Game # 2 - Flag Football

Well, my son had his second game on Thursday night. Either we had refs that didn't know the rules in the first game, or something....but we had new rules for this second game. Now we have four 8-minute quarters, and after a touchdown the team can get 1 point for running the ball in, or 2 points if they pass it in. I brought my camera, however my batteries lasted long enough to turn it on, then they decided to quit on me....serious bummer. On to the game:

We were on defense first, and on the first play their RB ran right up the middle untouched for a first down....I guess we were cuaght off guard. lol They go for the extra point, and we tackle them about the 1 yard line, but the official scorer gives them the extra point anyway! 7-0

We get the ball back and march down the field for a TD. # 5 got the TD this time, taking the handoff from my son. We get the extra point by going right up the middle. 7-7

We stop them on defense and take over at the 40 yard line. My son is at the RB position, he gets the handoff and runs around the end for a 40 yard touchdown. We miss the extra point on a double reverse....that was fun to watch, I'm not even sure our own team knew what we were doing. 7-13

The other team marches down and ties it on a 3 yard run. they get the extra point and go up 14-13.

It's the 4th quarter now and there is only about 2 minutes left, so a long drive with a TD should win it for us. So, my son hands off the to the RB who promptly runs it all the way for a TD....so much for burning the clock! we miss the extra point again, and the game is now 14-19 with about 1:30 left.

they take over and they are driving down the field, the get to about the 10 yard line and call a timeout with .08 seconds remaining....time for one play. This is nerve-racking Flag football at it's finest! The hand off and try to run around the end, and is forced out of bounds by one of our players....and time expired!

It's the first victory for our team! So far, the record is 1-0-1. With lots of smiles and happy kids.

A fun night out

Well, some things have got me down over the past few months, and luckily I have God, a great family and great kids that help me keep straight and help keep me happy.

About a month ago or so, a friend (John) emailed me that I hadn't talked to in a long time. We've gotten together a few times to watch TV, play some Playstation.....which I can totally kick his butt at, and we both have boys around the same age, so they play together. It's been a great time.

Last Friday we decided we wanted to go out and play some pool. So, we headed over to The Fox and the Hound and another friend (Jason) joined us. We soon found out that neither of us are pool sharks, but the food was good, and so was the company. We played for hours, just chatting about recent events and such. The highlight of the night? John backing up to sit in his chair and completely missing it and falling on the floor. I was laughing too hard to help him up, so someone at the table next to us asked him if he was okay. He lauged it off though and kept playing.

It was a great time, I hadn't laughed that hard in a very long time. We'll have to venture out for PN2 (pool night 2) sometime soon.

We are also in a Fantasy Football league together, and come week 5 I am going to steam roll his team....I'll write a nice recap about that one!

Tuesday Night Lights

Tuesday Night Lights



Tuesday was my son's first Football game. He has had several practices and scrimmages, but tonight was the real deal. He's in 1st grade, and this is his first year of Football. It's Flag football, although he desperately wanted to play tackle football....which he can't do until the 3rd grade.

He plays Quarterback and Running back on the offensive side of the ball, and Safety on the defense, and he wears # 3. In this first picture, he is getting the play from his Coach and then heading to the line of scrimmage.

The first play was a pass, a beautiful spiral that went about 10 yards, unfortunately the receiver only went about 5 yards....incomplete. The second play, he was the running back, and he took the handoff as you can see in the second picture:

He took the handoff and ran off the left tackle for a 45 yard touchdown run! He was excited, but rest assured their was no "sharpie" celebration, no "Hall of Fame Jacket" celebration, not even a Riverdance with his teammates. He just handed the ball to his coach, and headed back to his teammates, looking determined to help his team win. It was his first touchdown in a real game, I'm not sure how long he'll remember that first play, but I know that I'm going to remember it for a long time.

After a short time out and substitution, we started play back again. We kicked off (an 8 yard kick) and the other team had the ball for the first time.








So, next up was their first Defensive series. Let me remind you, he wanted to play tackle, not flag football. On the first play it was a handoff to the running back and he came around to the opposite side that my son was playing, so he followed him, the RB then turned around and got around the corner for a 20 yard gain until he was finally caught by one of my son's teammates.



The next play, he chased the kid out of bounds, and the kid "fell"...he promises he didn't touch him. lol



Then, on the next play the opposing team ran in for a Touchdown to tie the game at 6-6. They took over on the 35 yard line (it's an 80 yard field) and on the first play my son handed off to the RB and he took it to the house, which put us up 12-6 (no extra points in flag football). The other team tied the game on their next possession....as you can see, both teams struggle a little bit on defense.



The next possession my son hands off to the RB, and he runs about 15 yards. This kid is pretty good at cutting back and running right where the defense isn't. On the next play, my son faked the handoff and ran around the right side for a 25 yard TD. That put us up 18-12, with about 5 minutes left. The other team scored on their first play, to tie the game at 18-18. On our next series, we drove the ball all the way down to the 10 yard line with about 2 minutes remaining. We failed to get into the endzone this time, as one of our RB's was stopped at about the 5 yard line. The other team took over and was driving down the field. With about 5 seconds left, they snapped the ball and ran a reverse....totally faked out all of our kids, except one. He's #5, and I can't remember his name right now, but either he wasn't fooled by the reverse, or just didn't want to run to the other side of the field...lol. Either way, he was standing right there, waiting for the RB as he came his way. He grabbed his flag, which ended the game in a tie.



So, after a hard fought game, we ended up with a tie. The good thing is, no one went home with the feeling of losing their first ever football game. The whole team played great, and they really started to play better as the game went on. The offensive line started blocking, the defenders started playing their positions with a little more attention.

It was a great night for some football. Like I said earlier, I'm not sure how long he'll remember his first game, but Dad's never going to forget that first night under the lights.

And now...Dad is sick

Well, my 18 month old daughter had a respiratory virus over the weekend, so she had a trip to the doctor....which she didn't like. She had a runny nose and was sneezing along with a very mild fever. She never lost her appetite, but you could tell she didn't feel good just by the way she was acting. She's doing a little better now, and hopefully will be over it shortly. Then yesterday, about 2 in the afternoon...I start getting a runny nose, start sneezing and getting body aches. Looks like Daddy is coming down with the same thing. Oh well, I prefer to think of it as me taking the sickness away from her! I'd rather me have it anyway.

Trampoline fun!

Well, took my son and daughter over to my sisters house to play with their cousins. Their cousins also have a trampoline, which proves to much fun. My son is 6, and his two cousins are 7 and 10, and they have a ball on that thing. They'll ask me to jump them and send them flying in the air, it's a good time...not to mention a very cardiovascular workout! My daughter is only 18 months old, but she loves being on that thing. She wasn't feeling too well starting Friday afternoon. Had to take her to the Doctor and turns out she has a upper respiratory infection, which meant she had a runny nose and the sneezes all weekend! She wasn't feeling too well at all this morning, so after some medicine and a long nap, she saw everyone on the trampoline and wanted to go! So I got everyone off and put her on it. She doesn't jump, she just stands there and laughs. She'll sway back and forth some, and walk a little bit....she thinks it's hilarious. I'm sure as she gets older she'll jump, but right now she just has a ball being on it!

Football with the boy

Since my son starts Flag Football in a few weeks (as listed below), I've been playing in the backyard with him. He's fast and extremely competetive, so once I taught him about making people miss he's been quite hard to catch. I let him by me a few times to build up his confidence, and then after that he got by me twice with me giving my full effort.

Now, I know there aren't many passes in flag football...or even pee-wee football, but we did work on throwing the ball back and forth. He seemed to be afraid of the ball, because even though he would catch most of them, he would be turning his head away as the ball got there. I asked him why he was doing this and he finally admitted that the football is big and it would hurt if it hit him in the head. So I told him that he would be wearing a helmet when he played, so the ball couldn't get to his head. Unfortunately, I don't have a helmet that fits him, so we used a Catchers helmet and mask from his baseball supplies. Worked great! He stopped jerking his head around and was watching the ball all the way into his hands. Turns out he can throw pretty darn good as well. He has a competitive fire that drives him whenever he is playing a sport, and he'll keep at it until he gets it right.

It was a fun day, he was running little 5 yard curls and I would throw him the pass, he'd catch it and turn around heading for the "endzone"! Then he'd head back the other way and try to "Juke" his way around me....and many times he could. I'm so glad he loves playing sports, I'm even happier he enjoys doing it with me.

A regular conversation with my Son

That's my son, playing shortstop in the ever-competitive T-Ball league. That's me behind him, coaching our team. It's a scanned picture, so it's not the highest quality, but it's one of my favorites.

This is part two (or three…I lose track) of my “Daddy” posts as I just started calling them a few minutes ago. Kids never cease to amaze me, or even teach me things that I never saw coming. I started blogging a few months ago, and I found out that it’s an easy way to let some of my real feelings out. Being a man, it’s sometimes hard for me to express my real feelings or let them show, but while blogging you can hide behind the pen….or in this case, the keyboard….who writes with a pen anymore? Anyway, on to the latest:

Two Saturday’s ago it was just me and my 6 ½ year old son. So, I asked him what he wanted to do. Apparently, he saw a commercial for a new Shrek game on Playstation so he wanted to rent it and play it. So we headed out to the Movie Gallery and picked it up. It’s a one player game, so we mostly just sat together while he played, and I helped him through some of the hard parts. The game was fun, but that wasn’t what was important to me, it was our conversations. How many in-depth conversations have you had with your children? Not a Father-Son conversation, more like Friend-to-Friend conversation? It was the most fun and eye-opening moment I’ve had in a long time. He was talking to me about baseball, swimming, and many other subjects. He had a hard time finishing off one level, so I took over and ended up doing this really cool move (totally by accident) to defeat the level. He looked at me and said “Nice move Dude!” and then gave me a high five. I started laughing after that…first time he ever called me Dude….then he started laughing because I was. After a minute, he stopped laughing and he asked me why we were laughing….priceless.

He just finished up his third year of playing baseball, so I asked him to tell me what he thought about it, if he had fun, and why he likes playing. He told me it was fun, because he likes winning! He also told me it was fun because I was coaching and he liked being out there with me. I told him I wouldn’t always be his coach, because as he gets older and continues to play, he will have different coaches. He told me “It’s okay, I’m getting older now so I think I can handle it, but I want you there to watch me.” I told him I wouldn’t miss it for any reason…not one pitch, not one at-bat. I then asked him about Football, he is finally old enough to play and he will start in a few weeks. It’s a Flag football team, he isn’t old enough for a tackle league yet. He’s very excited about this, although he was a little confused about it at first. He asked me “so do we all just race for a flag, and whoever gets it scores a touchdown?” Again….priceless. So I then explained to him that instead of tackling each other, you have to pull a flag that hangs out from their waist. He thought about it for a minute and then said “then can I tackle him?” I told him that there would be no tackling this year, but if he liked it, he could play again next year and be old enough to be in a tackle league.

After that conversation was over we had a very in depth conversation of “Teen Titans vs. Shrek”. He’s a huge fan of Robin from Teen Titans and went into a very detailed description of how Robin, although smaller, could defeat Shrek. He has a very imaginative and creative mind, and it really showed through this story.

Sure, we spent many hours playing that game that day, and we of course defeated the Mighty Prince Charming. But the thing that made that day really special, was just the time we spent talking with each other, father to son, and friend to friend.

The Storm

My family is going through a rough patch right now, and I can feel just how easy it would be to lay down and let the situation take control of me. Many times in the past few weeks I've gotten very weak and started to slide. But each of those times, God was there for me. A family member calling, a friend calling, someone in my church family calling me, someone emailing me....things like that. I heard this song last week, and it really stuck with me. It's a song from Casting Crowns and it's called "Praise you in this storm"

I was sure by now,God, that You would have reached down
and wiped our
tears away,
stepped in and saved the day.
But once again, I say amen
and it's still raining
as the thunder rolls I barely hear You whisper
through the rain,
"I'm with you"
and as Your mercy falls
I raise
my
hands and praise
the God who gives and takes away.

And I'll
praise you in this storm
and I will lift my hands
for You are who
You
are
no matter where I am
and every tear I've cried
You hold
in your
hand
You never left my side
and though my heart is torn
I will
praise You in this storm

I remember when I stumbled in
the wind
You heard my cry to You
and raised me up again my
strength
is almost
gone how can I carry on
if I can't find You
and as the
thunder rolls
I barely hear You whisper through the rain
"I'm with you"
and as Your
mercy falls
I raise my hands and praise
the God who
gives and takes
away

And I'll praise you in this storm
and I
will lift my
hands
for You
are who You are
no matter where I am
and every
tear I've cried
You
hold in your hand
You never
left my side
and
though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this
storm

I lift
my eyes unto the hills
where does my help come
from?
My help comes from
the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth
I
lift my eyes unto the hills
where does my help come from?
My help comes
from the Lord, the maker of
heaven and earth

And I'll praise you in
this storm
and I will
lift my hands
for You
are who You are
no matter where I am
and
every tear I've cried
You
hold in
your hand
You never left my side
and though my heart is torn
I will
praise You in this storm

Meme: 8 things about me

Well, I was tagged by the people at newslimericks to post 8 things about me that no one knows.

Here we go...

1. I had long hair (very long) in High School.

2. I had gas one day in my Stats class at MSU. I thought it would be quiet, but it wasn't. Right afterward, I just gave a weird look to the person next to me, then everyone assumed it was him.....he was sleeping. Sorry man.

3. I used to work at U-Haul, and our initiation for new employees was to put them in an enclosed trailer and drive around the lot as fast as possible.

4. Head Cheese makes me gag. I used to work in a Deli, and if people would order it, I couldn't cut it. Nasty stuff.

5. I'm addicted to Fantasy Football. I have 10 leagues I am in. I will be starting an FFA class in the near future. (fantasy football anonymous)

6. My office is in a cave. No, I am not Batman.

7. My son wasn't watching where he was going at Silver Dollar City one day, and he ran into a cart. I then took a few minutes to teach him the importance of paying attention so he doesn't hurt himself or anyone else. I then promptly stood up, turned around and knocked over a guy walking the other way. You have to love Irony.

8. I can't get enough Peanut Butter. If it has Peanut Butter, I will eat it.

These are 8 things you may not have known about me.

Aim for the eyes!

So I have been having gunfights with the kids all weekend....oh, I should probably tell you they are waterguns. It's one of the boys birthday today, and one of his presents was a pack of waterguns. After being the superior athlete in our waterfights (don't mind the fact that I am bigger and older than them!) the kids banded together and found out a way that they could get to me. "Aim for the eyes" was the last thing I heard before everything went black. Yep, they figured out that if they hit me in the face, it was all over if they could just blind me.

Kudos to the kiddos for finding a way to to defeat me.

What a fun time, running around getting wet, laughing.....good stuff.