Month: October 2015

hoosiers

This past Saturday we finished up our first basketball season with all 4 players on the court. Thankfully, the age group divisions allowed for them to be grouped on 3 teams so I didn’t have 4 practices and 4 games each week to manage. Even though I love it, 3 hours of games every Saturday is my max.

Watching Camille play was hilarious — she was very particular about her pre-game hair. Usually braids, occasionally pigtails. And we had a few meltdowns on game days when the only shorts I could find were navy because the uniform was supposed to be black shorts. These things are important when you are 5.

before her first game

learning how to play defense — arms up!

 getting extra coaching from her brothers

gotta work on getting the ball out, not just up . . .

good game, good game, good game . . .

time for post-game snacks! 
This is going to sound crazy, but seeing her out on the court is like seeing my mom as a 5 year old girl. Her mannerisms, her expressions when she’s uncertain of herself, the way she pushes back her hair, and the way she runs is all Pam. I love it. 

End of season trophy with her coaches. She didn’t score any points, or even take any shots during the games, but she learned how to dribble (and she did make a few baskets during practice). 
Caleb and Carter had a good season — I love seeing the brothers work together on the court. I didn’t take any photos because they move too fast for them to show up as anything but green blurs. Carter moved around great on the court, but had an off shooting year. I’m sure it’s because he hasn’t adjusted to his new hight. He’s having to relearn all of his techniques using longer arms and longer legs. Caleb was the youngest on his team, but he played just as well as kids 2 years older than him. 
Even though I didn’t get any photos of their games, Carter and Calvin were part of a 3 on 3 basketball tournament last week and someone got a few good photos of them. (Carter above)
Calvin (under the basket — black sleeve on his arm)
Calvin has been getting really good — he grew a few inches over the summer and was lifting weights so he’s able to muscle around on the court better. But he is having to make the choice this year between varsity basketball and soccer and is going to choose soccer. He’s been playing with the Marine intramural team on base so he’ll be all ready when the season rolls around in January. 

As much as I love watching him play basketball, this sight of dad and son warming up before the game is pretty great. (Josh has been playing too).

Cross country finishes this week, Middle School volleyball ends next week, flag football starts next week, Middle School soccer starts the week after that . . . one season rolling into the next, all year long.

Glory days

We’ve sweated through our 6 months of purgatory and are finally reaping the rewards for perseverance. This weekend Fall arrived, which means it now feels like California summer. 
The kids have 2 days off of school this week for Ashora, the final offering in our Optional School October, so why not head to the pool on this 90 degree day? 
Carter returned from Germany yesterday, full of stories, but empty handed. Their group’s luggage didn’t make the connection in Istanbul so we’ll go pick it up today. I’m sure he’s happy that he gets a day off from studying Arabic since he’s doing so poorly in the class we made him take his book along to study if he had any free time (he didn’t — shocker). 
He said they would wake up at 6:30 every morning and go do a physical activity as a group: swim, run, a game, etc. After breakfast they would break into groups to work on projects or learn a new skill. Carter’s teachers said he was great in their GPS skills class, which didn’t surprise me a bit since he’s more reliable than my phone’s GPS when I need to get somewhere. 
Games, skits, group projects, presentations, a scavenger hunt, a visit to the castle, a dance, a Volksmarch (a German walking thing), and other activities with 152 other middle schoolers made for a busy and fun week. 
Working hard at something! (He doesn’t remember what)
Group photo at the castle. Carter is in the middle if you zoom in. He said the girls outnumbered the boys 2 to 1.
Heading home! Happy to have him back because we had a lot of this while he was away:
Yes, actual tears because she missed her brother. Daily, she would sigh, “I miss Carter.” How nice that she loves her brother that much. I hope they always feel that way about each other. 

A thing I never thought I’d do . . .

My car is doing weird things. It smells like it’s burning when I’m driving, but not the normal burning oil smell, something electrical or chemical. Anyway, it needs to go in to the mechanic, but my kids also need to go to their previously scheduled activities. I was thinking through the options and realized that I could call the boys’ driver and see if he could pick them up at the house and drive them to soccer practice. By the time they are finished, Josh will be off work and will be able to pick them up and bring them home.

So I What’s App’ed him (since Bahrain’s world revolves around What’s App) and 5 minutes later I have a confirmed ride for my kids tonight. We are slowly, but surely becoming more Middle Eastern by the day. Next thing you know, kindergartener Camille will be heading out with Sitare to bring her to a playdate (that’s totally a thing here). If you ever hear of me doing that, then it’s time for an emergency extraction.

I’m not going to know what to do when we get back to the US. Uber maybe?

globetrotters

First of all, I survived another day of CF. It was a blur of sprinting 1 kilometer, then using up the remaining minutes lifting 66 pounds over my head as many times as possible, then doing it all over again, but substituting pull-ups for the weight (I can’t do a single pull-up, but there’s a substitute exercise that is just as painful). Overall, it wasn’t a terrible one. I’ve experienced much worse.

The big news in our house this week is that Carter is off to Germany! Yes, traveling is one of the things that keeps us here in the Middle East. Calvin has been getting go to Germany with school the past 2 years and now Carter is getting in on it too. He came home a few weeks ago and said, “Mom, I’m going to apply to go to the Junior Leadership Seminar in Germany. If I get accepted, can I go?” I looked over the application and asked, “Did you know you have to write essay answers to all of these questions?” thinking that would be a deal breaker, but he said, “Yes, I’m going to do it. I just need to know if you’ll pay the 200 Euro for me to go if I get accepted.” Baby, I’d pay 200 Euro for anything that gets you to write an essay, so YES!

Kid knows what he wants. He sat down, wrote two pages all about his leadership experience, what he hoped to get out of the seminar, and his thoughts on what makes a good leader versus a poor one. Out of 15 applications he made it to the final 4: the interview round with the Assistant Principal and some other staff. He wore a suit to school, answered their questions, and as a result he’s on his way to Germany tonight! And wearing his Bavarian hat to get into the spirit of things. 

It’s going to be chilly (especially compared to our normal 95 degree days) so he had to scrounge for warmer clothes from both his younger and older brother. We realized he had no pants so Calvin donated two pairs of his very skinny jeans that he had outgrown (that I still had to take in at the waist) and Caleb let him borrow a long sleeved T-shirt. I better start shopping for some clothes for our Christmas vacation or we will all be freezing! 

They left after midnight (like all flights from here seem to do) and stopped over in Istanbul before arriving in Germany the next day. He and the two other students from his school will be meeting up with Middle School kids from the other base schools from all over Europe.

Very tired future leaders!
So far Carter was able to text me to tell me that they had arrived, that he had eaten dinner, and that he was almost out of money on his phone. Oops, I should have checked that before he left. All that means is that he can’t text me as often. Bad for me, but good for him. This is where he’ll be this week:
“Oberwesel is located on the Rhine River, approximately 50 miles from Wiesbaden.  It is an historic town situated on the site of an old Celtic settlement and a Roman military service point.  It has many points of interest including the Schönburg Castle, the city walls, the Ochsenturm (Oxen Tower) and the Haagstrum.  The Youth Hostel is a part of “Schönburg Castle”. 
There will be over 140 middle-level students from DoDDS Europe schools.  The staff is composed of over 25 DoDDS educators.”
Sounds like a fun place, doesn’t it? At the end of the week Carter will come home and Calvin will take off with the Cross Country team to compete in Wiesbaden, Germany. He qualified last week as the 6th and final member of the team. All those very early morning runs paid off!

Do hard things

I have a love/hate relationship with CrossFit. I hate doing it, but I love what it’s doing for me. I’ve had a few people lately mention that I’m looking fit, both slimmer and stronger, but that’s not it. I mean, that’s great and hopefully I’ll continue to pull it together, but what I’ve found that’s really valuable is how it stretches me mentally every day. I started working out get my body in shape, but I’m loving that it’s strengthening my mind.

Each morning I have to go do things that I don’t think I can do. Every day my brain says, “There is no way you can do this” and I have to fight that feeling and do it anyway. Some days I succeed and do the impossible, other days I fall short. Either way, it’s excellent practice for my brain.

As a rule for life I don’t do things if I’m not 100% sure I’ll be able to do them. I avoid failure and any sort of risk. But this exercise is a revolving door of impossible tasks and I don’t have a choice but to try. Practicing uncertainty over and over again takes away the power it has over me. And it makes everything else relative: “I did 50 back squats this morning (lifting 110 lbs each time) — finding my way to a new place to meet a group of people is a cakewalk in comparison!”

My brain is learning the lesson that I can do hard things and is having to find a new set point for impossible. It’s also learning that trying and failing is OK too, but that I fail a lot less often than it predicts I will. Every time my brain tells me that something in life is too hard, it is faced with an arsenal of proof that I’m a lot tougher than it gives me credit for. It probably seems funny to talk about my brain as if it’s not me, but some days it really does feel like my brain is the devil on my shoulder, whispering (or shouting) at me to give up. Thankfully these days its voice is a lot quieter, but just because I’m not currently mentally ill, it’s still a constant practice to keep it in check and to muffle those words of discouragement that it would be eager to feed me if I gave it a chance.

I just got the kids off to school and I’m waiting for the alarm to tell me it’s time to put on my shoes and go do more hard things. I’m dreading it because today is the hard coach, the one who not only makes me do all the things, but tells me to put more weight on the bar and then babysits me to make sure I finish every last bit of it. It’s terrible. And wonderful. I’m totally dreading it. My legs are already dead from those 50 back squats yesterday, but he’ll laugh and say that it’s nothing. I have no idea what we’ll be doing today, just that it will feel impossible and that somehow I will get through it and be glad that I did it, but not in the way athletes are happy they worked out. I’ll be happy in the way that people with a phobia of flying feel when they’ve touched down at the end of a flight and are tempted to kiss the ground: “We made it! I’m alive. Hallelujah. It’s a miracle.”