Long needed update

Let's see, what has happened in our lifes in the last few months.

1. Mason turned 13 on June 29th, yes I officially have a teen. YIKES! We went to Fiesta Texas and rode all the roller coasters to celebrate. The teenage attitude shows an appearance more than I would like. It is a wonder I can function on a daily basis with how much I really don't know. It is a good thing I have Mason around to let me know everything.
2. Brad turned 46. I can't believe I am married to someone that is 46. He has a new love, his mustang. He has also started teaching a class two nights a week with his union through HCC.

3. Baseball ended for Tanner. No more Combat. Tanner hit his first real over the fence homerun! He ended up hitting two during games and several at practice. This picture shows his second one coming off the bat.


4. School started. I have an 8th grader and a 6th grader. I began my 20th year of teaching. I still really love it.


5. Mason started and ended his football season. He was the C team starting quarterback. He is waiting for puberty to hit and finally have a growing spurt, so he can compete with some of the boys at school. It is amazing the size difference in one grade level of boys. Some of them are men and some of them are still boys.
6. Basketball season has started for Mason. He made the 8th grade team and they have their first scrimmage tomorrow.

7. Kyle came home and lived with us for a couple of months, during his break from school. He turned 22. Nothing much has changed there. He still has no job, no car, and no money. He might be joining the Air Force. Which makes Brad very excited.

8. Tanner joined a new baseball team. Hopefully, no more "Daddy ball". This is with a paid coach. They have their first practice today. We took the fall off and he is ready to begin playing again.

9. I went to my first and hopefully my last baby funeral. My school secretary lost her sweet grandbaby to SIDS. This was one of the worst experiences in my life. I can't wrap my head around how someone can survive losing a child.

10. Tanner is thriving in Jr. High. He was my "Tanner the Terror" when he was under 5. I was so worried he wouldn't do well in school. He struggled a bit in first grade, then was diagnosed ADHD. He did fine in elementary school, but it looks like Jr. High is his place. He is taking all pre-AP classes, except math and he has made all A's and one B the last two six weeks. His confidence in himself is really growing. He even got nominated from one of his teacher's to be a KJH star. On another note, he has lost two pencil bags and a few other things. Staying organized is not his strength. I told him I was going to velcro his clothes and his supplies and just stick everything to him each day.

11. Tanner began confirmation at church. It is exciting to see him grow in his faith. He asked to be baptized in February. He has a very sweet spiritual side. He went on a church retreat a couple of weeks ago. This was his first time to go away for an entire weekend. I really missed him and had trouble sleeping that weekend. I think he had fun, but he said the food was bad and he had trouble sleeping too.

The next couple of months will be busy. We have the following things coming up.

1. Thanksgiving at my moms. This will be our first holiday without Cole. I pray my mom does okay. Hopefully with all of us there, she will be too busy to dwell on it.

2. I turn 42. I am sure Brad is thinking the same thing about me. When did his wife turn old? At least I am not going to be a grandma anytime soon. My sister's 19 year old will be a father in about a month. After the initial shock, Susan is excited. I just can't get over her being a grandma. It makes me laugh. I am excited to meet baby Elizabeth Grace.

3. Christmas

4. Sports - Basketball with both boys. Baseball for Tanner, and Mason is looking for a baseball team to join.

All in all our life is surely not boring. We have been blessed and I pray we continue to be.

Tanner Turns 11

May 26th was Tanner's 11th birthday. He wanted a cookie cake and he wanted to take a piece to lunch with him. Therefore, we sang happy birthday and ate cookie cake for breakfast. Not a bad way to start a day if I say so myself. After school I took him to the movies and then we had pizza for dinner. He wanted a cell phone and since he is going into Jr. High we got him one. He is so excited.

Ten years ago I took the other picture. I went back and read in a journal I kept and read a little about what Tanner was like when he was one. He just started to walk. I remember he was either extremely happy with a big grin on his face or the other extreme throwing his body down and crying. His moods could change in a blink of an eye. Not much has changed. He is a pretty easy going kid. He isn't the kind of kid that always wants something new, he is usually content with doing whatever he is doing at the time.

A while back I wrote about Tanner crying at school. I asked the teacher's to please email me if he cried, so I could know what was going on. I got two emails the remainder of the school year. I think they were blowing things out of proportion a little. I worried and worried over this and have finally come to the conclusion that it will work itself out. Tanner is just sensitive. As he gets older he will learn how to handle his emotions a little better. Being a sensitive guy is going to be a good thing when he gets older and has a wife to care for. During baseball he still gets upset when he strikes out or feels he made a mistake, but he is quick to recover and doesn't let it interfere with the rest of the game. I think he is going to be just fine.

2 days until Christmas

I am amazed Christmas is almost here. I haven't posted much lately, because really nothing too exciting has been going on. Work, school, turned 41, etc.... Did I say turned 41, how the hell did I get so old? Just seems like yesterday I was 21.

In the last month this is what has happened with the boys:

Mason made the basketball team for KJH, they had two games and won both.

Tanner had a baseball tournament and has begun basketball practice with Katy Youth Basketball.

See nothing too exciting. I finally got our Christmas pictures taken last night. It is a record for me. I have never waited so long. Bad news is this means no Christmas cards will be sent this year. Today my plan is to go to the grocery store, bake, clean, and go see a friend that is in the hospital.

Brad is off this week. I am not used to him being home with me during my break. This has thrown me off a bit. He goes back to work on Monday. The boys are anxiously awaiting Christmas. I am anxiously awaiting it to be over. Just joking, I love Christmas. Merry Christmas to all!!

emotional basket cases

It has been a real long time since I posted anything. Football finally wrapped up a couple of weeks ago. Mason's team ended up doing pretty good finishing 3rd in the district. I think their end of the season record was 6 -1-1. He ended up loving football and is really looking forward to next year. He played quarterback on the c team and scored at least 4 touchdowns during the season. He kept wanting me to record him throwing the ball, but I never had the camera running when he did. It is hard to anticipate when the play is a throwing play and when it isn't.

Mason tried out for basketball last week. He said there were about 100 kids trying out for about 30 spots. He made the b team. He was very excited about that. Right now he is in fear of one of the coaches and isn't too happy about that. He has complained about this coach since football season started. He says all he does is yell and he can't stand him. He is scared of him. The last couple of days Mason has been home "sick". Monday I got a call from the nurse saying he threw up at school. He stayed home Tuesday and then this morning I got a call from the nurse saying he was sick. I went and picked him up and finally determined he isn't really sick. He is scared of the mean coach at practice. They are having to run the width of the gym 6 times in 30 seconds. He says he can barely make it in 30 seconds and they have moved the time down to 25 seconds. He was crying and yelling saying he couldn't do it and the coach is going to kill him. He will have to stay after practice and do it over and over until he gets it done. He doesn't want to be punished by this man. I brought him back up to school and told him to deal with it. I don't really know how to handle this. Why coaches have to be so mean sometimes I really don't understand. I know part of it is okay, but there is a line that I think some of them cross. What worries me is if Mason can't handle it, I don't know how Tanner will ever handle it.

I had Tanner's parent teacher conference and his teachers told me they are concerned because he cries a lot in class. He will be in Jr. High next year and they don't want him to be teased. Tan has complained all year about his teacher and how he doesn't like her. He says she yells all the time and he thinks she is stressed out. I couldn't get him out of bed one day because he was crying and saying he didn't want to go to school. This has never happened. He wasn't even the crying, clingy type of baby when I dropped him off at daycare.

Why are my boys so sensitive? I know I have always been sensitive, but I don't remember it interfering with my school or sports. How do you teach your kids not to let one person ruin things for them?

Fall Ball

Fall baseball has begun for both Mason and Tanner's teams. Mason played a couple of weeks ago with his new team. They played in an elite tournament and his team is a select team. We got beat all three games, but overall I think the boys didn't look too bad. This past weekend they played two games on Sunday in the open league. They won both games. I think Mason is happy he decided to change teams and is playing 13U.
Tanner's team was moved from the select level to the elite level this fall. They played their first elite tournament this weekend. Tanner got ejected from the game. His first ejection, and hopefully his last. He was running home to tie the game up and tried to run through the catcher. Apparently you are only allowed to do that in the pros. He was very upset, but I think he has learned from it. His big brother was very proud of him and wanted to know if he broke the kids arm. I don't know what I am going to do with him. We lost that game, but won all the others and ended up the champions of the tournament.

Tanner started playing baseball with the local pony league because his tournament team isn't playing or practicing much this fall. We went to the first practice and I realized we had made a big mistake. He was the oldest kid on the team. None of these kids have ever played kid pitch baseball. They were calling Tanner the "Little League Professional" by the end of practice. His coach came up to me and said he didn't really know what he could teach him. Not a real good sign. He played his first and last game with the Rangers yesterday. It was painful to watch. I didn't realize Tanner would be so much more advanced. I figured he would at least be on a team with kids that had played kid pitch before. Tanner threw the ball from short stop to first base and the first base mans glove flew off when Tanner threw the ball to him. Tanner was very frustrated, so we decided to hang up our hat. It was supposed to be fun and Tanner was getting upset with these boys that couldn't help that they didn't have the experience he has.
Mason played his second Jr. high football game. It was really kind of comical. The O line couldn't block to save their lives. Mason is playing quarterback and that isn't really good for him. They didn't get a first down the entire game. We did win because the defense intercepted a ball. Mason said the coach changed the whole offensive line, so hopefully they will do better tomorrow.

Jr. High Football

The first picture is before the game. Notice his number. He picked number 12 for Colt McCoy. His favorite football player. The bottom picture is the first play of the game. Mason is behind number 24 getting ready to throw the football.

Today was Mason's very first Jr. high football game. I don't know who was more nervous, me or him. Mason is starting quarter back for the C team. We played a bunch of kids and friends from when I taught at Williams and we all sat together. When we went to sit down we looked at each other and asked if we should sit together or not. We decided we could sit together until high school football. That is when the real rivalry begins. LOL

I am so proud of Mason. He did such a good job. He passed the ball at least 5 times and the receivers did great and caught them. The first quarter we had the ball the entire time, but didn't score. We only have 7 minute quarters. The second half they had it for about half the time and then we had it and we were about on the 20 when time expired. The third quarter started and we held them again and had just gotten the ball back when it began to thunder and lightning, so they delayed the game. They ended up calling the game. We were very disappointed. The boys did great! I am looking forward for next Monday.

Back to School

We started school on Monday. Mason is beginning the 7th grade and Tanner is the top dog being a 5th grader this year. We went to Safari Night at the KJH to get Mason's schedule and locker set up the Wednesday before school started. When we got Mason's schedule we immediately went to try his locker. We tried and tried and couldn't get it open. That left us carrying around all his supplies as we went around to his classes. We began comparing schedules with his friends and I noticed he was missing a class. They hadn't assigned him a reading class. Mason was really excited about this. Unfortunately, I had to burst his bubble and let the counselor know. He had to go to school on the first day with all his supplies, saxophone, football helmet, cleats, and lunchbox. He was a bit nervous and unsure about what to do with an incomplete schedule, no working locker, and having his first day of Jr. high football practice. It all worked out in the end and he said he had fun at practice.

Tanner ended up getting a teacher Mason had in 5th grade and we really didn't like. Mason still talks about her and blames his struggles in math last year on her. He says she didn't teach them anything and would just yell at them. I am hoping Tanner has a better year with her. I think he already has 5th grade fever. Everyday this week I have asked him how school was and he has replied he hates it. You know school sucks. He didn't end up with any of his friends in his class either. Yesterday he came home a little excited. He is finally a safety patrol. It is official, he got his vest yesterday. He was bubbling with excitement because he got to get a kid in trouble. I think he is going to end up being a cop. He likes busting people. I hope having all this power doesn't go to his head.