50 Mile Bike Ride

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One of the Eagle Scout required merit badges is a choice between Swimming, Hiking, or Biking. C is not a fan of swimming and the hiking one is surprisingly tough. He chose Biking. One of the biking requirements is to do a 50 mile bike trip within 8 hours. He and J worked together to plan out a route.

C's friend M came along for the first leg. He started at Log Boom Park in Kenmore at 9 am. They biked to Gas Works Park in Seattle which has an incredible view of downtown Seattle. J drove down and met them there to encourage them. J took the photos.

It was a cloudy day, not too hot and not too cold. Perfect for biking 

They biked back to Kenmore and then M left. My son A joined C at this point and they headed east towards Woodinville. I met my boys at Marymoore park in Redmond. I got C's lunch and drink order. A said that he was tired and he had only done about 13 miles at this point while C had done about 30.

J and I met the boys again in Woodinville at Wilmot Park and J brought a sub for A to eat. C didn't want to stop and just carried on. A caught up to C on the trail. J met the boys at the end point in Kenmore. C finished at about 3 pm. He could still smile at the end! 

note our cars in the background

C now has to demonstrate that he knows how to change a bike tire to his merit badge counselor and he will have completed all the requirements. 

I'm so proud of his accomplishment. As well, he did all that biking while wearing a back brace! I bought him a very large strawberry milkshake to reward him.

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Hamlet (One Act)

C's one act was performed on June 7th. C's friend Gavin played Hamlet. C played Claudius the King. Sometimes Shakespeare plays are set in different times or places for variety. This version of Hamlet was set in the 1920s. Since it was a one act play, the play was in abridged format. 

The play was performed in the new middle school building. I loved how well lit this setting was compared to the usual location of the commons in the high school building. The acoustics were better as well. The kids sit on the floor while the adults sit in chairs. 

Here is C with Queen Gertrude

C's character dies at the end, along with pretty much everyone else!

A was unable to attend since he started his summer job that day. There were several fights during the play. J enjoyed those. They were pretty convincing but no one was hurt. G was fantastic as Hamlet. I was surprised that he wasn't nominated for a best actor award. We know G from Scouts.

C enjoys sourcing props. The table used in a few plays was found by C and I at Value Village. I spray painted it brown. I ordered a few props from Amazon and I'll be reimbursed. 

I attended three other one act plays and enjoyed them very much. The quality seems to be getting better every year.  Here is C with his proud parents

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The drama awards were given out on June 10th. C received a director's award. That award is given out by each (student) director of each play to the person who was a servant leader or the most helpful to the cast and director. This award is more meaningful since it is based on character. I don't have a photo of C with that award yet. Here is C with his friend M who was the director.

C has only been in serious plays during his time in Drama. We joke that he is "typecast." A more likely explanation is that he likes working with his friend M who seems to gravitate to serious plays.

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Night of Worship

 

C organized a Night of Worship on Friday June 3rd. 

It was something he decided to do months ago. He struggled with finalizing a date and a location. He had hoped to use a church but was unable to get permission.  The worship team were all students. Some juniors and some younger. There were 4 vocalists  (two guys and two girls) who took turns leading. There was a keyboard player, a box drum player, and 3 guitar players.

C was the organizer. He prayed and spoke briefly.

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It was held in the backyard of the drama teacher (married to the choir teacher). Five canopies protected everyone from the rain which started to fall half way through.  This photo was taken before all the crowd was there.

I would guess that there were about 25 people there, maybe 30. There was only one other parent who attended. The mom of one of the vocalists who is a freshman. Some CPC alumni showed up (3 young men). Word of mouth. Yes, that's A's friend in the top photo. It was over at about 8:30. They had a campfire afterwards but J and I left. 

It started raining quite hard about half way through so those canopies were needed. They sang 10 songs, I believe. How Deep the Father's Love and In Christ Alone were the only hymns.

One small issue was words for the songs. J and I used our phones to look up lyrics. I think a lot of the kids know the songs well. I tried to sing loudly to encourage the kids around me who maybe didn't know the songs. Maybe next time C will ask me to print up "song sheets."

I'm super proud of C and his desire to bring people together to worship God. Last fall J and I were talking with one of the teachers at CPC (just casually) about what C would do in the future. This teacher said I could see him as a pastor. I laughed at the time but now it doesn't seem that much of a stretch. 

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17 Candles, 16 Friends

Note: not all guests are pictured here.

We celebrated C's birthday on Memorial Day. The party was held at his friend Dawson's house since the guest list was so large. D's house is very spacious and has much better parking availability than our house. There were 16 teens at the party including C.

We brought in BBQ from Carolina Smoke. They were closed on Memorial Day so we had to purchase the food on Sunday and warm it up on Monday It was pulled pork and beef brisket. The brisket disappeared pretty fast. We also had potato salad and coleslaw from Carolina Smoke. I made a fruit salad. We brought soda and flavoured sparkling water. We got an ice cream cake from Dairy Queen. I wanted to get a large cake from Costco but they were closed on Monday as well. We would've save some money if the party wasn't on Memorial Day!

C wanted to do blind taste tests with his friends. The first one was chicken sandwiches. A picked them up from KFC, McDonalds, Ezelle's, and Chick Fil A. 

Six of the ten boys did that taste test. Here they are blind folded ready for a sample.

A secretary wrote down their guesses.  The second taste test was water. The girls did this one. No blind folds needed. The boys brought them cups of the various waters: tap, Costco bottled water, Arrowhead spring water, Fuji water and Disani. The girls did very well and most guessed correctly.

We were impressed with the girl whose answers went against the trend. C had intended to do a fries taste test but the kids were hungry at this point so we served the food.

This was the first party of C's where girls were in attendance.

Cake time.

After the cake was served and we did some clean up, J and I left. This was about 6:30 pm.

C was about to open his gifts when we left. The gift bags were funny including ones for baby girl and baby boy and Father's Day. The gifts were mainly gag gifts. One was a t shirt that reads Best Grandpa Ever. He wore that to school the day after.

That's D, the host, next to C.

The party was concluded at about 9 pm since it was a school night. A mishap meant that J had to go back to give a car key to C. Other than that, everything went very well.

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