No, For Real...

Ok, so I feel like all parents out there brag about their kids and their athletic abilities.  But, really?  Who is that good at sports at the age of 4?  Not many kids....except for OURs.  The big Al-Man.  No, for real....

This kid is seriously good at every sport he has tried.  His specialties?  Basketball, Baseball and most recently, Soccer.  How do we know this considering he has only been on this earth for 4.5 years?  And, has only been walking for about 3 of those years (he walked late....you may remember this.  Don't judge)?  Well, because, we are that family who literally has a basketball hoop in our house.  Not in the basement.  But, in what should be our main entrance of our house, but is currently the corner where all of his toys go.  One of these days, we'll have an addition, I swear.  BUT...that basically allows for him to shoot hoops whenever he would like to.  And, I swear - he makes almost every shot.  Not only does he make almost every shot, but the hoop?  Is high.  Like, on the highest setting.

Now onto baseball.  That kid can seriously hit the ball out of the park.  I swear.  AND, this isn't t-ball.  This is us pitching balls to him.  It is really unbelievable.  I can't wait to get him onto an organized team this spring to see what he does then.

And, soccer...bless his heart.  That child runs!  And, runs!  And, runs!  And, runs!  I was a little nervous about this sport at first considering the first 2 games were spent playing for 30 mins and crying for the other 30 mins (about what?  who knows).  But, after those (and our little pep talk about being team player)?  Holy crap.  That kid came out of his shell. That little stinker goes after the ball and once he gets it?  He just goes.  The funny thing?  He goes in whatever direction he is headed - whether it be towards his goal or the opponents.  Also?  He has NO idea if he is in bounds or out of bounds.  I swear - that kid covered more surface area of the field (the field as in the entire soccer playing area) than any other kid before in one game.  It was hilarious.  But, so fun watching him get so into it and put so much effort into it. 

 

 

 

Here's hoping that all of this athletic ability will lead to lots of scholarships.  :)  And....maybe a pro career (and paycheck for mama and papa!).  No, for real...

Happy Halloween!

Unfortunately, the big Al Man has been fighting a cold for a couple of weeks and of course, it seemed to be at its peak on Halloween.  As a result, the morning of started off with an epic battle to get him to wear his Halloween costume, which nearly resulted in me strangling him, but after we got over THAT hurdle, we were good to go....

As with all kids their age, I think that we went through 5 different costume ideas before coming up with a Cowgirl and a Cowboy.  How did we end up at that?  Because Avery is too smart for her own good.  She had been asking me to get her cowgirl boots forever.  Of course, she asked right at the end of the season last year, so after searching literally every shoe store in the mall, I still came up with nothing.  So, this year?  She figured if she wanted to be a cowgirl for Halloween, I would HAVE to get her boots.  And, she was right...

Unfortunately, Halloween falls during a pretty busy time at work, but in sticking with the whole "I'm a working mom, but I can still make time to be at my kids' activities at school" thing, I volunteered to help out at both of their parties at school that day.  Of course, when given the list of things that needed to be done, I immediately signed up for the sweet treat decorating, knowing full well that there would be plenty of sweet treat tasting by Mom during the making process.  The room mom clearly doesn't know me well enough, as she sent an email offering to buy cookies and asked me to bring the decorations.  I'm sorry, what?  We don't BUY cookies around here.  We of course need to make everything as difficult and as time consuming as possible!  Although, on that note, I lucked out, as there is a kid with peanut allergies in Alex's class, so I was limited and forced to do Rice Krispie Treats.  So, I made those.  Used cookie cutters to make them fun shapes.  Made the frosting (of course).  And, bought the decorations.  Of course, by the time the kids were done with them, they just looked like a pile of frosting with candy bones and bugs all over them and you had no idea what the hell it was supposed to be, but whatever.  They had fun. 

After Alex's party, I raced to a local coffee shop and worked for a couple of hours. Then, headed over to Avery's Halloween party.  Luckily, I wasn't in charge of anything for this one and could just enjoy.

After her party was over, we picked up Alex and headed home where I attempted to work for another couple of hours and I let them just chill out and watch tv.

Then, we encountered another episode of "Battling with a Cold" Al-Man when he decided that he really didn't want to go trick or treating.  I mean, I can't really blame the kid.  He wasn't feeling well. He didn't want to put his costume back on.  And, the kid doesn't even like candy.  So, really?  What was the incentive (besides his mother forcing him to do it because I knew he'd have fun once we got there)??? 

So, we went.  This year, we tried a new neighborhood because ours is well, pretty dead on Halloween night.  So, here we are with Alex who really isn't too sure about this whole thing and we walk up to the first house only to be greeted by a man dressed in one of the most scary looking ware wolf costumes I've ever seen, making all sorts of growling noises and playing spooky music.  I thought the kids were going to die.  Thankfully, as soon as he saw the horror in their eyes, he started dancing around and became a friendly ware wolf and eventually took off his head piece.  I think Avery's exact reaction was "He scared the Heck out of me!"  And, I couldn't even correct the poor choice of language, as quite frankly, he scared the FU$K out of me!

The rest of the night was great.  Both kids had fun and got a lot of candy.  Of course, Alex clearly couldn't get the ware wolf off of his mind and decided to remind me of this from approx. 130-430 in the morning.  Literally.  But, other than that, I'd say it was a successful and fun Halloween!