Grand Rapids Soccer Tournament

(Sorry, Blogger refuses paragraphs tonight!)

The girls' first game was at 9:30 this morning. They played a very good and FAST team from the Vardar-East soccer club. I still can't figure out what part of MI they were from. Anyway, we lost 0-3.

After the game the girls had a chance to walk around, watch some of the other teams etc... There were 16 teams just in our age group alone. A lot of the girls bought these soccer balls on an elastic rope that the tied around their waist. A great thing for eye/foot coordination. Madison couldn't leave hers alone. I told her to stop she wouldn't get worn out... still a full game to go. She told me "it's addicting, I just can't stop." Ha! Sounds like she'll use it a lot. They also got a little silly and made this pyramid...while the moms worried they would fall and hurt themselves... a silly sounding "soccer" injury.

The 3rd game was at noon against Alliance FC. They were the hosts of the tournament. We won 4-3 in a nail-bitter!!! The last 5 minutes took f-o-r-e-v-e-r because we were ahead and trying to defend. I'm sorry to be bragging all the time. Madison did a great job as captain, and gave good directions to her team on how to stall... and run the clock. Their coach isn't very verbal from the side lines so she did especially great without his directions I thought. The other team got multiple breaks from the refs. It was so tense that I got a bad headache afterwards... sometimes that happens to me. A let down of adrenaline I think.

They have some fancy way of scoring teams based on wins, goals scored, goals gave up etc... Out of 8 teams in our pool, we came in 2nd...and 3rd place out of 16 teams. The two 1st place teams in the two pools went to the championship game. We were really, really happy with that high of a place... especially for our first tournament like this. I honestly was afraid we would lose all 3 games so 2-1 was great!

We got home at 5:30 tonight. At bedtime tonight Madison asked me a question about church tomorrow. She had to pause and figure it out when I told her today was Sunday and that tomorrow was school! It did feel strange not to be in church on Sunday!

Last night she told me she couldn't wait for today to come... because "Number 1, I get to play soccer. Number 2, I get to buy a soccer ball (on the rope thing) and number 3, I get to play soccer!" She has a nice big bruise from an elbow she got in the upper arm and some sore feet but she went to bed smiling from ear to ear.

Whew!!! I didn't play even one minute, but I'm having sympathy fatigue for the girls myself!

Softball, Baseball, Soccer Tournament

Yesterday it was nearly 80 degrees but of course because it was Opening Day at the Little League fields, it was 45 with strong winds! It was FREEZING! What a cruel joke from mother nature! Madison had pictures at 8:15 and her first game at 9. Her team lost in the bottom of the last inning after they stole home after a ball got passed the catcher, 4-3. Bummer. Her team played pretty well for their first game though. Madison didn't have any errors while at 1st base and even caught a high pop fly. She struck out once and grounded out twice. Overall she played very well, considering the weather, lots more layers of clothing, the wind and her nerves. She was very nervous to bat against a fast pitcher.
Pictures, L to R:
Opening Ceremony and our friend Grant was the cub scout holding the flag.
Madison fouling a ball off.
Madison and Pakka on the field. Pakka was a base ump for 1 inning while Tony ran and got his pictures taken with Quinn's team.



Quinn's game was at noon. By now the heavy clouds were gone and every now and then the sun peaked out. It was still cold, but was better. Quinn's team scrimmaged for 3 innings. This was his first time to pitch and he did great! He said he wasn't nervous at all and really looked like he was having fun. Three different boys each pitched an inning. Quinn struck out 2 batters! He did so great! He also played 1st base. We were very proud of him. Nate pitched too and did a nice job as well.



After Quinn's game we traveled to Grand Rapids, MI to the Alliance FC Spring Invite soccer tournament. These were nice fields out in the middle of no where! The actual address was Lowell, MI but seriously, the closest town of Lowell was a 15 minute drive. This was the first tournament outside our league. I had no idea what to expect. Our U-11 girls played GREAT tonight! We played the Tri-City Strikers from Grand Haven, MI at 6pm and won 3-0. The girls were so excited. It was a great start to their tournament and a big confidence booster. Madison about took 2 girls out. Two of her kicks hit them so hard that they had to take a knee two different times (for an injured player, they take a knee). One of them was mostly drama and I caught Madison and a few close teammates trying not to snicker!


We had some starving girls to feed afterwards. We ate some wonderful Italian food afterwards. The girls got a little giddy. The pictures of Mariah D. and Kiley H. were taken by Madison.

Quinn and Grant were the only little brothers along for the weekend. They weren't quite sure what to do with all of these girls!

More weekend adventures to come!

Mid-Week

Last night we handed out all of the uniforms. Out of over 1000+ items ordered I only have a few things to fix yet (they sent a few pairs of wrong pants, some late shirts are coming). I would say that's pretty good.

The kids have had lots of practices lately and we are frankly all tired of practices...let the games begin! Softball/baseball starts on Saturday. Never in my life have I thought so much of Little League as this year. It's amazing that it takes year round work to pull off a season. I'm praying that Opening Day will all go very smoothly. Madison's team has never played a full game on Opening Day... usually just "exhibition games" on that day. She plays a full game at 9am. Say a prayer for her as she is still quite nervous when up to bat...ever since she got her tooth knocked out. She thinks she is going to play 1st base again and she's happy with that. Quinn plays an exhibition game at noon on Saturday. I've only been to one of his practices (since Tony is the coach) so I'm excited to see his team and how they do. Tony thinks they'll be pretty good.

I had a board meeting at church on Monday night, 6:30-9:30. We interviewed a person for our Outreach Pastor position. I think it went pretty well. We'll see...

Well, I've got 1 hour before I need to go do the pick-up from baseball/softball practice. I have a mountain of clean laundry that needs to be folded. I thought I would take 5 minutes out to say hello to all of you.

Love, Leah

U13 Flames game

Today was a busy day. Previously I spent 6-8 hours planning the worship service for this morning. It was a lot of work! I never imagined that it would take that much time! Anyway... the service was very nice I thought and it went smoothly....and I am glad it is over.

Right after church Madison and I picked up Holyn and took off for Fort Wayne. Madison agreed to be a substitute for Coach Todd's U13 team (girls 13 or under). This is a league two age levels up from the one she is used to... they play with 11 on the field (instead of 7) and on a MUCH bigger field.

This is the first season that these girls have played together... and most have never played club soccer. We actually scored the first goal and kept up really well until towards the end of the first half, we went into half-time 1-4. They got creamed in the second half and lost 1-9. Madison played probably 2/3 of the game which was more than we expected. She had fun... even against girls much bigger than her.

Quinn played this afternoon too. Tony said he was still more timid than usual but played better. They tied against the Jr. Irish, 1-1. I wish I could have been there too.

We got back into town about 5:30 and met Tony & Quinn at B&P's for homemade pizza and icecream for dessert. We got home about 8:30. It was a good but long day.

One question for you... Where in the world did this weekend go?!

Quinn's Quips

While taking a shower, Quinn said to me...

"Mom, I think that it's really good that we have central nervous systems and everything, but in a way, it might be better if we didn't have any nerves at all."

"Why do you say that?"

"Well, because if you cut your leg off, it wouldn't even hurt."

I tried to give him the mini-symposium about how pain is also a protective mechanism etc... but I think I lost him.

Flames, records both 0-1

Today kicked off the Spring soccer season for the Flames teams. Madison's U11 team played at 9am. They played pretty well... it was a better start than last year. They lost to the South Bend Invaders, 1-0. The only goal that got by was a ball that was wet with dew and it rolled right between our goalie's legs. Painful to watch. Poor thing. Madison told me that she encouraged Kiley to just laugh about it... they both knew that was an easy one that she normally would always have gotten. I was proud of her for encouraging her and not getting down on her.



Quinn's game followed at 11am. This is their coach's first season with this team. He is the high school boys soccer coach. He seems like a nice guy. Just have to figure out how to get 8 & 9 year olds functioning as a team, instead of teenagers! Quinn was quite nervous and didn't play his best. He was quite tentative which isn't his usual. He wasn't jumping into the action like usual... playing it "too safe" I think...trying to not make a mistake. First time jitters. He has only had 2 practices with this coach, so what can you expect? His team lost to the Goshen Stars, 1-4. One of his teammates accidentally scored on our own goal. Wrong place at the wrong time and your body is the thing that redirected it in. (Thankfully it wasn't Quinn though!). Madison has had that happen to her. It will be fun to watch this team change, grow and improve. They are playing U10 (under 10) and the "gold" division... which is harder than the division they played in last year.

Traveling Light

Heather stayed overnight on Friday night and will again Monday night. Her dad is working out of town right now and her mom works the night shift at the hospital. Jennifer walked her over after Heather "packed." This is what she brought! I had to laugh. Max Lucado's book, "Traveling Light" popped into my head. What a cutie. (No, Madison is not standing on her tip-toes).

Earthquake in Indiana

I'm sure most of you have heard that we had an earthquake this morning at 5:37am EST. I missed it by 8 minutes! My alarm went off at 5:45. Shucks. Madison however, felt it. She said she was up going to the bathroom at that time. I asked her what happened, she said she was sitting on the toilet and their toothbrushes started rattling in their holders and the water splashed her on the bottom. I laughed so hard! I asked her what she thought had happened... she said she was so tired, she really didn't think much about it, and went back to bed. Ha! How can you get splashed by cold water on the bottom and not wonder what happened? Anyway, her teacher was quite excited by the whole thing. She noticed it too. They went to a web site and registered what they were doing when it happened... and she made sure Madison registered her unique experience too. She'll have some interesting memories of her first (and hopefully last) earthquake! : )

Mid-week post... at the end of the week

Seriously, last night after I went to bed I thought, "Boy, I really should post a mid-week note to my blog soon"... viola' it is already Friday night. AND THEN... I got this harassing email from my Mom today at work telling me that Cheryl and Addi get all the information and BTW where have I been?!?!?!

Here are a few words to explain my week.

679 little league uniforms
8 different sports practices

6 hours of planning this Sunday's church service

3 major softball teams to organize

4 days of work for pay

*********************************************

Memories made... priceless.

(And I'm not implying that they are all good memories!)

First three soccer games of the season this weekend... watch for the ESPN Sports report.

The long road home

It took us 11 hours to get home. The kids traveled great. We got home at 10 tonight.

Interesting things we learned/saw while gone...

Matt & Lisa can drive past 41 (literally) signs for the Meramac Caverns and not notice one of them.

We saw buffalo, emu, long-horned cattle, a fox and coyote (ok, these last two were road kill) along the way...well, some of us saw them... one van did not.

Madison can some how find the accidental way to get her long hair caught in the cooler's running fan. We thought about leaving her little head plastered to the lid of the cooler for awhile... but Mom gave in and climbed into the back with her to cut her hair out.

We saw a crazy person riding their bike along the interstate (well, some of us saw it).

Madison and Dylan counted 31 Mustang cars while on the trip.

We already knew that Matt & Lisa were super great friends and so easy to get along with. We had a GREAT time traveling with you guys!

Cocoa had a successful week as well. She had her "fixed" surgery on Friday. Karla picked her up yesterday morning and had her waiting for us at home when we arrived. (Thanks Karla!). We were all happy to see her (OK, and Tigger too).

Our last day in Branson

We spent our morning playing ping-pong at the Activity Center


and pool too...

In the afternoon, the guys and kids threw in some more laser tag and went to see the movie, "Nim's Island" while Lisa and I did a little more shopping at the Tanger Outlets. We made a taco meal for supper and then it was back to the Activity Center for swimming and Euchre...



and then back to the condo for Jocker, cookies and icecream.



The week went really fast. We are getting ready to take home lots of good memories of Spring Break 2008.

Silver Dollar City

Today we went to Silver Dollar City. We've been watching the weather all week, trying to decide what day would be the best weather-day to go. It turned out to be beautiful, in the 70's and sunny so we were thankful for the right choice. We spent almost 7 hours here. The park usually has 20-30,000 per day. Today their count was 1,020. We basically had the park to ourselves. There was never a line and on most of the roller coasters, they let us stay on and keep riding and riding. At one time Tony and Brock were in the front car and Quinn and I were in the last car... with no one in between. Eventually 3 of us got tired out and Quinn was the only one on the whole ride! We definitely got our money's worth. We went to the Chinese Acrobat Show as well was the Irish Dancers. The kids weren't into the shows as much but tolerated them for the 30 minutes each. We went to Mazzio's Pizza for supper, then it was back to the condos for ice cream and warm cookies, swimming and euchre, melting into bed about 11:30. Tony hasn't worn his watch all week on purpose... not wanting to live by the time like we usually do. Hope your weeks are going well too.

Dixie Stampede

The Dixie Stampede has definitely been one of the biggest highlights of the trip. The kids loved it and is was especially fun because Matt and Lisa were chosen out of the audience to do some "barrel-racing." They told the guys to run to the horse that they wanted to ride. As soon as they got to the real horses, they had them stop and said "not those horses... THESE horses" and showed them the stick horses. They won the race! It was hilarious and fun! Brock was yelling at the top of his lungs... "That's my mom and dad and they are going to win!" It was so cute. They got medals to keep. We didn't know that we would be hanging out with such famous and talented people! : )

More of Dixie

Just a few more pictures of Dixie for you. We came back to the condos and some of the kids went swimming, some played video games and Lisa and I got smoked in Euchre by the guys. We are staying up late and sleeping in. Our sleep is going to be all off schedule but we sure are having a fun time!

Ripley's Believe it or Not

Lots of unusual things... they had hundreds and hundreds of these nail aprons with the company's name on it. We looked for Kalona Lumber but didn't find one. The kids enjoyed looking at all the unusual things. The picture in the top right hand corner is the vacuum cleaner designed for the Chitty-Chitty Bang Bang movie... a favorite in our house.

Catch Phrase

This morning Matt & Lisa went and sat through the Fairfield/Wyndam time share talk. We played Catch Phrase with the kids for an hour and then watched a movie. It's rainy and over cast today.

Highlights from Tuesday

Happy Birthday Karla! Hope you had a wonderful birthday in DC! I've never been on vacation on my birthday... I'm sure that puts a different spin on things.

Today Lisa and I went shopping to some of the outlet stores here. We found Crocs for the kids for $20 a pair. That was our biggest bargain. Guess what? I ran into Myrna who used to work at the CCC at GGH in the Croc Store. It really is a small world isn't it? It's so weird to run into people... 10 hours from home! I wonder who else is wandering around here from our area.

The guys took the kids to play laser tag while we shopped. They had fun and were all a buzz about their scores etc... That was the first time for our kids so they really enjoyed it. Lisa made us a sloppy joe dinner for supper and then we went to the Hamner-Barber magician/ventriloquist show. It was very funny. I don't know that it was the MUST SEE as was advertised to us but we all enjoyed it. Quinn was chosen out of the audience to receive one of two DVD's that they gave out. I think it was the 3rd-grade-arm-waving-with-the-correct-answer type of thing that sold him. He was quite delighted about that and stood in line after the show so that they could autograph it for him. We stopped at Sonic on the way home. It was a day with very few pictures taken. Cameras weren't allowed at the Hamner show and of course laser tag is in the dark so you'll just have to use your imagination today.

The weather was rainy and cool today...and looks like more of the same is predicted for the rest of the week. The kids have spent quite a bit of time at the activity center... swimming, playing basketball, ping-pong etc... They certainly haven't been bored.

Today (Wed) we are planning on going to Ripley's Believe it or Not and then our family of 4 is going to the Dixie Stampede tonight. Yahoo! More adventures to come...

Pirate's Cove Adventure Golf

(As usual, double click on pictures for a close-up look).

The afternoon was perfect for 18 rounds of putt-putt. This pirate's cove place was super neat. The flowers were gorgeous as were the water falls. I was laying in bed trying to go to sleep and I realized that I never even heard what my score was. Quinn was quite concerned for me... I'm sure he didn't want me to lose. Ha! There were several holes in one (not by me). You'll never believe this... we actually ran into one of the Ox Bow teachers and her family here at this Putt-Putt place. See... may be Branson really is a hot-spot for Spring Breakers. : )

We spent the rest of the evening hanging out at the condos... going on a walk, reading, watching the NCAA Championship game. We ate such a big late lunch that we really didn't need much more the rest of the whole day. The adults had dessert for supper (icecream and brownies)... hey, we can do that, we break rules for vacation! : )

Lambert's

We made it to Lambert's! We went at 2pm on a Monday and got right in! Are we clever or what? The food was delicious as advertised and the rolls melted in your mouth. The kids loved the rolls flying through the air. Most of the kids bought the big drink coolers as a souvenir. Madison chose the hat instead.

Wish you were here....

Fish Hatchery

We even managed to fit something educational into our trip. We went to the Fish Hatchery which is less than a mile from our resort. Highlights from this stop was seeing a 4 foot black snake when we went on a walk in the woods... enough to make Quinn declare that "I'm never coming to Missouri again!" (Cheryl, thought of you down here in the holler). Of course we saw lots of fish and the kids fed handful after handful of fish food. We stood and watched some fishermen fly fishing for awhile. The weather cannot be any more perfect.