Basketball season

That time of year...I am coaching Jaydon and Lucy's basketaball teams again. It is fun and a lot of work and I probably dwell on creating practice plans a bit too much but we are hopefully having fun, learning new skills and (soon to be) competitive.

Last Basketball Game and Banquet

Jaydon and I paired up to do basketball again this year. I really loved coaching this season and the amount of improvement I saw in all the kids as amazing. It was a great group to work with and really fun to be part of the Y sports.

Our last game

The quick banquet right after the game.

Jaydon did a great job. He really improved on his dribbling and rebounding.

I thought I had a video of Jaydon dribbling and shooting during the game but I guess not. Don't blink or you will miss Jaydon shooting right at the beginning of this video, then it is just me trying to wrangle them all in to do a cheer before we begin.

More Basketball

Jaydon continued to enjoy basketball season and I had fun coaching his team.

Working on some skills

Team Huddle

He's off!

 Taking a picture of a picture isn't the best option but here are Jaydon's individual and team photos from the season.

Jaydon plays basketball

We signed Jaydon up for basketball this winter and I volunteered to be a coach.  Both of us had a great time and we look forward to doing it again.  This was his first game and getting pictures of youth basketball players while the game is happening is a challenging feat.  Thanks Grandma for trying to snap a few on my camera.

It is pretty chaotic but still a lot of fun and Jaydon had a great time and learned a lot, just what we were hoping for.

March Madness!

We love March Madness in our house! It is the one time of year when we will turn on the games and just have them running the whole time while we go about our day.  Here was a photo of Jeremy and Jaydon and Higgins enjoying some game time.  Some great games this year and some fun cinderella teams to watch.  Go Wichita State :)

Lucy shoots and scores

Lucy has discovered making baskets and she is loving it. She plays in the tub and in the living room and is always appreciative of applause and cheering for her made attempts.

Unfortunately I came in at the very end of her streak but dad really had her going with making lots in a row and yes, she normally has bath water, we had just drained it and couldn't interrupt her streak to pull her out.

Pac-12 Women's Semis

Through our basketball team we got great tickets for really cheap to the Pac-12 Women's Championship in Seattle, we saw the two semi-final games and it was great.  My sister and I both grew up watching the Stanford women play and we were pretty dorky and excited to get a photo with the Cardinal!  Our seats were six rows up at this angle.  It was great!

Whoa, busy December!

December is always super busy and super fun for us!  I love the holidays and all that is involved with decorating and baking and spending lots of time with family.  Blogging time is not easy to come by since Jaydon stopped napping but here are a few updates from December.

Lily found Lucy's crib one day and was quite content to sleep on Lucy's 'pillow,' a burp cloth that we try and keep under her head still today just in case.  She is much less spitty but still manages to consume, either through me or by herself, things that don't agree with her system on occasion.

Sometimes this is the best way to try grabbing a shower and getting something accomplished.  Both kids trapped :)  Though Jaydon can really just climb in and out of Lucy's exersaucer he stayed put for quite a long time.

Self portrait!

Decorating the tree!

It was so awesome this year because Jaydon wanted to help, he put up many ornaments by himself and it was fun to look at the tree and know that while it may not have been exactly symmetrically arranged it was sure done with love and enjoyment of the holidays with the Christmas music playing in the background.

I don't even know what number this was for our annual cookie making extravaganza but it still produces insane amounts of goodies and a good time is had by all, albeit tiring.  

This year on cookie making day my sister was scheduled for an emergency gallbladder removal (she was sick for a couple days and after visiting urgent care on Saturday they realized it would need to be removed Sunday).  While it should have been a quick 45min-1 hour procedure I waited by the phone and kept waiting.  My sister's gallbladder was in such bad shape the liver had come down around it and the Dr. cut the bile duct, thus making for quite a bit bigger of an emergency involving a transfer to a different hospital for a specialist to repair it.  Two 4-5 hour surgeries later she was in recovery but had a long road ahead.  Hearing about this while at cookie making day I decided I needed to head south to visit so Jeremy helped pack the kids and we all headed out that night so I could get to the hospital before she was out of her last surgery about 11 at night.  The photo above is Jaydon pretending to play a game while trying to get some lunch before traveling to get back up to school for basketball. 

I am again coaching basketball and while my girls are working hard to improve we started out with many girls who have never played or only played a very limited amount of basketball which makes it very hard to be competitive with teams that have been playing together for years.  Jaydon and Lucy make some appearances with me at practice and the girls absolutely love seeing them.

Lucy and Higgins (and Jaydon) aren't too excited about me having to leave them every day with a babysitter for periods of time.  This self photo was taken after getting back one night early in the season from practice.  Lucy was crying, Higgins and Lucy decided they needed to be held and Jaydon was somewhere around my legs wanting comforting too.  

With all the business of travel, holiday festivities and basketball stuff Jaydon was worn out!  He doesn't really take naps anymore but he ended up falling asleep while watching a show this afternoon holding his milk.  It was cute, though when he does take a nap he wakes up very cranky and so it isn't really worth it to have him nap anymore.

Lucy trying some egg for the first time, thankfully she is handling it well so that has been added back into our diets!

This video does not do justice to the situation but I was trying to be a bit sneaky and capture how cute Jaydon was being.  He received an ornament from Nana and Grandpa when he was one that is a photo of them and a recording of their voices wishing him a Merry Christmas and telling him they love him.  He would play the ornament over and then start talking to it telling the ornament he loved them too.  It was super cute!  

And I just realized when looking at the calendar for selecting the date of this post that all of this stuff happened within the first week of December - CRAZY!  

Coaches vs. Cancer

Every year for the past few years our basketball conference has done a large scale fundrasier to help fight cancer. Every team plays in a game decked out with pink and we all wear special t-shirts and have honorary coaches who have been impacted by cancer. This year with some snow changes to our schedule we went from hosting the game to being the visitor and while I was always going to have my mom come to my JV game, she got to be our varsity honorary coach as well. Jeremy was out of town and we had to bring Jaydon along as well so grandma got to be an honorary coach and babysitter. It was a great event raising money to fight cancer or crush cancer as our t-shirt logos said. Thanks mom for coming up and participating.

Jaydon watching from the stands with our statistician and a couple players. He later climbed down and came almost onto the cour during the game before I caught him and took him to the bench to be with grandma.

The girls getting ready for the starting line-ups to be announced and my mom with another coach on the side.

My mom had to stand in the center to be recognized, they always read a write-up about every honorary coach and this is what was written and read about her.

When Susan Lahti was diagnosed with breast cancer in June of 2010 her thoughts went to her mother, Jean, who had battled and beat breast cancer 3 times before losing her fight with colon cancer a number of years later. Susan decided that aggressive treatment was her best option and after her double mastectomy she was declared Cancer Free!! She has been able to go from a participant in Casting for Recovery, a fly-fishing support group for women with cancer, to an instructor, continuing to help others deal with this terrible disease. Susan is the mother of Squalicum Assistant Coach Sarah Smoldon and has helped instill in Sarah and her entire family the love of basketball and the pursuit of good health. Susan played basketball for the Western Washington University Vikings and basketball has continued to play a large role in her life and lives of her family. She is a physical educator at Mt. Lake Terrace High School where she coached varsity basketball along with having previously coached at the community college level. She is happy to be here tonight, back on the court, where she spent so many years playing and coaching, and is honored to be part of such a wonderful event to help CRUSH CANCER!