Are You Ready for Some Football???

We're sports loving family and football season is underway. Flag football, that is...

I have a crush on the coach!

Nice handoff!

Last Saturday was our first game. After the first few plays, the quarterback runs off the field and says, "Mom, I'm scared. I don't want those boys to touch me." To which mom in all her gentleness replies, "Get back out there son! Your team needs you! And stop throwing the ball away! Wait until your man is open! Now, let me see a mean face... Meaner... Okay, GO!" Not one of my best parenting moments, but that's where I was a the time.

I am not athletic, but I am competitive. Everything I do must be done to perfection. It is not enough to do my best, I must BE the best. Drew, on the other hand, is naturally strong and atheletic. He can throw the football dead on. He can catch the ball on the move, over his shoulder, with his fingertips. He can outrun all but one player on his team, but he'd rather jog.

In watching Drew play football, I've noticed some areas for development in his character (confidence, assertiveness, courage) and some in mine as well (which I'm sure you don't want to hear about). The good thing is that he isn't on his own to learn these things on the schoolyard and I'm not on my own, blissfully unaware of my faults. We're growing together.

And now for pics of my beautiful ballerina, who is every bit as competitive as her perfectionistic Mommy, and would take on the her brother's football team any day (and likely show them up).

The night before her first lesson, J and the kids were practicing football and he says, "When you run, dig your heels in and push against the ground." I'm like, "Um, honey, that's the opposite of what she's going to learn tomorrow."

Sure enough the next day Jazzy is clomping around the room while her prim and proper teacher says, "don't let me hear you... toe, heel... toe, heel..."

Won't be long before we trade those slippers in for shin guards...