Pine Wood Derby

We had a major milestone in our family this past week. Our first pine wood derby! Scott figures he's going to be doing a lot of these over the next 10 years, so he invested in all the right tools to help Josh build his car. We were into Josh's car over a hundred dollars, but Scott tells me it's an investment in the boys' future, so it's worth it. Plus, when we divide it out over all the cars we'll end up making, it really only comes out to about $5 a car, so I guess it's ok. Josh came up with the design and helped cut it out. He wanted to paint it navy blue, but I only had black paint, so he settled for black--with orange flames on the sides. Josh was so proud of his car, and couldn't wait to race it.

We all went to cheer Josh on. The little boys were especially excited to watch the races.

(Sara and her best friend Ady. I love these two girls. They are only one month apart in age, but are both on the either extreme of the growth chart. They don't care, they love each other.)

Josh was so excited for his first race.

But, the first race didn't end so well. In fact, it didn't end at all. The weights that were glued to the bottom of the car, were dragging on the track, and the car stopped mid track and didn't even cross the finish line. Josh was devastated and so embarrassed. He started to cry and thought he was just done. But we explained to him that it was triple elimination, and that we would fix his car and everything would be fine. We pried the weights off the bottom and glued them to the top. Josh wasn't sure he wanted to try racing again, but we convinced him to give it another try. And the next race he won! That put a smile on his face and he enjoyed the rest of the derby.

Josh ended up placing third overall and got a trophy for "Best Racer".