The Pitch

We have been out on the pitch so much lately, that I haven't had any time to blog!! Last weekend we went to 4 games (both girls, Sounders and the UW womens game). I am proud to say that we are not the only soccer crazed people out there - another family on Maria's team went to the same games we did (their oldest played right after Isabelle down in Olympia so we really followed eachother around all weekend!).

We love being able to take the girls to womens sporting events - especially if its not raining. As I write this it is windy and rainy outside and both girls play this morning (brrr). Morrie and I went to another Sounders game 2 nights ago and it was fantastically awesome. Although we didn't win it was a tight match against the one other team that has the same stats as us- so it's no surprise that it was 0-0.

It's playoff season now, so if we don't answer the phone, we are watching FSN. If we don't show up to your party, we are going over game strategy - even though the Sounders head coach doesn't usually consult us, we want to be ready just in case. The other morning the girls and I went over who we thought should start that night (a dream line up if you will) and exactly who we wanted on the bench. We bleed blue and green.

12!

Isabelle got to go on her first boat cruise dance this weekend, and she was very very excited!! her youth group does way cooler things than what I did in junior high!! Her life is all about youth group and soccer right now.

Here she is the next night at the Sounders game!! We had the awesome luck to find ourselves with some friends in their suite and the girls had a blast. I can't even describe how much fun the kids had while we were there.

Here si she at her own game earlier that day. Click on the pic and look at those awesome leg muscles!!! She is one strong player.

My girl. At 12. Listens to her ipod a lot. Sings a lot. Looks ups MLS stuff on the internet and tells me thinsg about other teams. She is a smarty pants. She now wears my shoes as well as her own. She is growing up much faster than her mom would like, and it seems to have been at hyper speed lately. Sigh...

Fall!

Fall is really really here! It's just so beautiful. I know we had "the most awesome summer there ever was" (and that is how I will always refer to it). However, the colors of fall just can't be matched. The coziness of a warm fire, the cat and dog sharing (or hogging) the floor right in front of the fire, warm drinks, cool soccer days, no sunscreen!, and all those lovely scents. I can light my apple cider candle and not feel like a dork my house smells like fall, because now it really is!

Not that I would turn down a free trip to Hawaii, because I will be there tomorrow if you need me to, but the change of season is just perfect!

Fingerprints

This morning I woke up and wandered downstairs. As I turned the light on in the kitchen, I noticed the fingerprints all over the sliding glass door from where the kids eagerly open it up to go play outside with the dog. I noticed the doggie nose prints all over the lower part of the door as she looks outside scanning for cats, squirrels, and birds to go chase. I noticed the sticky maple syrup around the cabinet handle where I pull out the pancake ingredients every morning. I noticed the cat paw prints on the fridge from where she stands on her hind legs, leans on the freezer and peers into the open fridge and smells around (I keep telling her that is not where the catnip is hidden). I noticed the greasy fingerprints all over the kitchen sink sprayer because my girls can't just wash a dish, they have to SPRAY it off every time - and make water spray up onto the window in the process.
I noticed all these things and thought that maybe, just maybe, having a perfectly clean house wasn't all that it's cracked up to be. Maybe I like having all these reminders of the little paws and hands that live with me. Maybe it's okay to just enjoy the warm goodness of maple syrup, and be grateful that the kids are even getting the dishes and the water together.
Oh, who am I kidding? I totally cleaned the kitchen and wiped down every surface that those little gruby hands touch with antibacterial wipes while they were away at school. I erased every shred of evidence that I saw of smudges, prints, stickiness, stains and crumbs. And I enjoyed the cleanliness that was my kitchen for 4 hours.
Then they came home from school and the cat and dog ran all over the place in excitement, and the girls snacked and laid their homework in the crumbs and tossed their bags about and it was messy all over again. Tomorrow I will remember that it WAS clean, and it WAS nice, and Morrie will wonder why don't I ever clean up when I am at home by myself. Then I will pour maple syrup all over him.

Was that a weekend??

We were suuuuper busy this weekend! Our highlight was this top picture of Isabelle scoring her teams only goal on a penalty kick! It's not the ball on the ground near the goal, it's the one in the air just to the right of Kiana.It went in the top right corner of the goal, woohoo!

Here is Isabelle running to get after the ball, and in the next picture you can tell she won!

Isabelle had 2 games, Maria had one game, we went and saw my niece's game, Maria had a friend over, I had girls night out, the Huskies won!, we went to a brunch, the Seahawks dominated, I took a nap, and then we went to church. I may or may not have been totally awake at church on Sunday night. Can I have a day off now?

Cross Country!

Sunday Maria had her second cross country meet. They run against other CYO schools. The schools in all of the Seattle area are divided into 2 groups since each group brings hundreds and hundreds of people to the meet, they run in 2 shifts. Marai and her friends just got their HFK tattoos on their cheecks and are stretching (chatting) before their race.

Here Maria is lined up with 8 of her classmates and her and Megan are doing some sort of pregame dance.

And they are off! Maria is especially excited that I got a picture of her "flying".

She runs a full mile, and this is 3/4 of the way through. Only one girl is ahead of her (there are about 50 girls in this race).

Here they come down the finish line! Maria ran a time of 7:19 last week and this week finished with 7:10. Way to go girl! She got second place - she is AMAZING.

Maria and Angela after the race, laying on the ground. Does Angela's arm look like it is about to break, or is that just me?

Izzy rocks!

Boo Yah! Look who got to the ball first! After looking at this picture, I thought Isabelle had rolled her ankle, but since she never mentioned it, I guess she just has flexible joints.

Isabelle took a ton of goal kicks and free kicks during this game and she played the whole game (which she was not thrilled about). On the sidelines however, the parents were enjoying watching her foot and the big kicks that she is capable of.

It did seem like she was msotly just clearing the ball, but she gets right in there at times as well.

Thanks for the sun!!! We made a few sacrifices the night before to some Sun Maiden just to be on the safe side.

Maria today, Isabelle tomorrow

I had the camera out with me this weekend, so here are some soccer pictures! I didn't want to overwhelm anyone, so I will put up maria's today and Izzy's tomorrow. This top picture shows how Maria likes to roll, let the entire other team chase her! She scored once in her first game, which they won 5-0. It sure felt nice, because last weekend it wasn't pretty.

In Maria's second game (the other team was short players) her coach ahd her play an entire half as goalie! Crazy thinking since she has never done it, not even in practice! She had a shut out for her half, and they ended up winning 6-0.

In between games, we threw in soccer pictures, because why would we want to go home?? We got to her first game at 8:45am, ate lunch in the car on the way to pictures at 11:00, ran back for the second game at 12:30 and then went straight to Izzy's game which started at 2:00. We finally came home at 3:45 and lay comatose on the floor for a few minutes and then got up and went to my parents for Grandpa's birthday. Whew. I am tired just reliving it!