Saturday, June 13, 2015

It's Great to be 8!

Our S turned eight last month and was baptized today!  


* Still says a few of his own words, such as "tooken" instead of taken.  I will be sad when those disappear completely.

* Loves math.  It's still his favorite subject, but he did a seminar on archaeology last fall and I think that was his favorite one last year.  

* Finally learned to trust himself riding his bike a few weeks ago and he adores it.  Sometimes, I have to double-check he's made it home from school because he heads straight to the garage for his bike.

* Still loves his cars.  We have so many Matchbox cars, it's embarrassing, but I've tried to pare down the collection, and he knows them all!  

* He loves real cars, too.  Sometimes, he'll make a chart with makes of cars and sit in our front window and mark which cars drive by.  C made him a version on the computer, so now he takes it when we drive places and keeps track of which cars we see.  Future statistician?

* Had a long term sub in his second grade class because his teacher had a baby, and he adored her.  It was so cute.  He even got up the courage to invite Mrs. Ryerson to his baptism.

* Actually asks if he can help weed.  He really likes helping in the yard and hearing about the different plants and how they grow.  I still miss having him around in the spring to help me during the day.  

* Is very precise.  He has a set routine for jobs/getting ready for school and has it timed to the minute.  Now that he has his own watch, he times everything.

* He still loves geography, too.  When he's angry, he'll start naming all the countries in South America, then North America, and on and on until he calms down.  Once, he got halfway through Asia before he was himself again.  Nothing gets him out of a serious funk faster than me intentionally misnaming a country.  :)

Saturday, June 6, 2015

Soccer

The end of spring soccer at last!  I don't know why the spring season seems to drag, but there it is.

S was not on board with it this time around.  He resisted going to practices and even for games, he said the only thing he liked about it was the snack at the end. :)  He improved dramatically this year, though.  He is so short still and some of those other kids are fast and tall and intimidating, but by the last game, he wasn't so afraid to run at the ball and actually take it from the other boys sometimes.  I was proud of him.  He did great at defense and liked being goalie a lot.  He said it was so he didn't have to run so much.  :)

(I couldn't find a picture of him playing, but here he is with pink eye and the pen he got at the dr's office!)

J just devoured it all.  He loves everything about soccer:  being on a team and making new friends, working hard and pushing his skills to new levels, running, competing, studying strategy.  When he plays, he gives it everything he has.  I love that about him.  He worked SO HARD this year, and his team had a rough spring season.  After winning nearly every game in the fall, they lost every game in the spring - by a lot.  J is so fast, he did a great job taking the ball down the field and passing to teammates so they could score.  He probably assisted in 80-90% of their goals.

But he really wanted to score.  He tried and tried and came close so many times.  Then their final game, everything came together.  The boys were all there, and they all played together.  Their defense was tough (finally!) and they scored 2 goals pretty quickly.  Then, with only 2-3 minutes left in the game, J got the ball and moved right down the middle, kicked it hard and arced it right over the goalie's head.  It was the perfect goal.  I might have cried.  He was so happy.  We didn't record it because G's battery died, but you know what?  I'm glad I was just watching and not worrying about a screen because now his moment of triumph is emblazoned in my memory.


I can't believe I just wrote a whole post about soccer.  Me!  The things motherhood makes you do.  :)