Pinewood Derby Day

This was it, the day of the big race!

Curly was super-excited. He and my sweetie had put in tons of time sanding wheels and smoothing cars. I think it was a little overkill, but they even waxed the cars with real and actual car wax. They had so much fun working together.

We arrived at the church a few minutes before 6:00. I was awarding two boys their Arrow of Light and we needed to set up the sound system. Unfortunately, the cd player swallowed my cd. So we scrambled trying to figure out a Plan B.

In the meantime, Curly got his car all checked in. The only problem was the missing track. It eventually arrived and the guy was setting it up the entire time we were trying to give out awards. Then he spent nearly 30 minutes with all the boys watching while he tested each and every car on the track.

Things finally got underway. Curly's car performed well in all but one race. He was convinced that he was going to win the 2nd place medallion. When the winners were finally announced, he wasn't the 2nd place winner as he had hoped, he was FIRST place!!

I guess all that work and effort was worth it; the grin on his face shows it all.

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Gratitude Day #3. I am grateful for good pencils. Not the cheap ones; give me a Ticonderoga with a good eraser any day. I love writing with a pencil because when I make a mistake, I can quickly redo without a huge splotchy blot of ink. That said, I much prefer a pen to a mechanical pencil. I tend to push down when I write and I can go through an entire lead without ever accomplishing anything. My kids have finally learned the value of a good pencil and I have given up on buying them the holiday ones at the dollar store. They just leave them in the can and take all the Ticonderogas anyway.