Coaching? ME?

Here is one for you, if you know me you know will know why this is so ironic, I will be coaching Edward's Blastball team this year. Yep, me! They couldn't get anyone to take the position (a whopping 4 weeks plus one practice). So because I said I would be willing to do it in a pinch, I get to be the lucky one. For those of you who don't know what Blastball is. It is an introduction to T-ball. The children hit a ball off the tee, and run to 1st base only. There is no other bases to run and every child gets one turn up to bat. Once the whole team has had a turn at bat, then you switch with the team in the outfield. You play for 45 minutes then the game is over. No score is kept it is just a great way to help little ones get used to batting off of a tee, playing outfield, and running to bases. The bases they run to honks. It is cute. Edwards birthday happens to fall just right so he was able to play this year and last. Next year though it will be T-ball if he wants to continue with baseball. The reason this is ironic (me, coaching) for those who don't know me, is because I don't like sports. My son bowls and I like that, we roller skate, ride bikes and go for walks but I am not a sports person, they aren't even allowed on in my house. However that is me (and well, Kirk too....except for boxing) and not Edward. He is too young to know what he will like, so we are encouraging him to try all different types of sports out. He has taken Swimming lessons (will continue with those this summer), played Blastball (2nd year this year of that), is on a bowling league (since June of 2006 basically). He will be trying Soccer out this summer at a week long soccer camp for an hour and a half a day for 5 days. I want him to try Tennis, but that might have to wait until next year. I am not so sure about football or wrestling (those of course will be sports he will try in a few years maybe). Basketball I am still trying to find out when he can try that one. I also want him to try a few different types of dance classes like tap and jazz. I know Kirk would like for him to give boxing a try when he is older. The only thing we will not let him try is Martial Arts unless we can find a class in that with a Christian Approach to the philosophy. Basically I want to give him the opportunity to try things then make up his own mind as to what he wants to pursue. The only thing that might not be an option is bowling because that is a Physical Education Credit for him in Homeschool. I take this approach with him on other things too, like food....just because I don't like it doesn't mean he wont.

BlastBall

Edward just finished Blastball (these are pictures from his one and only practice). They had 4 games altogether....Every Monday for a Month. The name of his team was The Bears and they work Green (this color) t-shirts to their games that said Blastball on them. It was a great introduction to T-ball. Next year he will still be young enough to play Blastball, so we will sign him up for that again. He seemed to enjoy himself greatly and learned a lot of valuable lessons about Sportsmanship, Teamwork and Sharing. Being an only child, who is homeschooled we felt that these were very important lessons for him to learn. You could tell that he was the only child on the team without siblings, because he was the one out in the field laying in the grass throwing a screaming fit because someone else caught the ball. His Nana got to come and see him play 2 of his 4 games. Of course both daddy and mommy were there to cheer him on at all his games and his practice. We have a ton more pictures. I just haven't uploaded them to my computer yet because it desperately needs to be reloaded. For those of you who aren't familiar with what Blastball is, the children hit the ball off of a tee. The ball is soft (like a nerf ball) and so is the bat. The children only run to 1st base and when they jump on it, it honks. There is no score left and the games only were 45 minutes long. If you hadn't played all four innings by then, that was okay. The game was still over. Great for little ones and to see if they even like the sport. They also have Munchkin Tennis through our rec center but Edward is fully booked both set of sessions with that, so we will not be able to do that this year. Maybe next year. We just want to give him the opportunity to try all sports, even though neither Kirk or I are sporty people. We don't want our dislikes and likes to flow over on Edward, we want him to decide for himself....after all he is his own person. We try very hard to take this attitude towards everything from food to activities. Of course there are a few activities that because of being homeschooled that we do feel aren't optional choices....we do them as a part of his curriculum.