It Was Great

What a great weekend! I mean it was great. We were just the right amount of busy. We watched games. We played games. It only rained once and not for very long. 

For the last two years, I spent the holiday weekend alone. It was a gift from Tim. He took the kids to his parents' cottage to give me a little break, a little alone time. It was so nice. But this year, JT had a baseball tournament and Tim's parents were out of town. So we were all home together. I was slightly bummed to be missing out on a weekend of day drinking and bingewatching TV and doing a lot of nothing. But it turns out being together was exactly what I needed. 

I think it's what we all needed.

"I think we have the best family," Wade told Tim when we walked back from a family basketball game. "Well, second best."

"Who is the first?," Tim asked with a surprised smile.

"Well, God and Jesus," Wade said matter of factly.  

I feel pretty good about two things--our second place ranking and that Wade thinks about God and Jesus at all (we have totally slacked on taking the youngest child to church!).

The only problem now is that none of us want to go back to school or work and we just want it to be summer vacation!  It was a great weekend.

Morning meeting on Saturday to talk about family rankings and all the fun we were going to have over the long weekend.

The world kind of exploded with green in the past week and a half. And we love it. 

Tim is one of the coaches on JT's team.  

A lot of baseball this weekend. It was fun to watch.

JT plays hard and yup, gets very, very dirty. Lol.
Love the shades right?!

What a goofball. He's the bat boy for JT's team.

Friday night at the court. JT was at a friend's house so we subbed with a neighbor kid. 

My dad came to town for a night and gave Wade a run for his money on the basketball court.

Baseball Games, Recitals, Work Stuff, Oh My!--The Busiest Time Of Year

Last week Tim and I took a deep breath and said "we can do this" while looking at each other with frightened eyes. We were preparing for one of the hardest times of year....the last two months of school. Otherwise known as the busiest, craziest time of year where everyone has an event, a party, a game, a play, a recital, a dinner thing, work events, fundraisers, practices, final exams, track meets, softball games, baseball and baseball and more baseball. Ahhhhhh!

It's a fun time of year but holy shit so busy. Trying to be everywhere and get four kids where they need to be is a challenge. Are we up for it? Not sure. Will we do our best? You better believe it.

JT's baseball season kicked off with a few (ahem, five!) scrimmages over the weekend. I saw part of one (because I was running Lucy to softball and working on work stuff that had deadlines and you know, all the stuff!) and he looked so happy.  

That's the thing, it may be hectic but I feel so grateful that my kids are active and healthy and happy. They just may be a little late to a few practices, games and events because well, there are so many! 

We can do this! And then it's summer and I cannot wait. Woot! Woot!

I took a few pics with my fancy-ish camera at the part of the scrimmage I was able to make it to. Check it out:

The younger sibs hanging in the dug out. 

Baseball And My Fancy Camera

I am enjoying my fancy new camera and starting to learn how to use it better.  Every week I'm going to post some pictures of some of my favorite things and title it "Using My Fancy New Camera."

Here are a few shots of JT on the pitcher's mound a couple weeks ago doing what he loves so to do.   

Opening Day

It was opening day for the Youngblood boys this past weekend.  The day they look forward to all year, the day outdoor baseball begins.

All three of them had games this weekend.  There were 10 games in all.  There were victories and defeats and lots of pitching and catching and diving plays and pickles and smiles and high fives and "you'll get it next time"s. The boys loved it.

Wade is the official bat boy for JT's team
and he loves it so much. 

Opening day is a time to celebrate for most of the family. While I am happy for my boys, I don't feel quite the same way.  Opening day seems to shine a light on all my inadequacies and shortcomings as a mother/person.  

I imagine going to 10 baseball games in one weekend with three different children and three different teams while trying to make sure your fourth child who isn''t so crazy about baseball doesn't feel ignored and your two dogs don't tear up the house wouldn't seem like a big deal to an organized, totally together, well-balanced mother.  But I am none of those things.  I am the running late, forget the forms, always behind on the laundry, wishing she could be at everyone's everything, over sensitive, defensive, but trying hard mother.  

It's not just baseball...it's football season, basketball season, holidays and other hectic times of the year.  When I had babies and toddlers I didn't really picture what it would all look like when they got involved with sports and extra curricular activities.  I had no idea how busy it would all be.

There are some mother/people that thrive with schedules and family time management and I bow down to them. I am in awe of them and hope they remind me of practice times and color coordinate maps to the tournament for everyone on the team.  I appreciate all the help I can get. One mother/friend on one of the teams gave me a calendar for Christmas to help me plan better and I thought it was so great (I have yet to use it for family planning however).

I laugh about it, but it bugs me.  I mean what's wrong with me?  Why can't I get my shit together? The more frazzled I get about all of it, the more I seem to screw things up.  I was running late to the game yesterday morning and feeling guilty. And THEN I took a wrong turn to a place I've been going to for years, I dropped a new tablet and the screen shattered and I ran over a basketball.  And then I cried.  I worry that I'm getting worse as I get older and that I'm totally screwing up my kids.

Someone asked me how I did it all, how did I get everyone everywhere they needed to be and I laughed my head off.  "Not well," I replied.

Last night after all the games had been played, we sat down to eat dinner together. Tim and I were almost falling asleep at the table, but the kids were still giddy and excited about the weekend. They were laughing and telling stories about their games. Lucy was chiming in with what she saw on the playgrounds and in the bleachers. 

They laughed about me running over the basketball with my minivan and even how mad I got about the shattered screen until I embarrassingly realized I was the one that had shattered it. I was worried that they were going to be scarred by my ineptitude at organization or my scattered way-of-life, but that wasn't the story they told.  At least not yet anyway.  

JT's team won the tournament and they got trophies.
Wade can't believe he got a trophy for being bat boy and he is haaaaaappppy.

What Color Is Your Summer?

The last day of school happened last week.  Since the moment the kids stepped off the bus, we have been all full gear, pedal to the medal, all about summertime.  No looking back, baby.  

My kids are a little older, we know what we are doing with this whole summer break thing.  We know there isn't a minute to spare when it comes to summer fun.  Get out the chalk, make the lemonade, swing, run, swim, soak up the sun, jump rope, bike, lay in the tall grass, explore, watch the clouds, smell the air, chase the ice cream truck, find a hammock, do nothing, do everything. Go! Go! Go!

When the kids were little we used to make summer books full of drawings, journal entries and pictures.  I got the old books out to inspire the kids and so they could remember what printed pictures looked like.  We laughed at their baby faces and smiled remembering the trips we took and adventures we had.

Hard to believe my seventh grader spelled awesome like this "asem" just a few short years ago.

Looking through these books inspired me
to print out pictures again.
There's something about looking through photo albums!

Even though we've been at this summer break a few years and know we want to do everything, I wanted to be intentional about our summer planning.  I asked the kids to name two things on their "must do this summer if at all possible" list.  I modeled my questions on the book What Color Is Your Parachute that I used after I graduated from college to find out what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.  Remember that book?  I still have my copy from 1996.  Did you know a new copy is reissued every year?  But the core questions remain: What? Where? How?  What do you most love to do?  Where do you most love to do it?  How do you find such a job and persuade those employers to hire you?  

The kids list included going to the sand dunes on Lake Michigan, going to a Detroit Tigers game, going on a road trip to see cousins down south and family baseball games in the backyard.  We can totally handle all the what's, where's and how's of their summer dreams.


The color of our summer is going to be bright and green and blue and shiny and happy.  
What color is your summer going to be?

Exploring.

Kicking.

Slipping and sliding with all of our might.

Supporting.

Going for it.

Looking in the eye.

Hitting hard.

Sharing joy and excitement.

Reading and reading and reading.

Riding and riding and riding.