Last Soccer Game

Sorry for the delay in posting. I have been a bit under the weather for the past 2 weeks, plus we have had a lot of baby shower stuff going on! Last night was the kids final soccer game of the season. I must say, this has been a great program for the kids. It was a great way to introduce team sports to them. Abbey and Brady really enjoyed the program. Brady scored a goal last week during one of his games. He was so excited.

Brady and Katie Sue were on the same team and both of them have improved dramatically from the first game of the season. They had an excellent coach that really worked with them on the skills of the game. Their team was really good too. There were several "superstars" on the team. However, there is one little boy who was bound and determined to get a goal last night, so each time the ball got close to the goal he would run into the pack and pick up the ball with his hands and move it to right in front of the goal and then kick it in. Brady was highly offended with the fact that someone on his team was "cheating." There is another little boy who is an absolute brute! He didn't care if you were on his team or not, he would knock down anyone who was anywhere in the same vicinity of the ball. It got to the point where the coaches would have to sit him down because he would hurt too many kids. Brady learned very quickly to stay away from the pack when this little boy was on the field.

Abbey, I think may have finally found her "calling." She has been begging to play soccer for several years now and I just couldn't bring myself to put her in a sport that is so physical. But she finally talked me into it, and I am so glad we did this. Abbey really surprised me. She was put on the team of 2nd and 3rd grade girls. She of course was the smallest on the team, but she did get the nickname from all the parents on the sideline of "Animal Abbey." She was really aggressive (in a non-hurtful way).

At her level they actual play positions. Although her coach was a dud and didn't really teach them much about the game, there was a father of one of the girls on the team who would help coach the team every once in a while and he really worked with them on the skills. Abbey played forward most of the season. And like I said she was always in the pack fighting for the ball. She had no fear of the other girls/team. She also figured out when the ball was close to her teams goalie, if she hung out near mid field she would be able to get the ball when it would get kicked away and she could take it most of the way down the field and pass to a team mate who was stronger at kicking into the goal. The last couple of games of the season though she has been playing defender and she really did well in that position too. Goalie is hard for her, but when she is a defender, man she charges the ball coming towards her goal and gives it a boot out of there. Sunday night they will have an awards ceremony for all the players and everyone will get a trophy. Like I said this program has been a great start for my kids and they have already said they can't wait for it to start back up next year.

Girls Night Out!

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Last night a bunch of us from church got together for a PBGNO (Primitive Baptist Girls Night Out). We had a great time! We all met up at my house and from there caravaned to a local pizza joint in downtown. Then we headed over to watch the community theater production of "Anne of Green Gables, the Musical." It was so cute and had some really catchy songs. We are going to have to find the soundtrack. And FYI, this is the longest running musical in Canadian History! All in all it was a spectacular evening with good friends. We are looking forward to making this a regular event and hope many more can join us!

I'm too young to be old!

Okay, I've been getting some flack for not having posted in a while. What can I say, school is as tough on the Mom as it is on the kids. Now that I have two kids in school...that's twice as much homework, plus you got to throw in that this is our first year for FCAT testing which increases Abbey's homework load an additional 30-40%. And frankly, posting would take away from my Parking Wars and virtual cat on Facebook! Why oh Why did I get addicted to that thing! Oh yeah and did I mention how my body just all of the sudden is falling apart! Who'da thunk that at the young ole age of ... well lets just say very early 30's, that one's body could cause so much pain! Somehow I have managed to sleep on my neck wrong twice in the last month. Once on one side where I couldn't turn to my left and now on the other side where I can't turn to the right. Makes for some scary driving! I mean, come on, you would think after 30 something years I would know how to sleep correctly!

Now for a few random stories. On Saturday we attended the funeral of my Great Aunt Hannah Mae. The viewing was at the funeral home in Tampa at 9am and the services started at 10am. Well, for those of you who don't know us all that well, we are a bit punctually challenged! Matthew more so than Me. So me being the smarty pants that I am, told Matthew the funeral started at 9am and that way if we were a few minutes late (to the viewing) it would be no big deal. Well, my plan backfired and he found out about 10 minutes before we were supposed to leave that it was in fact just the viewing and not the funeral itself that started at 9. So therefore, he naturally kicks it into tortoise mode and we end up not leaving for Tampa until 8:30. So long story a little less long, we made a few wrong turns and had to make several U-turns in order to find our way to the funeral home. When we finally arrive, we pulled into an empty parking lot. So naturally I thought "oh man, I must have gotten the time wrong." So as we're driving around the big empty parking lot, finally one of the funeral directors points us in the right direction of the parking line for the procession and low and behold not only are we the first in line, but we beat all of my family that morning. My parents operate on Miller-tary Time (for those of you who don't know, Miller is my maiden name). My Mom has every clock/watch in their home set for about 15 minutes fast. Their motto is "To be early is to be on time; to be on time is to be late; and to be late is to be left behind." So as you can see by the documented photo, Matthew went around the rest of the day making sure everyone knew that he was not only on-time to the services, but that he beat my parents. Now, I know what you must be thinking..."who carries a camera with them to a funeral?" Well, in my defense, it was still in my purse after the Kindergarten Teddy Bear Picnic the day before.

Brady and his best friend Angel eating their picnic lunch! (notice their bear ears)

The kid in the green shirt is the boy in Brady's class that was suspended

from KG less than 4 weeks into the school year!

"Grandma, Curb!"

I know many of you are remembering the many lives lost 7 years ago this day, and as much as I don't want to take away from that...I do want to remember somebody we lost 10 years ago today. My Grandmother, Helen Boyer. This was my mom's mom. She passed away very suddenly and unexpectedly, yet she has left me with so many happy memories that I just wanted to share with everyone!

My grandparents lived just about 5 minutes away from us for all of my childhood years. I can remember going over to their house after school, just to visit. She always had an entire cabinet full of the "good stuff." I don't even remember how this got started, but we would tell Grandma "I have a headache" and she would always direct us to the "goodie cabinet" for some pills. The pills were the little rolls of smarties candies. My grandmother also stocked her freezer full of my favorite treat which was icey o.j.'s. She would freeze cups of orange juice, and it wasn't just any orange juice...it was Tropicana orange juice, which was a luxury item in my house growing up. To this day, I will occasionally pour a cup of oj and stick it in the freezer, for a treat later on. My grandmother also would buy us a book each time she was out and about. My favorite series was Sweet Valley High...oh the memories are flooding back. I think Kimberly always got a Nancy Drew book, plus we always had a new Archie Comic Book to read. I still see those at the checkout counter at Publix and smile at the silly "jokes" that I learned from those books. O.k. O.k. here's one:

Jughead: Hey Arch, look at those bunches of cows.
Archie: No, herd
Jughead: Heard of what?
Archie: herd of cows.
Jughead: Sure, I've heard of cows.
Archie: NO! A cow herd.
Jughead: What do I care what a cow heard? I don't have any secrets from a cow!

Oh, come on people! That is great humor! To this day, whenever one of the kids says "hey look at those bunches of cows" I start in on the joke...I know Matthew has heard me say it enough times so he will usually say the parts with me. I knew there was a reason I loved that man! O.k. so I've digressed.

Another memory from my childhood with my Grandmother (and Grandfather too) was at their Lake House in Lake Wales. It was the coolest place. It was mainly dirt roads through this subdivision, but we would walk up to "Buck's Bayou" the local general store to buy us a bucket-o-bait. Then we would head back to Grandmas house to sit on the dock and catch fish! Now I don't think my sisters were quite the fishergal that I was...I could literally sit out there dawn to dusk, baitin' my hooks with those slimy little suckers and catching me some speck fish. Then, I'd take my catch in the house where Grandma would clean it up and fry up some of that goodness!

My Grandmother was also quite the funny lady. She had the best laugh in the world and would always have the most sincere laugh at all of our jokes (even the not-so-funny ones). One day Grandma was either picking us up from school or taking us to school and as she was driving through the car line, she hit the curb. She didn't just bump the curb, she drove up onto the curb and probably sent a few pedestrian flying for cover (ok maybe that is a little bit of an exaggeration), but anyways, I believe it might have been me that said: "uhhh Grandma? Curb!" From then on, all we'd say is "curb Grandma" whether we were anywhere near one or not and we would all just bust out laughing! Another funny story that I will always remember about Grandma, is known as the "Designated Driver" story. My Grandma was 99% of the time the designated driver when they would go out with friends since she didn't drink much. So this one particular time they were coming out of a restaurant and some of the people she was with had a few too many drinks and were acting a bit inebriated. So my grandmother started to "make fun" of them by showing them how they were acting...in the process she tripped/fell over a parking curb and broke her arm. We were so worried about her, but all she did was roar with laughter over the irony of it all. It was then we decided to keep her away from curbs of all kinds!

I know this has been a long post, and I appreciate all of you who read it even though you didn't know my grandma. She was a special lady who is sorely missed. I am thankful that my Mom shares so many of her wonderful qualities. And even though my kids never had the chance to know Grandma Boyer, they get to experience similar memories through my Mom.

Grandma, we love you and miss you. Thank you for the many years of special memories. There are so many more that would take years to write about!

Happy Memories

My dear friend from high school came in to town last week with her beautiful little girls and her wonderfully sweet husband. These two little girls are gorgeous. The two year can carry on an adult conversation and use words that I don't even know. And her one year old is practically putting puzzles together by herself. We had such a great time, I just hope we didn't wear her and the family out.

The kids started soccer the week before last but I am a bit delayed in getting the pictures up here. They had their first soccer game on Thursday night and it was definitely a hoot to watch. Especially since they only had 2 practices before the first game! Brady and Katie Sue are on a team together and I think the two of them spent more time talking, hugging and staring off in to space than they did actually kicking the ball. I think Brady's strategy is: "maybe if I go out of bounds, I won't get kicked!" So as you can imagine, there was a lot of "coaxing" from the coaches and parents to get him "in the game"!

Abbey on the other hand did pretty well considering she has never played soccer before and her coach hasn't even taught them the rules of the game!?! She almost scored a goal, I was so excited for her! Now since she is in the 3rd grade this year, she is playing on a team of 2nd and 3rd graders. I was a little concerned at first about her maybe not being able to "keep up," but she really held her own. Thankfully, the team is made up of a lot of newbies to soccer, so although the sizes of the girls vary greatly, the talent is all about the same (or should I say the lack there of :-P). That unfortunately doesn't bode well in the scoring area! But the point is, she had a blast! On the way home from the field she said "so Mom, which team won?" That's the nice thing about this league, there is little focus on winning and losing and just getting the kids out there to have a good time!

Oh yeah, and I almost forgot. The Saturday before Labor Day, the kids got invited to a roller skating party! This was a first for them. They both have roller skates, but they are the kind you wear with shoes that don't slide very well...plus we have a paver drive way that is really difficult to skate on since it is so bumpy. Well, Brady and Abbey got out there wobbly feet and all and had a blast. They did roller skating limbo, roller dancing and a lot of falling, but as Brady says: "It's okay if you fall down, everybody falls down." Even Matthew and I got out there on the skates...I think the grownups were having just as much fun as the kids. I know it brought back a lot of childhood memories of me...wearing a leotard that was a bit too small, and old stockings of Mom's that had runs in them, and perfecting our figure 8's!

Thanks again Nicole and Family for taking the time to come visit us! We had a great time and miss you guys already!

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Happy Labor Day!

Just wanted to wish everyone a very happy Labor Day. My good friend from Boston is flying in this morning with her husband and 2 little girls. They will be staying with us until Friday, so I won't be on the computer much.

I am asking all of our readers to please put out a special prayer for all of those on the Louisianna Coast that are suffering through this hurricane. We all know how Florida (and specifically Polk County, where we live) was the bulls eye for 3 storms in a 6 week period of time in 2004, and all though none of the storms were the strength of Gustav, we (Polk County) suffered greatly. This area has been hit with it's second major storm in three years. Pray*Pray*Pray!

White House Here We Come!

As I sit here in front of the computer wondering why I haven't gotten up to change the station from the DNC, twitching at the sound of Hilary Clinton's voice, I open up my email to find this link from my sister Kelly!

We have a big joke in our family about whenever we go out together, Matthew always runs into someone he knows. I often tell him, I feel like a politicians wife. I am very thankful that Matthew has built up such a highly respected business image. But Matthew can be quite the "chatty cathy" and there are some days when I just want to "go in to the store real quick" in my "Mom" clothes and not run into someone I have to make polite chit chat with. I need to work on my Trophy Wife qualities!

All I have to say is "YOU GOT MY VOTE, BABE!