Camping with the Most Amazing Fireflies EVER!

Well, I caught up to the summer!  I can’t believe I did it!

June was crazy busy for us, so there will be several posts for June.  I go back to work Monday, so we’ll see how much I can get done in these few days!

The first thing we did in June was go camping in Elkmont, in the Great Smoky Mountains.  We went with the cub scouts for a one-night camping trip.  This one was lots of fun, but a lot more work than the other scout camping trip, since we were in charge of all our own food too.  It’s a lot of work for just one night!

Now, if you’re not familiar with Elkmont, it is an area that is famous for its fireflies, and they really are the most amazing fireflies ever!  Except for the ones in Malaysia.  Because those are the only two places—Elkmont and Malaysia—where the fireflies are SYNCHRONISED!!

I’m not kidding!

It was fascinating to watch!  Everyone should go and see them!  They would all kind of twinkle on, and then you would see pockets of them sync up and all blink in unison, and then ALL of the fireflies would go out at once, and it would be totally dark.  Then they would start up again.  It’s hard to put it into words just how amazing it was!

At one point, Jim and I and the kids were all on a little path, and they were all around us, like we were inside a Christmas tree—all silence and synchronous sparkles. 

The rest of the trip was fun too, even if it was a short one!

John Pierce, Zachary, Thomas, Jake, Jonathan, Reagan, Avery
 

Hannah, Avery, and Reagan
 

Camping and Cars—More Cub Scout Moments, April 2014

In addition to Easter, we also went camping in April, this time with the cub scouts at an official boy scout campground—Camp Pellissippi.  It was an overnight trip, made much easier by the fact that all the food was prepared for us by the camp workers.  Nice!

There were different activities through out the day. Above, the boys (and Reagan) got their own little cast iron skillet in which they made their own little biscuits in the fire below.

They also learned how to make an oven out of a cardboard box and went on a hike.  Not to mention they got to hang out with their scout friends and do a lot of running around and playing.

The view from our campsite

April was also the month of the district Pinewood Derby competition.  For background on this event see this previous post. We lucked out in that the boy who came in 1st overall couldn’t go to the district competition, so that scooted all the boys up a place, qualifying Jonathan to go.  So Jim took all the boys to the competition and raced their cars against those of all the other district winners. 

None of them won, but Jonathan came in 7th in the district, well ahead of his brothers, confirming our belief that he had the best car.  That made us all a little happier!

But here’s the funny part…

Here is Reagan with HER car and HER 1st place trophy!

What?

The district competition has a special division called the outlaw division.  ANYBODY can race a car in the outlaw division.  They do this so that siblings can participate (and daddies can go crazy tricking out cars), and Jim told the kids about it with the original thought that Jonathan could at least race his car in the outlaw division.  But of course, when Reagan heard about it, she wanted to make a car too!  So Jim helped her make a car, all red sparkles and pony stickers.

And he entered it in the outlaw division.  But it turned out that her car was the ONLY car entered in the outlaw division, so she won!  (They did race it against some randomly chosen cars, and it did beat them!)

So in the end, Reagan came away with the biggest trophy!

Oops! Missed a few! Camping, Artwork, Safety City, Lysa, and RISK

I should have known that I would miss some pictures!  These came off my phone and didn’t make it into the correct folders.  Now they are in the right place, and I’m ready to share them with you!
First, in September 2013 over Labor Day weekend, we took the kids on their first REAL camping trip.  That is, we camped in a tent for more than one night  somewhere other than our back yard!  It was miserably hot, but the KOA had a pool and our camping buddies, Josh and Cris and their kiddoes, had a camper with air conditioning, so we managed to survive and have a great time!

Jim holding the big fish Cris caught.  She used hot dogs as bait, and now my kids think that is the only bait anyone should ever use!

All the boys on the playground—clearly it was a game day!  Go Vols!

Actually, I know it was a game day because Jim and Josh worked their tails off in the heat trying to hook up a TV to watch the game!

Also in September, Thomas painted this picture for me.  He said it was a blood machine and told me all about how the different parts worked to carry blood to people who need it.  He’ll make an excellent blood donor someday!

In October, the second graders went to Safety City, and Jonathan and Zachary’s sweet teacher snapped this pic of them and sent it to me.

In November, I went out of town one weekend with my friends Michelle and Katie.  We went to hear Lysa TerKeurst speak and even got to meet her.  It was a great weekend!

Jim also taught the boys to play RISK!  (Reagan and I were gone to ballet and a birthday party.  She wasn’t purposely excluded!)  They had to take a couple of breaks, but they finished the whole game!

Okay, now I think I’m caught up!