Greek God

The 6th Graders did a unit on Greek God's.  Derek was assigned Cupid.  I don't remember much about the Greek God's,  when he told me he had to dress up like Cupid, I said "do we need to dress you up in wings and a diaper? "

I did a little research on what he could wear to school that would be appropriate and this is what we came up with:

 The assignment was to come to school in your costume.  As I walked Trey to school that morning I saw a lot of kids (boys and girls) and white dresses or I guess I should say Toga's.  The kids corrected me and told me Romans wore Toga's, they were doing Greek. They did their presentations in their costumes, then ate Greek Food.  Sounded like a fun and memorable day.

Good Week for Dax....We never gave up!

After several attempts Dax finally passed the test to get his learners permit.  He can now start to drive with an adult driver in the car.  We are proud of him that he didn't give up.  I know several 17 yr olds that don't drive because they gave up on the test.

Dax has been behind the wheel a few times since passing the test, apparently driving is a lot harder than it looks.  "slow down, speed up, move to the left, get out of the other lane, get up close to the stop sign before your stop"  Ughh.  I'm glad we have 6 months to get this down.

In Dax's chemistry class they were learning about acids.  His Chemistry Teacher, Mr. "Jag" is  a great  teacher. They did this activity with acids (dye) first, now that they have worked with acids they will learn more about acids in a few weeks.  Mr.Jagiello  had everyone bring in $8 for the supplies and everyone that paid made a tie dye t-shirt.  Then they all wore them to school on Friday and took a class pic.  Dax was nervous that it wouldn't turn out very good, because the cardboard they had to fold was diffucult to get an accurate fold, which would then makes the dye pattern.  They dyed them at school, then he brought it home in a plastic bag and we had to wait 24 hrs for it to set.  The time came, Dax opened it up, and WOW to our pleasant surprise it turned out just how he wanted.

He got the spiral pattern, and the red and yellow colors are distinct, they didn't run into one orange mess.
Everyone wore their shirts on Friday.  His school has uniforms and they are pretty strict about what you can wear on Fridays.  Only school affiliated shirts (Class shirt, team sport shirt etc.)  For the longest time I couldn't figure out why there were always kids in tye dye on Friday's.  Now I know.


In other news this week....  This last Saturday Trey signed up to enter his first track meet. We were proud of him for even wanting to enter.   His events were the 100 meter and the standing long jump.  We practiced a bit over spring break, but I'm afraid we didn't get in enough practice.  Trey did his best and he didn't give up.  There was one girl who fell way behind all the other runners.  She just started walking, everyone was still cheering her on saying just "finish the race, don't quit".  Everyone wanted her to finish the race even though she would come in dead last and far from the others.   As soon as she got to the water station she cut across, gave up and never crossed the finish line.  I think everyone felt a little sad for her that she just quit. I told Trey no matter what finish the race, and he did.

Trey  in the bull pen getting ready for the race (I couldn't get a good picture from where the race started)

Measuring Trey's long jump distance

Hanging around on the bleachers before his events.  Trey had never been on bleachers before and he was nervous they would fall down.

Spring Break 2016

No big plans for Spring Break this year.  We had a nice time hanging out and working on projects.  One day we got Shamrock Shakes and headed over to Desert Breeze park for a bit

Trey joining the statues at the park.

My brother, Steve, and his family came down and the kids had a great time playing with their cousins Zane and Seth.

Derek had a three day backpacking trip in the Superstition Wilderness with his Scout troop.  They went about 17 miles over 3 days through an area called Reavas Ranch. I drove a group of kids up, I dropped them off in the middle of nowhere. It was about 25 miles east Apache Junction and 10 miles deep on a dirt road past Canyon Lake.  The drive really was pretty, my van came home covered in dirt.  I almost ran out of gas on the way back.  I was so relieved when I came to a gas station in Apache Junction. Luckily there were a few drivers in  caravan so at least I wouldn't be stranded.   I thought Derek would do ok with this trip since it sounded  easier than the Yellowstone trip.  It was still rough and he struggled a bit.  When I picked him up he said it was miserable and he was never doing it again, and I guess he needed help with his pack at some of the places.  Now that he has been home, and rested he is talking about the fun things that happened.  He really does have good leaders and lots of friends in the group, it had to be somewhat fun for him. They joined with the other two Pleasant wards.

View from where I dropped them off.

 Pleasant 3rd Group      Back-Cole Johnson, Dallin Blacker,Selanhongva McDonald, Todd Johnson,                                       Front-James Cannon, Derek Johnson, Garrett Kubricky, Noah Hansen, Mike Cannon, Ben Jones, Case Lueck

They are off

Derek with Blow Dart

Group picture in front of huge crazy tree

Hikers- 23 total in the group

Mark Volk with Derek's pack in the front.

Scouts

While Derek was off on his adventure Dax had  StakeYouth Conference in Superior, AZ.  Curtis got recruited to drive that bunch.  We have gotten plenty of good use out of our mini van hauling groups of kids.

There is an old High School in Superior that some people bought and "fixed up" for youth groups to stay in kind of like dorm.  Everyone sleeps on the floor.  It sounded like a pretty old beat up building.  They did lots of service.  Cleaned up the Cemetery, made care packs for  Syrian refugees, teddy bears, and hats for cancer patients

Superior High School

Curtis and Dax both said how depressed and run down the Town of Superior looked.  Old mining town died out.  Dax had a good time and said he met another kid named Daxton.

Lord Licorice/Play in a Day

Lord Licorice of Candy Land

Chandler West Stake had "Play in a Day". This used to be called Road Show, now instead of weeks practicing parts, dancing and making sets they do it all in one day, then perform them that night.  There were 6 groups, the kids were randomly placed with other kids from the Stake.  The assignment was to take a section from "The Strength of Youth" pamphlet and make a 8 min skit.  The skits  were already written and costumes were done by pre-assigned advisors.  Dax's group did a Candy Land Theme and he was Lord Licorice, the main character. He did a great job, he even sang.  We (his family) know how much Dax likes to be the center of attention, and he is always very confident when he is on stage.   I don't think most people know that about him, he can sometimes be very reclusive in groups except when he is in the spotlight.  So many people came up to me and told me what a great job he did and were surprised by his performance.  The entire night was pretty armature and corny, but the kids loved it and had a great time. Trey kept talking about all the skits the next day. In addition to Candy Land, There was a Pirate Theme, Something about Moses, Star Wars, Inside Out and I can't remember the last one.
The lady who was in charge of the Candy Land group, Marie Porter, came up to me a few days later and told me how great Dax was, how much she enjoyed working with him and getting to know him.  She said there was one kid in the group who was extremely difficult to work with (ADHD) Dax was really good to him, and tried to talk some sense into him to get him to behave better.  Dax had mentioned this to us that night, and we laughed and said are you "calling the kettle black"?  Marie told me, Dax was awesome and he was no where near  ADHD as much as that kid.  She said each time Dax said his lines in practice he said them differently, and they never knew what they were going to get, but each time he pulled it off.

Karen Scott took these pics and made this collage on Facebook of our Ward. Lord Licorice in Bottom Right

Service

Derek needed to finish up a few hours of community service for his next scout advancement. I went onto the "justserve" website to see what was out there for him to do.  I saw something about needing people of all ages to show up at a welcome home event for people serving in the military.  I read the description it looked perfect for our requirements (ages, time period etc) and the whole entire family could help.  Then I told Curtis about it and he told me his good friend growing up Andy Ibach, his son Zach was coming home from his Air Force Deployment in England and the town of Gilbert was honoring Zach and giving him an award, and invited our family to be there.  How convenient, we would of course go and support Zach, then we also get service hours at the same time.

I showed up early with the kids to do the service part, our cousins the Zoccoli's were there also to support Zach.  I look at the program and the whole entire event was for Zach. Wow I was not expecting that.  I thought it would be for multiple service members.  It was really net event.  They had several motorcycles arrive carrying flags, then the Ibach family arrived in a Limo, they walked down the red carpet.  We were there to wave flags and honor him for his service.   Zach was in his Camo uniform.  Senator Matt Salmon was there and spoke, the Mayor of Gilbert, the Principal from Hamilton H.S. where Zach graduated from. They gave Zach a few awards and talked about his military service.  It was a really cool event to go to.  I was glad my kids could be able to thank an honor someone serving our country, then it was pretty cool that we actually knew him.  It was fun night.

Real Soccer Player and Picnic

We have Trey signed up for Soccer, although come to find out, it isn't really soccer.  They get a uniform and they go to practice, but there are no games.  I was a little frustrated to find out I Paid $160 for him to not play real soccer, but then I realized at this age it doesn't really matter.  They don't really play positions (they just run in a huge pack chasing the ball) and they don't keep score.  This turned out to be good, they did a lot of drills and played mini games to teach them the skills.  Trey loved wearing his uniform to each practice.  When we started this a few weeks ago in January it was pretty chilly in the evenings during their practice times.  I kept telling Trey he could wear a sweat shirt or jacket under his uniform to keep him warm.  He kept telling me "No, I want to look like a real soccer player"  I guess real soccer players only wear their uniform, nothing wimpy like a sweatshirt hanging out underneath.  I got this cute pic of him in his uniform.

Trey our "Real Soccer Player"

Today Hancock had their annual President's Day Picnic.  I got the letter about this event telling me the times of lunch for each grade last week. I read it,   Then I kind of forgot about it.  As I was walking back from taking Trey to school today I overheard another parent talking about the picnic "oh no is that today???"  I went home and looked and the schedule and realized I could make it.  Even though Derek's lunch and Trey's lunch fall back to back, I opted not to go to Derek's because last time when they had the Veteran's day picnic in November, I could tell he would rather sit with his 6th grade friends, than sit with Mom.  Which I totally understand.

At 11:00 I finished up some work then I quickly grabbed something to eat at the picnic and headed out to Hancock.  First grade lunch starts at 11:05.   I waited near where his class kept  their lunch boxes, but I could see where  Trey would come in.  I saw him straggling in with the other 1st graders, he looked up and saw me.  His face lit up, then he walked a little faster toward me.  Because we didn't talk about me coming, he was surprised to see me.  He said "How did you know?"  I told him I read the letter.  It made my day to see him so happy and surprised to see me.  His friend Jeremy was with him, but Jeremy told me his parents and grandparents couldn't come.  I told Jeremy to eat with us.  I mostly just sat there eating my lunch quietly as I listened to Trey and Jeremy discuss important things like Skylanders, and Minecraft.  It was a great lunch today. 

Wild Weekend for Derek

Friday night, Derek was invited to one of his good friends, Zaiden Folk's 12th Birthday party. 

Ziden's Mom, works for one of the new apartment complex's in the area, so the party was held at the club house/pool of the apartments.  When I dropped Sean (the neighbor kid) and Derek off at the party, I was so impressed.  These were extremely nice apartments, The common areas, front office, parking...WOW.  Really nice for apartments.  I left the boys and pick them up a few hours later.  When I picked them up the pool had changing LED lights going, and all of the boys were having a blast in the hot tub.  Derek, and Sean had a great time, and most of Derek's best friends were there as well.  They are a good group of boys and they had a fabulous time, eating pizza and playing the pool.  It was kind of a nice change.  Pool are parties are a regular thing here in the summer, but it was a nice change to get to have one in January.

After a late Friday night, Derek had to get up early and head over to the Chandler Airport to work on his Aviation Merit Badge.  I'm not quite sure how this came about but two Gentlemen from our Stake who own planes were going to help the boys with the Merit Badge.  The thing that baffles me is how small a group there was.  If I have my facts straight only a few boys were invited, which makes sense because these are small planes.  I don't know how they decided who got invited I'm just grateful Derek was on the list.

Derek was really looking forward to this, and he enjoyed the experience, but there was a huge bummer.  Derek lost his ipod.  He took it so he could take pictures, he did take some pictures from the plane, but then noticed it was missing after he left the plane.  After a few phone calls, several searches, and many prayers.  The ipod was recovered.  We are so grateful to Jim Price, the man who owned the plane,who went back and searched his plane twice.

Now it truly was a successful and happy ending.

Case Lueck. Garrett Kubricky, and Derek