So I've been debating for awhile now on whether or not to start my own sports blog. For those of you that don't know - and most likely if you don't know, then you don't know me well - I watch sports, sport shows, sports talk shows, sports news shows, etc. everyday almost all day. I have one of the ESPN channels on at my house nearly 24 hours a day - currently ESPN2 with Sports Nation is on in the background. We have two TVs in our family room so that we can watch multiple sporting events. I am a coach, I was an athlete, and I will always be an avid fan of sports. And I'm not just talking about the major sports - football, basketball, baseball, and hockey. I will watch just about any sport that is on. I get mad for the 2 days in July after the MLB all-star game when there are no sports on. I love sports, its that simple.
I have been told that I am as knowledgeable as most Sports Center anchors. I have been told I should be a bookie because I can call a game with the best of them - btw, my dad is the one who told be to be a bookie. I have lots of opinions about sports, sports media, and the business behind most sports. I am comfortable talking with just about anyone willing to listen if the topic is sports. And sometimes there's no one to listen to me rant and rave about whatever sports topic is on my mind and so I thought maybe a blog would be the way to go.
So anyway, I'm just curious to know what other people think of this idea. I'm pretty sure I'm going to do it, but I'd like to know what you think!
Monday, March 28, 2011
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
The Most Amazing 8 years of my life
In June of 2003 I went back to my old high school for an interview to become the Dive coach for one of the most renowned High School Swim/Dive programs in the country. And believe it or not they gave me the job. Here we are 8 years later and its time to say goodbye.In those eight years I have gotten married and had three amazing kids, two of them practically on deck ;) As my own family grew, I also became reconnected with a family I had nearly forgotten about. To be part of the Pioneer Swimming and diving team is to become part of their family. And its not just when you are on the team, coach the team, or have a child on the team, its forever. I can't believe that I had forgotten just what a wonderful family it is, but I know that I won't ever forget again.
I was fortunate to have wonderful athletes and even better coaches along side of me. I was able to be part of 2 National Championship teams, numerous State Championships, 1 State Champion Diver, 2 MISCA Coach of the Year awards, and 4 All-American divers. I also was extremely grateful for the wonderful support from outstanding parents of both divers and swimmers.
I know my coaching career will go on, but I doubt I will ever be a part of a team as special as Ann Arbor Pioneer!
Monday, March 14, 2011
Tag Team Parenting
So its been nearly a month since my last post/update....needless to say, its been a little busy around here!
I have often referred to our parenting style as "tag team". What I mean by this is that most of the time I have the kids during the day while Chris works and then Chris comes home from work and takes over in the evening/night while I go to coach. It has been this way pretty much since Jake was born. Well, for the past month it seemed like we went to a whole new level of tag team parenting. Over the past 3 weeks or so it has been one of us has had to leave town leaving the other home with all of the kids and then switching. I was out of town two weekends in a row with Chris gone on business before, after, and in between. It has been insane, but somehow we have all managed to survive and the boys have decided its fun to have mom gone because that means more games with dad! And Rylan just seems to go with flow, she's just happy to have her mom or dad there to make her smile and carry her around :-)
As busy as it has been, there really isn't a lot to report. The boys are ready for winter to be over so they can play outside more, Rylan is getting a lot better at crawling and would really like to walk, Chris has been working tons, and I have been a coaching machine - pretty boring stuff. We do have some fun stuff coming up soon though. I have finished up my high school season so since I have more free time we have signed the boys up for swim lessons again for this month and soccer next month. I'm planning to manage AACC again this summer and will soon be busy trying to prepare the pool and staff for the summer. We are still planning to try to move late summer/early fall so we'll start trying to prepare the house to put on the market. Chris will always be busy with work and traveling. And Rylan seems insistent on growing like a weed and moving as much as possible ;) Some fun stuff for sure!
I have often referred to our parenting style as "tag team". What I mean by this is that most of the time I have the kids during the day while Chris works and then Chris comes home from work and takes over in the evening/night while I go to coach. It has been this way pretty much since Jake was born. Well, for the past month it seemed like we went to a whole new level of tag team parenting. Over the past 3 weeks or so it has been one of us has had to leave town leaving the other home with all of the kids and then switching. I was out of town two weekends in a row with Chris gone on business before, after, and in between. It has been insane, but somehow we have all managed to survive and the boys have decided its fun to have mom gone because that means more games with dad! And Rylan just seems to go with flow, she's just happy to have her mom or dad there to make her smile and carry her around :-)
As busy as it has been, there really isn't a lot to report. The boys are ready for winter to be over so they can play outside more, Rylan is getting a lot better at crawling and would really like to walk, Chris has been working tons, and I have been a coaching machine - pretty boring stuff. We do have some fun stuff coming up soon though. I have finished up my high school season so since I have more free time we have signed the boys up for swim lessons again for this month and soccer next month. I'm planning to manage AACC again this summer and will soon be busy trying to prepare the pool and staff for the summer. We are still planning to try to move late summer/early fall so we'll start trying to prepare the house to put on the market. Chris will always be busy with work and traveling. And Rylan seems insistent on growing like a weed and moving as much as possible ;) Some fun stuff for sure!
Friday, February 18, 2011
Fun with hair dryers, Valentines day, and 6 months old
Last weekend the boys got a little silly after their bath. Sometimes when they're good I let them use my hair dryer after bath time and on this night I let them go crazy and make some spikey hair dos. We had a lot of fun and even got a great video - unfortunately Brenden pulled his pants down at the end so I'm not going to post it. Here are a few pictures from all of the fun:
Valentine's day was a couple of days later. We're pretty low key around here, with three kids its nice to take it easy on some of these "holidays". The boys took Transformer valentines to their classes that their Uncle Chris had bought them. They came home from school with lots of valentines from their friends and of course some candy. Chris and I gave the boys a card and a box of chocolates to share. Rylan got a card and some new valentines pajamas. Chris and I exchanged cards and gifts as well and Chris made me a wonderful dinner complete with wine:-) We had a lovely evening and I think Rylan is going to be a wine lover like her mom ;)
And lastly, Rylan is now 6 months old! I can't believe how fast the time has gone. She's doing great, we'll have her 6 month check up and shots on the 28th to she how she's doing in the stat department, I still think she's on the long and skinny side. She's still doing really well with eating "solids". She seems to LOVE broccoli, she chows it every time I give it to her. She's also done with nursing, but we have around 30 6oz frozen pouches of breastmilk so I can continue to give her a bottle a day for about a month more. I am very happy that I was able to nurse all three of my kids, but I am SO happy to be done. I don't know how some women go a full year or even more, my sanity can only take the 6 months :-)
6 months old!
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Crawling and More Baby Food
Sometimes when I look at the title of my posts I realize just how boring my life must seem to anyone reading this ;-) Oh well, we enjoy our craziness and all the small milestones.
Anyway, so my mom was in town for about a week and was a huge help watching the kids so I could have a break and get a little extra coaching in while Chris was out of town. While she was watching Rylan there was a lot of practice with crawling. Chris has also been doing this when I coach in the evenings. And lately you can tell that Rylan really wants to figure this out and be on the move like her brothers. She has been able to get up on all fours by herself, but then she's just sort of stuck. She rocks back and forth and then eventually face plants in an attempt to move forward. Its kind of funny to watch until she starts crying, but even then its a little funny;) I know you all must think I'm a terrible mom for saying such a thing, but really its part of the learning process - you fall, pick yourself up, and then try to find the bright side and you can hopefully laugh about it one day. So back to the crawling part, on Sunday she was really trying to figure it out and Chris was down on the living room floor trying to help her out. And what ya know? She did figure it out. She crawled! Hands and legs moving together for a few shuffles. I was of course in the kitchen, but when I came over to see she did it again! She was only able to go a foot or two until she eventually face planted. And she then proceeded to use her head to move - see, the laughing helped - she realized she wasn't hurt and could use her head with her legs to move around as well. Jake also used the head and leg method for quite awhile before mastering the legs and arms together. Rylan spent about an hour Monday morning trying it some more. It'll still probably be another few weeks at least before she's quickly moving about, but she's definitely figured it out and is ready to practice so she can scramble around like a mad woman with her brothers.
In my last post I had mentioned that I tried some cereal with Rylan. Well, this week we've been trying a few more things. So far she has tried apples, pears, oatmeal, rice cereal, sweet potatoes, avocado, carrots, and cauliflower. She's doing pretty good, I'm trying to feed her twice a day, at lunch and dinner. It's been interesting to see what she likes and doesn't like, so far she has liked everything except the avocado. And the things she likes best she's actually trying to grab the spoon and feed herself.
I'm trying this time around to make some of my own baby food. My sister-in-law was kind enough to lend me her Beaba. The machine makes it so easy to do, it steams and purees the food. I always felt like with the boys there wasn't a lot of variety in the ready made foods so being able to make some of my own food I will hopefully be able to have more variety. And I'm hoping Rylan won't be as picky when she gets a bit older - fingers crossed! On Monday I made apples, pears, carrot/cauliflower mix, broccoli/potato mix, and carrots. I was able to freeze about half of it and the rest we've been trying out this week. She seems to like it just as much, if not more, than the ready made jars. Its definitely nice to be trying some new things and I really enjoyed making it.
Anyway, so my mom was in town for about a week and was a huge help watching the kids so I could have a break and get a little extra coaching in while Chris was out of town. While she was watching Rylan there was a lot of practice with crawling. Chris has also been doing this when I coach in the evenings. And lately you can tell that Rylan really wants to figure this out and be on the move like her brothers. She has been able to get up on all fours by herself, but then she's just sort of stuck. She rocks back and forth and then eventually face plants in an attempt to move forward. Its kind of funny to watch until she starts crying, but even then its a little funny;) I know you all must think I'm a terrible mom for saying such a thing, but really its part of the learning process - you fall, pick yourself up, and then try to find the bright side and you can hopefully laugh about it one day. So back to the crawling part, on Sunday she was really trying to figure it out and Chris was down on the living room floor trying to help her out. And what ya know? She did figure it out. She crawled! Hands and legs moving together for a few shuffles. I was of course in the kitchen, but when I came over to see she did it again! She was only able to go a foot or two until she eventually face planted. And she then proceeded to use her head to move - see, the laughing helped - she realized she wasn't hurt and could use her head with her legs to move around as well. Jake also used the head and leg method for quite awhile before mastering the legs and arms together. Rylan spent about an hour Monday morning trying it some more. It'll still probably be another few weeks at least before she's quickly moving about, but she's definitely figured it out and is ready to practice so she can scramble around like a mad woman with her brothers.
In my last post I had mentioned that I tried some cereal with Rylan. Well, this week we've been trying a few more things. So far she has tried apples, pears, oatmeal, rice cereal, sweet potatoes, avocado, carrots, and cauliflower. She's doing pretty good, I'm trying to feed her twice a day, at lunch and dinner. It's been interesting to see what she likes and doesn't like, so far she has liked everything except the avocado. And the things she likes best she's actually trying to grab the spoon and feed herself.
I'm trying this time around to make some of my own baby food. My sister-in-law was kind enough to lend me her Beaba. The machine makes it so easy to do, it steams and purees the food. I always felt like with the boys there wasn't a lot of variety in the ready made foods so being able to make some of my own food I will hopefully be able to have more variety. And I'm hoping Rylan won't be as picky when she gets a bit older - fingers crossed! On Monday I made apples, pears, carrot/cauliflower mix, broccoli/potato mix, and carrots. I was able to freeze about half of it and the rest we've been trying out this week. She seems to like it just as much, if not more, than the ready made jars. Its definitely nice to be trying some new things and I really enjoyed making it.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Snow Storm 2011 and oatmeal
Well the storm came and went. We did get a lot of snow, but closer to 6-8 inches and the "blizzard" conditions only lasted through the night, they thought they would go all day today as well. It has been snowing all day, but nothing too crazy, maybe an additional 2-3 inches.
Pictures from the backyard during the night:
The vanishing dump truck:
Dump truck at 10pm
11pm
The vanishing dump truck:
Dump truck at 10pm
11pm
9am
12pm
Jake was gone from 11:30 - 4:30 today playing at friends houses and sledding in the neighborhood. Brenden spent the day hanging out at the house and playing with his birthday presents. I took a nap thanks to Chris. And Chris spent the morning helping get all of the toys put together. We were fortunate that one of our neighbors plowed our drive way so we didn't have to shovel - big thanks!
I also decided today to have Rylan try cereal for the first time. She's almost 6 months old so pretty soon we'll be giving her cereal, veggies, and fruit everyday. Today after I fed her at 1:30p she still seemed a little hungry so I made her some baby oatmeal to try. She did great! I mixed about 2 tbsp with 1 ounce of breastmilk and she ate about half. She didn't make any weird faces or try to spit it out. She did get upset toward the end, but I think it was because she was full and that was her way of telling me. Hopefully she'll be this easy with all of her meals, probably not realistic, but one can hope:-)
I also decided today to have Rylan try cereal for the first time. She's almost 6 months old so pretty soon we'll be giving her cereal, veggies, and fruit everyday. Today after I fed her at 1:30p she still seemed a little hungry so I made her some baby oatmeal to try. She did great! I mixed about 2 tbsp with 1 ounce of breastmilk and she ate about half. She didn't make any weird faces or try to spit it out. She did get upset toward the end, but I think it was because she was full and that was her way of telling me. Hopefully she'll be this easy with all of her meals, probably not realistic, but one can hope:-)
Oatmeal face
Silly Brenden
My littlest man is 4!
I can't believe its been 4 years since my littlest man was born! Brenden is 4! Although sometimes it seems as though he's getting younger since we treat him like he's Jake's age and he thinks he's the same age as Jake. It can be pretty funny trying to explain to him that he is not as old as Jake and it will be a couple of years before he's old enough for whatever it is he thinks he should be able to do. More than one argument have been started because of this...
Anyway, Brenden had a very nice birthday. Brenden has had a hard time waiting for his birthday because Jake's birthday is just 9 days before. He gets very frustrated that he has to wait and in the past we've even given him an early present, but this year we wanted to break that habit. So everyday from Jake's birthday until his birthday, Brenden would wake up and ask if it was his birthday and when I would tell him no then he would ask how many more days. 9 days of this...at least it helped with counting backwards!
Brenden did luck out and get some early presents. My mom came into town on Friday night to see the boys for their birthdays and to help me because Chris would be leaving town for a few days. So on Saturday when she came over she wanted to give Jake a belated birthday present and also gave Brenden an early one. Also, my Aunt dropped off my mom and she had presents for both the boys birthdays. And then on Sunday my dad came over and took Brenden and Jake over to his house for lunch and presents like he did for Jake's birthday. So you can see that Brenden made out pretty good from my parents before it was even his birthday!
Also, on Sunday Brenden and I made chocolate chip and M & M cookies for him to take into school on Monday since he doesn't go to school on Tuesdays. The cookies turned out great and Brenden was a big help, he added almost all of the ingredients and was very eager to test the dough throughout the process:-) His class ate all of the cookies and sang Happy Birthday to him, he said it was a lot of fun.
For Brenden's actual birthday on Tuesday we had a very nice day. We started the day with chocolate chip pancakes and presents right after. He quickly ripped through all of his presents and was happy with all of them. For lunch, he went with my mom to get her nails done and they both went to McDonald's afterwards. He told me he got to have a chocolate milk shake - yummy! We did cake before dinner because I needed to pick up Chris from the airport at dinner time and didn't want him to have cake after we got back - there's no way he would have gone to sleep if he ate cake after 7pm ;) The cake was a hit and while I was picking up Chris, Uncle Chris came over with MORE presents.
Presents!!!!
The Cake
Chris and I were able to make it back from the airport before it was time for bed. I left two presents for the the boys for Chris to give them. So when we got home Chris gave Brenden a set of Legos and both boys Mario Cart and steering wheels for the wii, they were both thrilled! It was a really nice day and I'm especially happy that Chris was able to beat the storm and see Brenden on his birthday. And today when I asked Brenden what his favorite part of his birthday he told me it was all of his family - sweetest thing I've ever heard!
All in all, it was a great birthday! Happy Birthday B!
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