Prochein Amy

It’s back and this year I am not coaching. But going to the practice, it was hard not to jump in.

It should be an interesting season. There are 4 girls teams total, so by the end, we will know the opposition.

And the girls will have the biggest fan base there.

On our trip to Abilene, my husband brought up a fun way to have an adventure he had heard about from some friends. We decided to try it out – maybe since we were in a town we don’t live in. Have you heard of Geocaching?

Geocaching is a worldwide game of hiding and seeking treasure. A geocacher can place a geocache in the world, pinpoint its location using GPS technology and then share the geocache’s existence and location online. Anyone with a GPS unit can then try to locate the geocache.

But what is a cache? There are many kinds that you can learn more on their website, but mostly we found small containers, like a prescription bottle, with a small paper log in it. You have to BYOP(en) and you write down the date and your name. Then you can go online and log your find. Our finds took us to places in Abilene we would not have visited on our own.

This is a great way to add adventure to your trips or (once you have purchased a GPS) a cheap way for entertainment. Many car navigators have a “walking” feature.

Are you already geocaching? Send me an email so I can “friend” you and see your adventures.

Facebook has an application where you can vote on who is the nicest person. I updated my status with my thoughts on this contest.

Amy is too nice to enter the nicest person contest. I would hate to make the others feel bad when I win. That is not very nice.

Hubby also had a comment:

Mark isn’t nice enough to enter the nicest person contest to prevent someone else from coming in last. That is too nice.

When I took on the coaching gig for my 3rd grade daughter’s team, I figured I would regret it.  But it was for her.  Little did I know how good it would be for me.  So here is a bullet recap and random thoughts.

Our last game was this Saturday and we all dreading it since we would be playing the best team that had already stomped us twice.  I was honest with the girls and we all knew it would be a tough game.  In our practice we went over a few of the basics and worked on our weak points.  

Friday evening I get a call from the league coordinator asking if we would play a double header.  One team had forfieted and he wanted the other team to have a chance.  I asked the girls before the first game and they all enthusastically agreed. I was worried and it seem the only ones who hesitated were the parents.  I think the girls liked the idea of getting to play more.  

First game starts.  We stuggle, but then the girls gel and we are giving them a run for their money.  They beat us by two baskets, but only because they put their talest girl on our shortest to keep her from scoring.  Heh!  Our best game ever!  

It was great to see the girls improve, not just on our team.  

Our shortest girl plays with the most effort and makes up for it with umph.  Her parents were concerned a few times when she was matched up with a taller girl, but I knew she could handle it.

This was the first time my daughter has played.  She has improved 300%!  She can dribble, shoot, defend her dribble with her arm, and play awesome defense.  I know I am biased, but I see stars when she plays.  Not future scholarship stars, but the aura of fun and enjoyment.  She likes to play.

I have never played team sports, so watching the team dynamics and peer pressure was interesting.  I was suprised how the girls expressed their dissatifaction with a teammate who seem to get hurt all the time and gave up easily.  She was told to suck it up and point blank asked why she always got hurt.  Ouch, but it needed to be said.  

I have a new admiration for the sport of basketball.  I don’t think I will ever get into pro, but now that I understand the basics, I can appreciate the game.  I wish I had played in high school.

During our second game, the other team agreed to let my younger daughter play.  We were short 1 girl and had just played a game, so we wanted to give the girls a chance to sit out a period.  I sold it with that and that she was “only” a second grader.  Ended up she made about 3 baskets, defended like she should, and gelled with the team.  She was at our practices and helped out when we needed an extra, so I know that helped.  

There are various coaching styles out there and I was able to observe several examples of what not to do.  

Most of the mothers knew more about the sport than I did (which was nothing) and helped out at the practices.  They were honorary coaches!

I was challenged by many aspects of it (mostly the referring), but I enjoyed it and will coach again next year if I can.

The basketball coaching gig is going better than I expected.  I am getting lots of help from experienced parents and learning as we go.  I like it enough to want to coach again next season.

The refereeing, not so much.  It is a tough job.  I have ref’ed 1 and half games and after each one I am a nervous wreck.  Not to mention the anxiety before.  What is really weird about the whole thing – it’s like I have stage fright.  I get meek and almost shy.  That is not like me. 

I already signed up to ref two more games, but I am not sure I am right for the job.  I want to be good at it, but I don’t want to learn at the expense of the girls I am ref’ing.  This week I will do more reading about how to ref, see what I can find online, and how I feel after that.  I know the league would understand if I back out, but I hate to do that. 

Any tips or suggestions?

Smoked bacon weaved around sausage and more bacon.  Amazing!  

Allan shared this link on google reader a few weeks ago and I shared it with my anti-MIL.  We tucked it away until hubby found it and suggested it for Super Bowl Sunday.  

Not something you would want to eat on a regular basis, but if you get a hankering for bacon, this will get it out of your system!  The smoked flavor takes it up a few notches.

Today was the 2nd game of my coaching career.  I am 1-1.  Woo hooo!

Our first game I was pleasantly surprised by how well the girls played.  I recruited a basketball savy mom for our practice this week and we improved on our shooting and defending.  Rebounding needs some work, but I can see how it is hard to defend your person and keep your eye on the ball.

This league is about equal playing time, equal matchups, and building skills.  Each quarter the girls line up and the refs and coaches make sure the matchups are equal.  One matchup needed to be changed and the ref asked for me to select a weaker player (quietly, of course).  I realized I did not have a weak player, but a few who are just a little better.  How cool is that?!?!  I have a good team!

My Oldest is on the team and we had her matched up with the tallest girl from the other team.  Good matchup.  She asked me to switch her color so she could cover someone else.  I told her it was a good matchup, they were both the tallest, and she was doing fine.    I mentioned this to the other team coach and she said the girl Oldest was covering asked her the same thing.

Honey Bee used her new calculator and some critical information from her Dad to figure out the hours, minutes and seconds that the boy in the story cried.  I did not know she had a specific reason for needing this info until she asked me to post her story.

This year hubby and I added a new dish to our Christmas spread.

He tested the homemade Mushroom Soup Recipe (from Wolfgang Puck) at the beginning of December with great reviews and drooling.

So for the actual Christmas dinner, we used Paula Deen’s Green Bean Casserole recipe, replacing the canned mushroom soup with the Puck soup hubby made the day before and using fresh green beans. What I really liked about Paula’s recipe is that she mixes in the fried onions instead of just putting them on top. Yum!

It has been requested for us to prepare this dish for next years Thanksgiving dinner and we will be making it again for Christmas. It is a dish well worth the time since the taste and flavors our wonderful. It would be a great dish to take to a party if you want to impress. And if they don’t like it, you get to eat all of the leftovers!