Proud Parent

Johnathan has been so excited about becoming a Boy Scout and has tried very hard to prove himself to his scout masters and the older scouts in his troop. We have been very busy working on his first rank which is Boy Scout.

Tonight the troop held their Court of Honor and had a pot luck dinner. All the scouts were a little put out because they had to wait till all the parents and the siblings to fill their plates before they were allowed to eat. Needless to say all the parents thought that was a great idea! Once everyone had finished eating the awarding began.

The first patch handed out was the Camporee patch. This was hard earned by all the scouts who went to this weekend camp out. The weekend started on Friday night with clear skies and warm weather, at around midnight the clouds gathered and the rain started falling....it didn't stop falling till Sunday afternoon. Everyone was wet and muddy but they had a great time. Then Johnathan was called up and I had to accompany him, he was handed his Boy Scout patch and a pin that matches. He had to put the pin on me for all the hard work I helped him do to reach this point in scouting.

It was a great ceremony and all the boys were thrilled about getting their patches. The next Court of Honor will be held in January and there will be more patches to come!

What a way to spend a Sunday

For several weeks now the kids and I have been meaning to visit the Historical Jenkins Estate located about a mile from our house. It is now a park, but the original buildings are still on the grounds. Many people have their weddings at the estate. I wanted to go and check out the gardens this place is supposed to have. I was not disappointed and both of the kids had fun looking at the flowers and walking the paths.

I really enjoy trying to capture nature photos, with that said I have lots of flower pictures. And today I was in heaven taking photos of all kinds of things. But what made me smile and feel kind of good was Hannah snapping away at whatever Mommy took a photo of. She is getting pretty good at taking photos.Johnathan enjoyed the herb garden that is planted towards the back of the property. He enjoyed rubbing his fingers on the leaves and then smelling the different scents. One of his favorites was the lavender. When the kids smelled the rosemary they both said it made them kind of hungry.
We spent two hours walking around the place and we didn't even see everything. None of us are sad at having to plan a second trip to Jenkins Estate!

A Day at the Zoo

Well I know that this is a week late, but I had to wait for my laptop to return home before I could put my photos online. Now that it's back I can share some of the photos I took at the zoo with the kids and my niece and my two sisters. It was a full packed day at the zoo, I think we saw everything. And yes I took photos of flowers and other objects I saw during our day.

Johnathan, Mackenzie and Hannah stopping to pose for photos. They had flashes going off in all directions as all three adults were snapping photos.


I love this photo, usually the chimps are inside when the weather is questionable. But on this day they were out in their new yard. And I love how this one went straight up the hill and sat in the tall grass.
Here kitty kitty! I spent a lot of time taking photos of this cougar, its usually really hard to find them in the enclosure. But on this trip he was wanting his photo taken, he jumped down from his log and came to the window. Granted Johnathan was standing to the right of me when I took this so maybe the cougar was checking Johnathan out at the time. HHMMM lunch!
My little woodland pixie peaking in the bushes!
Johnathan likes to watch the birds of prey show at the zoo. Before it started they put a couple of the big birds on display up on the stage. Johnathan was getting a closer look at them without having to get too close to them.

It was a great day. The kids had a blast and everyone was completely worn out by the time we left.