Great day of soccer for the girls.  Wren’s team, the Fury, has taken all season to really come together, and they are really humming.  They surprised us all with energy we’d never seen before and a 3-1 win in the first game.  If you win, you keep playing, and the first half of the second game was still full steam ahead, with a 3-0 lead at the half.  But unfortunately the fields are all very sloped, and while playing uphill, we let the other team’s big shooter take too many long downhill shots to even up the game right at the end of the buzzer.  A 5 minute golden goal session was next (the first to score wins) – we won the right to play downhill but couldn’t pull off a score.    It was all nerves for everyone through a second 5 minute golden goal session – no score!  The girls kept up right to the end, but finally had to give up after a 4-3 penalty-kick shootout.

Reiley’s team played hard, keeping the ball on the other team’s half for most of the game.  They play their positions well, but the other team was playing mostly defensively and we couldn’t get through.  A couple fast breaks for them got them a 2-1 win.

It was a great season, the girls all improved individually and the teams really learned to work together.  Here’s to next year!

The girls had great games yesterday, even if they were losses.  Wren’s team played the best half they’ve ever played, full of energy, working together (there were even good passes!), getting a 4 to 1 lead, before they ran out of steam (with only one sub) and the lead slipped away (4-5 final).  Reiley’s team had to deal with an early score from the opponent, but then the offense and the forward defender kept the ball on the other side of the field the rest of the game.  Unfortunately, the other team went all-defense after their first score, and even with dozens of attempts we couldn’t get a hard shot past them (0-1 final).

Now that the girls are finishing up soon, I may be able to get to the adult games (which are also on Saturday mornings).  I’m going to try to ride my bike every day I can so this old man can keep up enough to injure himself (we’ll see how far I can get on that goal).

And then there’s the World Cup!  I’m going to try to watch as much of it as I can, certainly the US, UK and Brazillian teams.  Maybe it’s time to start calling it football…

When I got home from work tonight, Wren and Rei begged me to go outside and “play Nancy Drew”, where I run around the back yard and creek and nature trail chasing them in circles, trying to “kidnap” them and tie them up. Last time we played, I managed to convert the game into a cannonball shoot, where they would run and I would hurl a large ball of string at them to “break their legs” and “smash their heads”.  :>

This time, I told them it’s hard to think up fresh ways to capture them, and I’m a bit embarrassed to run around the yard yelling like a thug with the neighbors in their yards, wondering if I really am crazy. So we agreed to try something structured – a game of baseball! Nicholas and Jay joined in. If you want a great way to play ball with 5 or 6 people, try this:

• rotate the batter through the whole group;
• after you bat, if you get on base, stay there and run the bases until you score or get out;
• if you’re not at bat and not on base, play the outfield

This worked out great! Everybody was always busy. And everybody played whatever position they felt like – pitcher, shortstop, 3rd, 1st, even catcher. Highly recommended! Next time everybody (except Nicholas, a die-hard baseball fan) wants to try soccer – we’ll see if we can’t come up with something good there.

Reiley finished her last YMCA Princesses’ Spring Outing with a bang – more specifically a splash. We cooked brats and soydogs over the grill, had the Friday night ice cream social, woke up to reveille, missed ALL of our scheduled activities, but did what we wanted on our own time, going for a joyboy boat ride in the light rain, bike riding, shark tooth searching, hiking, snake handling, tree house climbing, soccer, splashing each other with cold lake water until we were swimming, and on Sunday… finally… with only 5 minutes left on the activities clock, decided to take the zipline plunge.

Reiley had such fun that she cried when it was over – poor kid, it was her final trip, and Wrenny takes over next year.  But we’ll keep up the adventures.  There’s something really special about spending individual time with each of the girls – you get to really connect instead of always playing “break up the fighting”.  Another dad in Guides and Princesses takes each of his kids, one at a time, to breakfast every Saturday, giving them each a turn to pick their favorite place and hang out with dad.  He says it’s definitely one of those things in life he “did right”.  Awesome.

From the “When in southern Rome…” dept…

Busy weekend! Match the description to the picture: new bikerack and tire, new treo antenna, new drumkit bass pedal, new deck landing.

Wrenny is seven! I can’t believe it. We don’t have any babies in the house any more, just adorable young ladies. For her birthday Wren said she wanted a sleepover. Ruthie, Savanah, Olivia and Chloe joined Wren and Reiley for a lot of fun and games, including mom’s mac and cheese and pigs in a blanket and ice cream and cake (all veganified and they all loved it all!), Dance Dance Revolution (sent by Gram), mom’s eraser clay craft (a hit!), a Nancy Drew treasure hunt mystery that Grammy and I cooked up and in which Reiley played the horse-theiving bad guy (including cowboy outfit and moustache!), and (of course) late-night movies and popcorn. All fun and no troubles at all! What a great bunch of kids!