Soccer is done! Yesterday was the last game, along with an end-of-season BBQ. It made for a very long day though! The scouts are camping down west of Cottonwood, and AJ was the only 'older' scout that was possibly going, and he needed to do a 'fireside ceremony" at the camp to finish up one of his merit badges, so we made arrangements to take him camping (at 8:30 Saturday morning) and pick him up (around 2:30) to come in and go to his game (be there at 4:00)/BBQ (starting after the game - 7:00 ish), and take him back out to the camp (back by 9:00 for the ceremony.) It is a 45 minute drive from the house to the camp site! It wasn't a lot of mileage, but quite a bit of it was on dirt roads. The camp site is beautiful - rolling hills, on a small pond that the boys could fish in, and everything.

AJ's game was good! They lost by 1 point (I think - maybe two??) The other team was very tough, and when we scrimmaged against them earlier in the year, they destroyed us. We were very happy to come close to tying them. AJ knew several of the boys from playing with them at U-Prep. Our team played really well together. It was about 95 degrees at game time, and probably 10 degrees hotter on the artificial turf. All the 'good seats" (i.e. in the shade) were taken, so I sat in the sun for two hours. Hot! Not as hot as the boys, but still hot!

The BBQ was fun. The host family had a pool, and the boys started stripping as they walked into the back yard, and just fell into the pool. I don't think their pool was as large as ours (hard to tell - it was beautiful, with an irregular shape) but it was hard to count the boys in the pool, there was so much splashing and dunking going on. I think there were somewhere around 13 boys in the pool, counting the team and siblings. Tell me, do they ever outgrow 'Marco,Polo'? They played that for a good half hour last night! The host family BBQ'ed hamburgers and hot dogs, with a lot of fresh fruit and lemon aid and ice tea. Yum! The coach also had a little presentation for the boys. We had to leave, so we only heard the presentation for the first couple of boys. He had 'nicknames' for each of the boys - depending on the styled, etc. of the boy. He called AJ 'the thief' for his ability to 'steal' the ball, and goals, from the other team. He also had a collage of photos made for each boy that is just too cool. They had one 'team photo' picture, one 'team photo' of the boys goofing off together, and a couple of action shots of the boys. I'll try to scan it later.

About 8:00, AJ and I left the party (which was up north of Shasta Lake City, by the way, almost as far as you can get from scout camp) and drove to the house and picked up 'stuff' he forgot to take camping in the first place, and then out to camp. Ralph had taken AJ out in the morning, and, since it was a dirt road, let him drive! When we hit the gravel road, I asked AJ if he was up to driving, and of course, he wanted to. Driving is still scary, but I think he is a little more willing to go get his permit now. It was scary, but it was also fun!

One problem with Ralph taking AJ out in the morning, and then letting AJ drive in - I didn't know the way in to the camp. AJ was focusing on driving, and missed the last turn in to the camp. It was pretty dark by the time we got out there and....you guessed it, we got lost. The turn in to the camp was about a 10th of a mile before the road forked. AJ knew we were close, and when we hit the fork, wasn't sure which way we went. He didn't remember a fork in the road. We took the right first, as it looked a little better travelled. Not far up, AJ was doing the 'this doesn't look familiar' routine, so he turned around. we went back and took the left fork. Not far up, it forked again.

We pondered for a while, and AJ knew he didn't remember two forks, so it must have been the other way, so...we turned around and went back to the right fork. We travelled a bit further on it, and ran out of road. Back we go to the left fork. At the next fork, we took the right turn. Not far up it, the road got a bit nasty for driving, and I knew Ralph hadn't taken the Camry down this way! Back we go again. I am now driving because AJ didn't want to be doing all these turns in the dark . Back to the second fork, taking the left turn this time. We got up to the top of a hill, and ran out of road again. Alex got out this time, and climbed around to see if he could see camp lights or something, Yippee! He didn't see the lights, but he could hear talking! We were close. He wandered down the hill a bit, and saw the lights of camp. "Okay Mom, it is over here, and I saw a road just down this way, so we can just drive down from here". I turned around (again) and headed toward camp. The 'road' that he saw was actually the lake, We probably could have driven down to camp from there - a lot of grassy meadows, etc. but I didn't want to go four wheeling at 9:30 at night! We turned around (again) and headed back out past the original form in the road, and found the correct turn off to camp. Finally!

To add insult to injury, the adult leaders thought I was lost! I told them I knew exactly where I was, I just didn't know where they were. I could have found my way home from anywhere in the whole trip. I wasn't confused or lost - we just couldn't find them!! They insisted on riding back with me to the 'main gravel road" (about a half mile from camp), 'just to make sure' I didn't get lost going home. AJ has ruined my reputation!