Abby- 8 months

Time flies by too quickly when it comes to baby life. Part of me is okay with that the other part of me is ready to grab each moment and just hold on as tight as I can. 

Abby continues to grow and thrive. She is not crawling yet but will roll and scoot her way to what ever she needs. 

Abby has discovered a love of baths. She lays in the water and moves her hands and feet with such pure delight. She squeals and even has let out giggles as she splashes. She loves yogurt melts and food in general really, she also believes that she is old enough to feed herself so meal time generally includes to two spoons, the grabbing of mom's dinner plate, a spilled cup or two, and end with a bath. I think it is her master plan to get just what she wants....it generally works. 

Snuggled up at church (this rarely happens)

She loves the puppy (and he is quite protective of her) and the fish, the fish will calm her down anytime she has a screaming attack. She loathes naps, making the days pretty long.

This was my dress from 1979!

Abby has discovered the joy of toys and it has been fun to see her pick favorites from her stash. She loves it when big brothers and sisters join in the fun too, this baby is a people person. She also enjoys the vacuum...not sure about that one.

her new past time, pull down the toy basket. 

She is inquisitive and seems to scoot faster when big brother is playing with the tablet, she just wants to get her hands on that wondrous thing. 

Abby is truly the sunshine of our family and we are so grateful that she is with us every day. 

Star Wars Blue and Gold

So last May I was asked to be a Cub Scout Den mother for James' Wolf Den.  I knew absolutely nothing about Cub Scouts, well I did remember my brother, Adam, earning his bobcat while we all stood around in the kitchen so I guess there was that. 

I have had fun with my little den. They are three of the cutest boys around and have some good giving heart. 

To celebrate the founding of scouts we had the traditional Blue and Gold Banquet, and to give a little bit of added fun we went with a Star Wars theme. 

I wish I had taken better picture of the decorations but they were awesome. We had lightsaber napkins, and some fun table decorations.  

As the boys (and their siblings) walked in they were given a pool noodle light saber. They had fun trying to keep the balloons up with the "force". 

We enjoyed Jabba the Hutt Dogs for dinner and it was hard to tear those boys away from their light sabers for a minute.

It was fun seeing what the boys had worked on over the last year. My little group had made recyclable robots, created their own dinosaurs, made rekenreks, and just had a ton of fun. It was fun to celebrate what we had done over the last year. 

After dinner their was more light saber fights, they even did well of not whacking each other...at least not hard.

By far my biggest surprise was getting Darth Vader from the Alpine Garrison to come and speak and help us with awards. He gave a great speech on the importance of scouting, it was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. The boys loved this surprise. He also helped hand out awards and had words of encouragement for each of the boys.

Vader was even happy to pose for pictures after. 

We did take a picture with our entire family but the person who was taking the picture didn't hold down the button so alas no family picture with Vader.

We were so proud of James that night who earned his Wolf advancement as well as six belt loops. I will miss being his den mother when he leaves to the Bear group in a few weeks.