Summer days...

I'm still around - I've been reading your posts everyday and commenting infrequently, but I'm still here. I just haven't had much to say lately. We've been really busy with baseball. Both boys went to their state tournaments and both teams took third. Colby's was great, as always. He hit a homerun over the fence, but this was really DJ's year to shine. He has always really gotten the shaft with baseball. He's good, but he's in with a mix of boys that are really good too and for some reason he's never really hit it off with the coach, but every three years, that coach moves up with his son and DJ gets the chance to have a really good year. This was it. During the season, he was an awesome catcher and then for the all-stars, his dad got to coach him.

There was a little bit of "coach's son" attitude a few times, but this tournament was outstanding. We took boys from 4 different communities and raised money to help with travel expenses. The boys all really "gelled" together and I think they've all made some lifelong friends. They all got to play, Darrell was really, really fair. He felt they all deserved a spot on the team and did a great job getting everybody in. The victories they achieved were done so as a team and everyone felt like they'd made a contribution.

DJ did an exemplary job behind the plate. He got beat all to heck (I even had to take him to the chiropractor when we returned), but he has had the season of his life. In two of the "important" wins, he was the winning run over the plate in a bang, bang play at home - and he's one of the slowest runners on the team. His short little legs were just running like no get out! It was wonderful to see that as a mom and I know Darrell was beaming with pride as well!

All the kids have had a good summer with sports and now Colby starts football. Sonya is excited to go into the 4th grade and Heather is ready to move to Mizzou. I'm ready for her to go, but a little sad to lose her. She has been seeing this boy and I sure hope it doesn't interfere when the time comes to go. I'm sure it won't but we visited the campus again this weekend, just to make sure the excitement was still brewing. This is the first "boyfriend" she's had and the timing couldn't be worse in my eyes, but I think she's got her head on straight. She's looking forward to the next phase of life.

Everyone is good in my neck of the woods and here's a few pics of summer for you.

Heather and Sonya making silly faces...



DJ resting after a hard game...



Colby watching a baseball game on Mizzou's field. He doesn't care who's playing, he just loves being at the field...

Happy Birthday America!!!!!

To celebrate, we are going to watch America's favorite pastime - yep, you guessed it BASEBALL!!!!!

Now you all know I love me some baseball, but I'm getting a little burnt out myself. Last weekend was wonderful. Colby's team won every game, but the last one. They lost the championship, but it was fun, nonetheless and Colby was really on his game last weekend and proved that he definitely deserved a spot on that team. He was batting over .800 and made two really great catches in the outfield and nice throws for plays at the plate. The catcher didn't get the guys out, but it wasn't because of Colby's throws. Normally, he's an infielder, so I was shocked at how well he did in the outfield and he really enjoyed himself. So that was the all-star team.

This weekend, he's playing in a tournament with my nephew in St. Louis - about 75 miles from us. It's really just a fun tourney, but he played last year and the coach requested he play again this year. He's excited.

Sunday - his district play starts for the all-star and DJ's starts on Thursday. Then it's weekends in Cape Girardeau, Jackson, MO and maybe even Nebraska for Colby and Minnesota for DJ next month, whew! I'm tired already.

We're not really doing much for the 4th, we're playing it by ear to see what happens after these games today.

Oh, and I'm not really losing weight very quickly anymore, I've had a very bad week at work - I'll blog about it later. But, I was surprised to see this morning that I finally hit the 20 pound mark and I'm going to get back on track this week, I promise:)

Happy 4th of July everyone!

Random Pictures

This was the band that played at Heather's graduation party. It was called the 4 Hot Chicks~



This is Sonya at a recent ballgame - she was bored, or can't you tell?



This is Darrell & I at Heather's graduation party.



Here's Heather while she was getting ready for her party. My little graduate, how sweet!



This is Sonya singing her little heart out. I thought it was a cool pic.

I'll have to get some pics of the boys up soon. I don't know where they were when we were taking pictures in the garage. I'll post some more on Monday.

Ain't no wrath like that of a woman's whose child has been scorned!

I am beside myself with anger. My son is one of the best baseball players on the 11 year old league, and this is straight from the stats, not just a momma who only sees the good her son does. He is a natural at baseball. At eleven, he is totally aware of the game, how many outs there are, what the batter will probably try to do - he's got it all figured out - I am totally amazed to watch him during the game. My other son is also really good at baseball, but he has to work really hard at it, it just seems to come to Colby easier. Now, that's not to say he doesn't get nervous, many times he can be seen chewing his fingernails during a game, but he's definitely got a baseball brain.

So, each year he makes the All-Star team. Whichever team wins the league gets to take 8 of their players and choose 4-6 players from other good teams, he has been chosen for the all star team every year. Two years ago, we had a problem with coach of the all star team, he invited Colby and would use Colby until he got a lead then he would sit him and put players from his team in that were not as good. We don't mind him taking his turn sitting the bench, but it was clear what was going on and this coach is known around the area as a snake, I don't even know why the parents in his own town allow thier children to play for him.

Last year, he invited Colby to the 10 year old all stars and we declined because we didn't agree with his coaching style. Colby played "up" with the 11 year olds and had a great time. This year another town won the league and this coach told a baldfaced lie about my son to try to get the other coach not to invite Colby to play with them. He said that when our team beat their team that Colby made a snotty remark to him - throwing it in his face that we had won. This was a couple of months ago, we asked Colby about it and he said, I probably said something to him when we were shaking hands, but it wasn't anything bad and I don't even remember it. You know, now that I'm writing this down, it all seems so silly, but I am truly upset by this.

Colby is playing and we're going to Ste. Genevieve, MO this weekend for him to play in a tournament, but now, there's this black cloud over the whole event. I was looking forward to it and now I'm not. This is something he loves to do, he is good at it and because a grown man is jealous of his abilities, he is using whatever he can to keep a kid, a good kid out of the game. How can he live with himself? I do not know if I can hold my tongue this weekend, but I'm going to try really hard. I will not, however, allow this to go unanswered. When the season is over, I plan to have a talk with that coach, if my husband doesn't first and I plan to tell him how disappointed I am with how he handled himself, that if my son truly did say anything inappropriate to him, the thing to do would have been to come to us and allow us to deal with it. We are trying to teach these kids how to be a good sport and as a coach, he should have facilitated that, if he was given that opportunity. Not only did he say that Colby said something to him (we never did learn what that something was), but he said that his players would not come along to the tournament if Colby went - this guy is an absolute ass! I swear, I'm not just saying this, everyone says how good of a kid he is, he's polite, you never hear much out of him - DJ is a mouth, but Colby really just keeps to himself when focusing on baseball.

Well, the other coach pretty much said that Colby was being invited either way, so they did all choose to come along - and we were told that no one else - I'm sorry, this is so hard to understand and I'm going to quit babbling about it and just try to get through this weekend with this jerk without boxing him in the mouth. Bad thing is - we will spend about the next month with him and if Colby didn't truly love this game and this experience, I would decline the invitation, but since I don't want him to know what's going on, I'm trying to keep an excited front for him.

Wish me luck. Sorry for the long post.

Quick Update

We had Heather's graduation party this weekend and things went pretty smoothly. My dear sister came to help me get ready. I truly don't know what I'd do without her. She and I barbequed on Friday night so we wouldn't have to mess with it on Saturday and that was the best idea - except for the fact that it took us until 4am to get it all done - but at least we didn't have to stand over the pit all day on Saturday while we had guests.

I really thought Darrell was going to do the BBQing, but I guess when he saw we had it under control, he thought we didn't need him and went to be about 1:30. Ass!!!! He had done alot to get the property ready and the pool - get the garage cleaned up in case it rained and we needed shelter. He'd been working his butt off, but so had I. I was kinda glad when he went to bed though, because Shelly and I had alot of fun trying to get it all done. Hot dogs were rolling off the pit onto the porch and we'd pick them up real quick and put them back on (5 second rule) - I know it's gross - but no one died and we just built the porch so I knew it wasn't that dirty yet:) (Are you all puking now? Well, get over it - what people don't know won't hurt them!)

We saw alot of family & friends we hadn't seen in a while and Heather was truly grateful for all she got. It will go a long way in getting what she needs for college life and the dorm room. I'll post some pics later this week, I'm still recuperating.

This is me being healthy

OK, so I'm drinking soy milk now instead of skim because I read in Women's Health magazine that if you consume just one serving of soy each day, it has been shown to reduce belly fat - I know, I know - but I'll take whatever I can get.

So, does it count if I'm having the soy milk with my Cap'n Crunch????? It still has the same calories as Cheerios and it was better than having a Pop Tart:)

I'm up to 19 pounds now, only 31 more to go to reach my goal weight. My goal date is September 15th.

9 year old DramaQueen

It is summer. My cellphone rings and I am irritated to see that it is my home calling. I have repeatedly told my kids not to call me on my cellphone. It is long distance from our house, so I get charged once on my home phone bill and again for minutes on my cellphone bill. "Send me a text," I say, "and I'll call you right back" - that's why we pay for texting - but oh no, when they're mad or excited or bored or hungry, whatever - they pick up that phone and dial those 10 digits.

So I pick up and hear my 9 year old's voice

"Are you and dad trying to ruin my life or are you just trying to get me to run away?" I squelch a giggle "What?", I say, as I strive to stop laughing inside and try to figure out what is wrong with her. She repeats herself with the exact same emphasis on every word~

Apparently, the cat, Peach Kitty - not Cinderella (Cinderella is her cat) pissed on 4 towels today and my husband is pissed off and threatened to take both cats to the shelter. I told her not to worry, none of our pets were leaving our house, at least not tonight:)