The 2012 Pinewood Derby

by HouseBoy

Evan participated in the Cub Scouts 2012 Pinewood Derby race. It's probably the Cub Scouts biggest event of the year other than our campout... it generates a whole lot of excitement with the boys and their parents.
Pack 3060 (New Delhi) had about 33 entries this year... seven from Evan's Webelos 1 Den. A couple of US Marines from the Embassy agreed to help out by officiating over the launch of each four-car heat. Evan's green "Random Bus" is in lane 3 in the photo below:

These races have become pretty sophisticated.  Each car has an official weigh-in and measurement. The cars must be no more than five ounces, and no longer than seven inches. HouseBoy was a part of the "pit crew" this year, helping the boys with last minute weight adjustments and wheel/axle repairs. Power tools, hot glue gun, tweezers, and graphite powder for lubrication - we had it all! The track is timed and monitored via sensors and a laptop connection. Software automatically tracks the heat, den and the overall winners by both speed and time.

Evan's car was named the "Random Bus." It was his own design. Aside from a little help with sanding, he did it all... design, painting and decals. We had some speed issues last year, but I guess we learned from our lack of success. This year Evan's derby car burnt up the track!.













He placed first in his Webleos 1 Den competition (1st out of his seven) and 2nd in the overall "Grand Finals" competition (second out of 33 cars). Pretty amazing.

 Great Job Evan!

2012 AES Science Fair

Evan and Audrey both came up with some pretty cool projects for the 2012 Mary Kelley Science Fair Projects.  This year the fair had almost 200 participants from the AES elementary school. It's not a mandatory thing, so I'm glad the kids were both excited to participate.
Evan and his best friend, Dylan wanted to try creating a maglev train - not an easy thing to do. They conducted research on magnetism, and the properties of magnets and discovered that many ordinary, everyday tools use magnets to function. With the help of a local carpenter, and design ideas from the Internet, we created a track-base out of wood.

I went on a journey to the huge electronics market in Old Delhi to find a shop that sells magnets.  I discovered three stalls there (market opposite the Red Fort) that sell nothing but magnets -all shapes and sizes! The magnets (small, very powerful ones) were about ten cents each. The boys used these to make our track for the "hover" train.

The boys worked on building their own "car" out of Lego pieces, and put together a fact-filled information display. Great job, boys!
Audrey chose to dive into a lesser known discovery made by Charles Darwin - the properties of Phototropism. For those not in the know - this is how plants grow toward a source of light.

With just a little guidance from mom and dad, Audrey conducted the research in the Internet, and developed her own display board. Both experiments received great comments and reactions from fellow students, teachers and parents. It was fun to work with the kids on their exhibits - I learned more about these two subjects than ever before!
HouseBoy is glad both projects were a success...and are now just more happy memories of our lives here in India.

Athletics

Evan participated in this year's ES Track and Field Event... seemed to enjoy his events: Long Jump, shot-put and the 200 meter run. The kids trained for about six weeks and then competed by grade level.

Audrey continues with her horse skills 2 times per week at the Delhi riding club. Lesa rides with her now for most of the sessions and seems to enjoy the mother-daughter time, despite the occasional fall. Evan and I enjoy the rides as well, we get to relax, read and drink a cup of chai with Ms. Beeru, the club's proprietor.

Last week, the kids started up again on the ES swim team at the American Embassy School. The are both drilling a few day a week after school on four strokes:  freestyle, backstroke, butterfly, and breast. Evan's favorite is the breast - he has one of the top three times for this stroke...

Audrey definitely prefers, freestyle, and is the second fastest on the team.

Archery!

by HouseBoy

Evan had a second chance to learn more about archery with the Cub Scouts this month. Delhi's Pack 3060 organized an Archery Training session at the US Embassy for our four dens.

Safety training, and archery techniques were reviewed and coached by two Scout-certified "Range masters." We also had the assistance of three embassy US Marines. The marines were on hand to provide range safety and archery tips for the boys.
Evan's group showed incredible improvement over last year's session. He and his fellow scouts demonstrated good technique and consistently hit their targets with accuracy.

Because the boys have grown stronger and taller, they were able to draw back their bows with greater ease and confidence. As a result, Evan and his den-mates spent a lot more time concentrating on targeting and stance.

By the end of the morning, the archery targets looked like swiss cheese! It was a great way for us to spend a cool, Springtime morning in New Delhi.