thought it a great success. (Also keep in mind that these boys are no older than 10, seriously, great success for such a young crowd!)

So the only question remaining is... How many Cub Scouts does it take to change a flat tire?

Answer: Six Scouts, two younger siblings, three dads and a mom (well, not really the mom, I didn't help at ALL)

Family Field Trip

To the dentist! The kids (thankfully) have not learned to fear the dentist like I have. Let's hope that lasts for a long long time. Perhaps it has something to do with missing half a day of school? Or maybe the cartoons on tv. Anyway, isn't it nice of Shelly and Archer to support their brother on his first dentist visit ever? Or, maybe that was the best place to see the cartoons...

Christmas Vacation

Its a little overdue, but here's Shelly's report on her time off from school. When she was writing it, she actually came up with a list of about twenty things we'd done. It was a hard job to narrow it down to just this.


Sorry, I really tried to get this to go the right direction but it just wouldn't cooperate. You'll have to hurt your neck to read it. Enjoy!

 

Random Poses

Here are a few random cute pics, no story, just a few I've collected over the last few months.

Its no wonder David often wakes up feeling completely unrested, how well would you do with a knee in your ear for several early morning hours?

 

 

This picture was spurred by my instructions to "Go stand by your brother and sister. Go over there. No, go stand over there by them. Stop walking in circles and go over there! Go! Stop, go, listen to me!!!" Every time I opened my mouth he laughed and shuffled around his circle track a little faster.

 

We finally did get the picture I wanted, and don't they all look so happy? :)

 

In case you missed it, that's a princess wand in his hand. He's been going around lately turning us all into various animals and proclaiming that he's Super Woman. Despite Shelly's best efforts to correct him, he continues on his quest to prove that he's Super Woman, and yes he CAN turn her into a bunny or horsey or anything he wants! 

 

That's all for now folks!

 

 

Brotherly Love

Elijah Graham is such a treasure, his smile is like nothing I've ever seen before, Archer and Shelly have beautiful smiles, but E's is different, its like his smile is bigger than his face, his eyes light up as if he knows, he knows exactly how cute he is. And he knows that he is about to get away with almost anything.

 

Shelly and Elijah at Shelly's birthday lunch, we picked her up from school for a McDonald's lunch. What a pair!



Archer's always asking E for hugs, Elijah occasionally complies but usually delights in torturing his big brother by doing exactly the opposite of whatever Archer wants. Can't you see it in his eyes? He KNOWS he's got us all wrapped around his tiny little fingers! 

There's More...

There's more fun... We had the big yearly banquet for Scouts, this time around I'm an official leader, it only took me three years to get sucked into it, but its a great organization and I'm happy to help where I can. Anyway, that's why I've got the scout shirt on (which really, the shirt, its one of the reasons it took me so long to become an official member, I just really DID NOT want to wear it, pride or something).

This year's banquet marked a milestone of only one year left before Archer graduates to Boy Scouts. That means that this is a year of lasts for him, and us - last Pinewood Derby, last year at Family Camp with this group of people, last last last. I really shouldn't get ahead of myself, but its hard not to consider that all of this that we've grown to love (the fun events, the people, the memories we're making as a family) is coming to an end.

On to the fun part, here are some pictures from the banquet.

Sassy Shelly? Just smile for the camera, pretty please??

Also, I just want to put this in writing, so we don't forget all our hard work years from now, we have been having SO MUCH FUN at our weekly meetings. David has helped the other leader and I come up with some great projects for the kids to make. Most of them Shelly gets to make too.

There's the pencil box with the secret compartment in the bottom. (Shhh don't tell anyone that I told you about the secret compartment!)

There's the marshmallow shooters, even E got to make one of those. Except he took his apart and just started throwing the PVC pipes at me one day.

There's the Belt Loop Displays, a nice way to display all those belt loops that they won't be wearing much longer, since they won't be wearing their Cub Scout belts when they graduate.

We made vibrobots with toothbrushes, we're going to make checkerboards this week, I can't even remember the other stuff, its already too long ago to keep track of. We'll just summarize by saying we're keeping the boys busy making tons of fun boy projects - I hope they remember Scouting as something that was fun, and maybe one day they'll even think, "Oh, I remember when I used that tool, learned about that saw, built something myself at scouts!"

Derby Time!

David's been helping the kids build a new batch of pinewood derby cars, the big races are coming up. This weekend Shelly's participating in the Awana races, and the boys are going to do the Scout races next week. Since David also helped some cousins put together cars, this year's total car build came to five. Total career car count is twelve, and he's just getting started. He's practically a professional, he's got all the associated tools and gadgets...

Archer's cars have kept a few signature lines through the years, but also evolved into a more carefully streamlined design as he's gotten older and perfected his stylings.

From top to bottom...
Archer's first car as a Wolf (second grade)
Bear car (third grade)
Webelos car (fourth grade)

Starting at the top and going clockwise...
Amberlyn, Archer, Shelly, Elijah and Austin

 

Some of these have big gaping holes in the bottom where they've been drilled out to bring the weight down. Others turned out just right, no adjustments necessary. All of them had their axels and wheels polished, axels straightened and then carefully bent to a secret angle to allow the wheels to ride on their edges... Most of them have extra weights added in the back, all of them have been meticulously sanded, painted, sanded and painted some  more. There is absolutely no excuse for slow cars this year, the Fortiers are going to dominate all of the regional races - Caledonia, Union Grove, BRING IT ON!!!

Some Fun Stuff

We've been busy as always, I've finally gotten around to getting some pics together.

First, Archer's Orchestra Concert, his very first ever. We've enjoyed watching him progress as he learns to play the violin, its sparking memories of my own attempts to play the violin in fourth grade. His concert was entertaining but we didn't get any family pictures as I'd hoped - there were just way too many people to contend with when the show was over.

There was the prep beforehand...

 

 And then there was the after-show photo shoot...

 

Since then, David's taken up the violin as well and its heartwarming to hear them talking about music theory and practicing together.

 

 

More to come in the next few days!

Milestones

As our kids are growing up, we're always looking for those big moments... first steps, first words, first day of school. They become harder to define or see as they get older, but there was a major milestone reached today.

I've had Nana's famous Salad Dressing Cake for a little while now, I've wanted to try my hand at the delicious creation. I tried a couple of weeks ago, and no good. It was a complete flop, didn't turn out and the whole thing had to be tossed out. So disappointing. "This is why I don't bake," I told myself. Archer asked me today if I would bake the cake. I told him I had to be in the right kind of mood for it, and I wasn't in that mood today. He said, "I can make it." I couldn't really think of a reason why not, what's the worst that could happen? No worse than anything I'd done. So I said fine, and went to take a shower. He was on his own. At one point he called Grandma Shell for advice on whether he should grease the pan (he promptly forgot her advice and didn't do what she told him anyway).

I came back to the kitchen just in time to see him struggling with trying to hold the bowl while he poured the batter into the pan. I helped finish that up, then put it in the oven for him. Half an hour later...

Can you guess? Guess what happens when a nine year old boy with no baking experience simply follows the directions to make a chocolate cake? It turns out PERFECTLY. So good. So so good, I am SO proud!!!

Most of the cake is already gone, and I'm sure they'll finish it up for breakfast tomorrow morning. Perhaps I should be asking Archer for advice in the kitchen from now on?

Nana's Salad Dressing Cake

Ingredients

1 cup sugar
2 cups flour
3 tablespoons cocoa
1 tablespoon vanilla
1 cup cold water
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 cup salad dressing (mayonnaise)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350
Mix all ingredients and pour into 9"x13" cake pan. Bake 25-30 minutes.

(Grandma Shell's advice was to spray the pan with cooking spray before pouring in the batter. Grandpa Craig's advice was to butter and flour the pan. Archer did neither, and used a non-stick baking pan.)

Why we love it

Easy, we always have the ingredients on hand, we love that we get to carry on Nana's tradition and share this one with everyone we love

 

Four Stars - what's with that last holdout? Doesn't he love cake? No? Strange...

Opening Day

This has been a long.... long.... winter. Too many days with the kids home from school because of cold weather. Record snowfall, record cold. We started out March with more snow. My mom's voice ringing in my ears, "In March the wind blows down the door, and blows my soup upon the floor..."

Now, March 14, finally, temps in the 40's and it feels like summer. Archer has been begging for days to bring his bike up out of the basement so he can cruise the neighborhood but I've been putting him off. Its just so cold out. Today, he took matters into his own hands and started to bring it up himself. He would have probably made it, if not for the little (or big?) scare downstairs. I know he wants to say ghost, haunted, some kind of scary story. But he knows better than that, he wouldn't say it to me but he was terrified. His story got me secretly scared and I almost wouldn't have gone down if it weren't for Shelly, she wanted her bike too so she led the way. I didn't let on about how I was quaking inside, we dug her bike out from under all the bigger bikes (why do we have 47 bikes down there???), grabbed E's little wooden bike under one arm and Shell's under the other and climbed back out of the dungeon basement. Only glancing back over my shoulder once to make sure nothing was following us.

A quick rush to find shoes, sweatshirts, helmets and then... Silence inside the house for about twenty minutes while they enjoyed their newfound freedom. Speed, coasting, peddling, tight circles and wide turns and enjoying the wind in their faces and the sun in their eyes. Twenty minutes. The wind finally crept in under their sweatshirts, tummies growling because its been thirty minutes since they last ate, they eventually all came in hungry and freezing nearly to death.

Opening Day for the biking season didn't last too long, but the kids have been out, the bikes are in the garage and there's no going back to the basement now. Spring, Summer, something with warmer temperatures is on the way!!

In March the wind blows down the door
And spills my soup upon the floor
It laps it up and roars for more
Blowing once, blowing twice
Blowing chicken soup with rice

~ Maurice Sendak