Rover

Nate has been working his way through Exploring Creation: Astronomy.  One of the fun activities was to make a Mars rover out of food.  Here is his creation.

I think he had fun!

Masquerade

One of the goals of American Heritage Girls is girl leadership.  Our troop works to empower girls by letting them plan and run special events.  They learn so much by doing these events.  As adult leaders, we try to shepherd them some by asking good questions, but let the girls make the event their own, and sometimes run into struggles along the way, ;earning how to navigate them.

Our troop held a Masquerade Ball.  It was a Daddy Daughter event with multiple troops attending.

 

The girls (a 14 year old Pioneer and 12 year old Explorer) planned the theme, 

 

the decorations,

 

and the food.

 

They set up and cleaned up with the help of other girls in the troop.  They did a great job.  We had a little incident with glitter, but other than the clean up of the aftermath,

 

I believe a great time was had by all!

Well, except Nate.  Poor fellow tagged along for set up, the beginning of the dance, and clean up.  He even helped make the salad.  He really did well and was tired here from helping clear away all the chairs from the sanctuary.  I promise I got him a milkshake for his troubles!

Russian Piping

My older girls have enjoyed learning cake decorating over the past few years.  They've done cakes for birthdays and ceremonies.  It is fun to see them learning a skill that they may get to use in their own homes some day.

For Christmas, my mom got us a Russian Piping set.  These allow you to use three different blended colors in one large piped shape.  Instead of the traditional piping of a rose, with a straight tip on a flower nail followed by piping each individual petal with a different tip, there is one larger and more complex tip that makes the entire flower.  It requires a thicker icing to hold its shape, but it is amazing to see the entire flower come in one good squeeze.  We did find that it looks best if you give it a little twist as you go, or the shapes seem a little less realistic.

 It was so thick at one point Katie and I were squeezing together to get the icing through...maybe one more tablespoon of milk next time!

 Gabby added in the leaves around our flowers.

Ha!

Completed.  Personally, I would have gone for more matching colors...two shades of pink and then white or the like, but you can really see the different colors here.

After we cleaned up, the best part...

Not according to Plan

Our family had a trip with 100 of our closest AHG buddies...well girls in troops from several of the states closest to ours to visit the Space and Rocket Center in Alabama.  We filled out permission slips; we paid fees; we had our maps, phone numbers, and copies of our medical forms.

Then our Katie was under the weather.  We sent Gabby and Justin on, but within a few minutes she assured me she felt much better.  We called them back, so we could set out as a family.  We had made it about 15 minutes in to our trip when we had to turn around and throw in the towel...thankful for the old ice cream bucket we keep in the car for such occasions.

The gal felt horrible about it, but healthy again, of course!  Isn't that how it goes?!  So instead of our trip, we spent our Saturday at home working on this project and that.  Maybe we all needed the quiet day.

Friday Funnies

Ellie announced her favorite movie is High School Musical Chairs.

*****

E: I played dumb theologist.

Me:  What?!  How do you play that?

E: You dig things up.

Me: Archeologist

Braces, Braces, Braces

Back in 2017 Miss Gabby got her braces.  It is amazing when I look back on her smile before to see just how far she has come her teeth have moved!  She had been very discouraged by the way her teeth were twisted.  She is about 20 months into the (very approximately 36 month) process.  Yay!  Over halfway!  Her bite is responding well to the rubber bands being used to shift it.

Katie started with a spacer at the same time as Gabby's braces and moved on to braces at the end of the summer of 2018.  She had the shock joy of one of the younger girls from our AHG troop popping in while she was there, mouth open to have brackets applied and telling her how odd she looked with the spreader in her mouth.  Poor gal!  She is only expecting to wear her braces for two years, so she may finish up around the same time as Gabby.

We love our orthodontist.  We've followed this lady all over creation.  We first met her at a practice near our church.  She was great and told us, "Not yet," on braces.  That is so nice to hear, when someone is not necessarily working in their own best interest.  We found out she left that practice, and through some whispering, we found that she had gone a little further away, but still a drive-able distance, so we followed her to her new practice.  There she told us that Gabby would need those long term braces, but in the long run it was better to do that, to save a tooth she would loose without them, but not have the expense of putting them on twice.  We heard she was opening up her own practice, back closer to home (for her and us).  She was just going to do it on her day off to start, until she built up her patient base.  As we started in the other place, we intended to stick with it, but they got wind of her extra curricular orthodonting and decided to let her go, so we followed her to her temporary spot, in a dentist's office on their day off and in the evenings after they closed (what a great plan for everyone--they got rent for the time they weren't using the space and she could start work before her office space was open).  Now we've followed her to her very own office.  We're excited for her.

And then in November, I got braces too.  I'd been warned that due to wear, if I didn't fix my teeth through braces, I would eventually loose teeth.  My smile never bothered me, as my top teeth have been fairly straight, but those bottom ones are tight and twisty.  First she started on just the top, moving them out of the way a bit, trying to prevent putting bumpers on my teeth.  That didn't work out, so when she added my bottom brackets and wire last week, I got bumpers so I don't accidentally knock off my bottom brackets.  Then one of the bumpers came off, so I got another bumper on Monday!  I also got torture devices springs to make room on the wire, between my teeth, to get my canines attached.  She gave me the ceramic brackets on top, for the same prices as traditional metal ones, to make it less obvious that I'm wearing braces at forty.  And she gave us the friends and family discount.  Did I mention we love this lady?

Ellie asked to see the new braces (the bottom brackets are metal, as ceramic will damage the enamel on the back of your teeth as they touch, plus the springs make for a lot of metal).  She deemed them 'scary.' So there is that.  Ha!

Friday Funny

We need to turn around while out driving the other day, so Justin pulled into a nearby parking lot.

Ellie: What is this place?

Me: It's a veterinarian's office.

Ellie: [with the joy and gusto only a young child can offer, looking fervently around] Are there dogs here?!