Football Season IV

It has all begun again. The sweat. The practices. The smell of week-old practice uniforms.... blech.

Matt's team kicked off the new football season with a Jamboree game on Tuesday, and Matt had a lot of playing time. He has a new number this year because he has a new position. Instead of tight-end, he is now a tackle. He was the only one who wore his black underarmor for this game,which was great for me. It made it lots easier to pick him out of the crowd.


There he is in the middle.

There were tons of action pictures to take.


About halfway through the game, Matt had a great moment. One of his teammates fumbled the ball, and Matt recovered it. Of course, during the most important shot of the game for me, my camera focused on the kid behind him and left Matt blurry. Here is falling on the fumbled ball, though.

And here he is getting tackled by the opposing team player who was going for it too.

Smoosh. (I am sure he loves it when I sum up his shining moments in manly one-word statements like "smoosh.)

I liked this shot. I took it right after the play was called and they were starting to unpile.


This was my favorite moment, though, because after he stood up he looked at me with that "Did you get pictures of that?" look, and this time I could say, "YES! I did!" Last year I missed getting shots of all his good moves.
There were some more plays made by all the kids and the game stayed pretty close.





Matt likes this shot the best.







In the end, Elkins made a last minute touchdown that gave them the game. This Friday is the first regular game of the season for the senior team. I probably won't get to be at this game, but even if I am not there in person I will be cheering them on. Go Red!

Football on the 4th

Initially, there weren't any All-Star games planned for Saturday, so we asked some of our friends to come over for food and games. Then Kyle was supposed to play on Saturday after all, so we called them all back and cancelled. Then a storm rolled in and the games were postponed until today. We called them all back again and said, "Come on over!" So they did. We had a minor feast spread out, there were 16 kids in various forms of play, 8 adults feeling outnumbered by the kids, boardgames and fireworks were brought out, and most importantly, there was football.

Nathan, Jack, Josh and Matt started warming up before everybody else got here. It was the "young" ones vs the "old" ones.

I think my old one and young one were each surprised by each other's strength.

A lot of times I shoot, and just hold the shutter open to get 6 shots in a frame to capture the action. It means I get some unusual shots sometimes, especially when things happen so fast your eyes can't keep up with everything. This is one of those shots. Things look potentially painful in this shot, but neither one can remember this moment now.

There was a lot of smack being thrown around out there. Some of it was deserved.

There was some showboating going on too. I am not sure all of that was deserved.

After Slade and Brandy arrived, the guys wanted the gals to play too. Then they immediately called for "Skins and Shirts" and tried to call "shirts." We told them it was tackle football, not flappy football, so "skins" was out of the question.

Mystery and I were able to play, while Brandy took care of her baby and Crystal (married to Nathan) took my camera and was the photographer. Mystery was trying to distract me from my quarterbacking duties in this shot.

Here are all 8 of us running after someone who had the ball again. All of us "old" ones should be physically recovered enough from our football injuries in time to play again next July 4th. I just want to mention that in my day to day life I take a lot of pictures. Sometimes I take a few hundred in a really busy day. However, Crystal (married to Nathan) has me beat for sheer picture taking volume, hands down. She took over 1200 (that is not a typo) pictures in the time it took our team to beat Matt and Jack's team. That is some impressive picture taking!

During our feast, Nathan and Crystal's little girl sang "Open the Eyes of my Heart, Lord" to us.

Nothing is as cute as being serenaded by a pre-schooler.

It was a good day. After the football games were over we set off our collective fireworks and then watched the neighbors shoot theirs off. Afterwards a mean round of Cranium WOW was played, where the guys actually won. Happy Birthday, America. It was a lot of fun enjoying our independence today!

The State Play-Offs

"Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss it you will land among the stars." Les Brown


I really do not like the end of this quote. Its inaccuracy bugs me. You would have to really overshoot the moon to land amongst the stars. If you don't make it to the moon, you really just kind of float aimlessly outside of the atmosphere unless there is something to bring you back to Earth.

The football team wasn't expected to go very far this year. Nobody thought they would win all but one game in their conference. Nobody thought they would go all the way to the state playoffs. But the boys didn't bother to listen to what "Nobody" thought. They slaughtered their way through their competition. They fought their way to the top. They shot for the moon, and last Friday the moon came out to watch them compete in the state play-offs.

It was a very cold night, and the game started later than normal. I knew Matt wouldn't play until the end of the game, so I kept the kids home in the house to stay warm. About halfway through the game we bundled up and made our way to the field.

I found Matt and the rest of the boys who weren't playing watching the game intensely. They were already losing 21-0 when we got there, but they still had a fight left in them.
I don't know why it touches me so much when the boys go their knees when a teammate is down. It does, though. It really does.
The Tigers got the ball back, and began powering down the field one down at a time.
They were determined to not walk away with a zero on their side of the board.
So they just kept moving down the field,
while their teammates followed them down the sidelines.
After several downs and tackles
(hey guys, incoming "ouch!") They finally made a touchdown, and picked up the extra point kicking the field goal.
At this point I went to take some pictures of the band for Crytal (not married to Nathan), and that was when Matt was sent in to play for about 30 seconds.
I didn't have time to even get my camera focused on him before he as brought back out and the game was called.
They didn't win the state play-offs, but the really important thing is that they made it to state against all the odds. You played a great season, guys.
I took the last shot of the coaches talking to the team after the game. (Matt told me when they got back to the field house, his coach officially "fired" them all for year.)
Then I watched my boy walk off the field for the last time this year. It was sad to see them disappointed, but I personally feel disappointment can be a great motivator. They shot for the moon, landed on their feet, and "Nobody" would be wise to not underestimate them next year.

Spooky cuteness

We had a busy halloween night full of colorful characters!

There was a ferocious puddytat....
an All-Star baseball player (he decided this was going to be his costume)...
an adorable ladybug.....
a Bony Maroney (he picked the name for himself)...
and a master magician who couldn't find a hat.
Aren't they cute?
We started out at the church where we were having a party for the kids in the area and a chili dinner. The kids played the games and built an impressive candy pile. Chet's friend Tyler came by, and then Chet went with Tyler and his mom to go trick-or-treating.

Jessica and Tony brought Daniel to the party, and he didn't have a costume. I gave him a pirate wig we had there, and we had fun with his dreadlocks for a while.
While the kids played Daniel and I spent some time laughing and playing together. Then he got down on the ground to play and show off his soldier-crawl skills.
He and his Uncle All-Star and Uncle Bony Maroney all spent some tummy-time together.
"Hey Uncle Bony Maroney... give me your candy...
or I will steal your nose!"
The party ended at 7, and after cleaning up and putting the church back together we headed over to the highschool.

Matt and the rest of the team had dressed up as football players for the evening. They were busy winning their place in the state playoffs in the final homegame of the regular season.



Daniel and his Aunt Ladybug played "Peak-a-Boo and Giggle Too" for a little while.

Then Kyle let me know that he and his friends thought burying Todd in the sand seemed like a fun idea. Boys.
Matt and some of the other JV players were called in to play at the end of the game. They stomped the competition, just like they have done all season. One more win, and they will be the number 1 seed in the playoffs. Woohoo! Go Red!
The game was over, and Bony Maroney danced a little funky jig in celebration. Then I rounded up my goblins and we finally headed home, where everyone came crashing down from their sugar high. I still haven't recovered, which is why you are getting pictures straight out of my camera and unedited today.