Bike Ride and Egg Hunt

Scott had Will spend the night last night and they stayed up way too late playing Mindcraft.  I really have a love/hate relationship with sleepovers.  I loved going to friends homes and having them at mine to have sleepovers.  As a parent, I am mean for making them go to bed at a very late hour.  I am also doing our entire family a total disservice when I have tired kids the next day.  Scott has kinda been a pill lately.  He is a great kid but is entering the years that he just wants to be with friends and knows it all.  I know that this is just going to get worse as he enters pre-teen and teen years. Not looking forward to it.  Anway, I am glad he had fun but not so glad about his tiredness and moods today.

We went to the pool in the morning.  I thought I was coaching but it turns out I am subbing the next two Saturdays.  I sub for our gym very occasional Saturday morning practices for the year round team and masters team.  Usually 2-3 people show up so it is much different than what I am used.  Very low key but fun to see the kids an parents I used to coach. After convincing the older kids to leave the play center and play outside (it was like pulling teeth), they ended up having a great time and I couldn't get them to leave.  We eventually left and headed to Heather's to go on a bike ride.

Scott missed a 5 mile hike for Scouts and needs to do a 10 mile bike ride or 5 mile hike using a compass for navigation so we opted for a bike ride.  We picked up Paisley and went 5 miles to downtown Walnut Creek.  I love the Walnut Creek trails.  I miss them.  There are big trees, shade and I miss that.  I haven't been there in years to walk around and was so impressed on what a nice remodel they did.  The kids had a good time. The kids are learning bike etiquette on trails.  There are a lot of us, so we need to move over and get a single file line so other bikers can pass. The boys liked going in the dirt and off road.  They would look for mounds to jump and everyone had a good time.  We got a pound of sees candy (thank you sara for a great christmas present), walked around and then headed back to Heathers for an easter egg hunt and chinese food.  The kids had a great time on the easter egg hunt.  They each had to find a golden egg that was hard to find.  After we enjoyed being outside and enjoying time with cousins and my sister and jason.

I came home so tired, but wanted to chronicle the day before life gets too busy and I forget.  Time for bed!

Season 2

I start my season on Monday.  I am really excited!  I really do think it will be a great year.  It will be fun to coach with Aaron again.  We coached together at Valley Vista and his team lost his pool so he is going to come and coach with us.  He is a great coach and we have very similar coaching styles and philosophies.  Nikki is coming back who I love.  It is always a crazy first couple of days with the number of kids on the team but is going to be so much better than the beginning of last year when I had 280 kids who I had never coached or knew and trying to organize them into lanes, levels and learn names.

Getting organized before the season is always an adventure.  Everyone wants to make it the best year and improve everything that needs to be improved and sometimes it feels like decisions go in circles a couple of times before they become solidified but I think there is a great plan and just excited to get to coaching part of the job.

We had a training meeting with our swimmer coaches which went well.  Last year we threw together a spirit squad very last minute because we had a ton of brand new kids in our pre team and not enough bodies in the water.  It was so nice to be able to know the goal and set up of the program to be able to make a plan.  I think it is going to run so much smoother.

So tomorrow begins swim.  My kids are excited.  Blake asks everyday if swim starts today.  He really liked it last year which surprised me.  He is my one kid who doesn't get cold which is so nice.  Scott can't wait to be with his friends and have something to do everyday.  I don't think Tyler is going to swim much this year but I sign him up anyway.  He didn't swim much last year.  I think it becomes too hard with his heart but I figure even if he gets in to just do the drill set it helps him to feel like he is a part of the team or group.  He had a blast just playing soccer with the kids on the field last year so hopefully they will all hang out again on the grass this year.

Kira does gymnastics 3 days a week but after trying to figure out how to get blake to swim and kira to gym and all the driving, I decided for her to just take the spring off gymnastics.  That plan of course wasn't liked by her gymnastics coach who told me she would digress months and is doing so well, etc.  I get it, but I also realize that she is young and maybe this will be a good little break.  Well, we are still trying to figure out a plan to do both but i am not going to stress about it too much.  Last year I didn't take Blake and Kira to the pool in the spring because it was too hard to get them there and I didn't want it to interfere with me working.  I didn't think they really cared, but it would be fun for them to actually do a whole season and see if they like it.  It took Kira weeks into the summer to become comfortable but she says she actually wants to do it so we shall see.

So here goes another season!  I think it is going to be a great season!

Playing After Church

When we lived in the Northgate Ward everyone hung out and played after church on the grass.  It was the culture and always so fun to talk with friends and the kids to get wiggles out and hang out.  Our new ward doesn't do that.  Everyone just goes home right away which is probably the normal thing to do.  Well today we saw friends walking by the church on a walk.  We were on our way out and I of course loved catching up with the mom while the kids played with each other on the grass for over an hour. She has 3 kids, 2 boys Scott and Tyler's age, and a little girl Kira's age.  They were going to come to Dana Hills to swim but it didn't work with their other sports and decided to take a break from swim this season.  Tyler brought his massive yarn ball and they wrapped it all around the church about 3 times.  Totally fun at the time until they had to do the reverse and collect it.  Nevertheless, the kids didn't really remember each other from the couple interactions they had at swim meets but became friends after about 5 minutes and had a great time.  I am so grateful for the nice weather and beautiful area we live.  Tyler loves to finger knit and it is great therapy for him.  It keeps him distracted from pushing his siblings buttons.  He brings his giant ball of yarn to church.  Good times.

Bike Ride Adventure

Danny worked in the morning and at 2pm was ready to get out of the home with the kids but I had the van at work which is frustrating.  I should have taken another car.  I told him to go on a bike ride which he is always down for.  So apparently the kids rounded up some neighborhood kids and Danny took 9 kids to Krey to play around.  They all had a great time.  The kids came home to tell me how they were doing bike tag, made up some game and were trying jumps with the bikes.  On the way home they went through some mud.  It was the highlight of the day/afternoon.

My boys earlier this week went with friends to throw a boomerang they got.  They had a lot of fun and rounded up some neighborhood kids that lived along the ride.  Scott had a great time and wanted to have a friend over afterwards but instead the boys wanted to each go to their homes and play against each other on the X-Box.  Different homes but connected through video games which Scott isn't into.  He can do games for a little bit but thinks it gets boring after 20 minutes.  I think that is a great thing but am seeing more and more how frustrated he is that his friends are transitioning from being outside to just wanting to stay home and be on phones or video games. Hopefully someday the shift will go back to playing outside, getting off phones and playing and being kids in free time.  It concerns me how that is becoming less common for this generation.  I sound like an old, concerned person, but it really is sad to me.

Danny is so great at getting outside!  So grateful he is instilling that in our kids.  They have been playing on the trampoline a ton and in the court which is so nice.