Nostalgia and Reality.

This is me. The year after my mother made me match my sister the Halloween before. I was a witch and so was she. I was mortified for a whole year. Enough so that my mom made me this Cinderella costume, 36 inch hoop and all. I won all the Halloween costume contests that year not only because my mom did awesome but because I really was Cinderella. I also wore this to see the movie in the theater. I remember little girls pointing and saying, "Is that Cinderella?" And I knew I was. I loved all the girly girl things in the world. I also danced and did gymnastics. I remember my mom having to drive to the next town just for me to have dance lessons. I also remember when lessons came to our small town of Sisters, Oregon. It was great fun to dance and do gymnastics. I was extremely and unnaturally flexible. The splits were actual comfortable for me and I wish I had the picture of me and 6 other girls doing headstands. My spilt was to die for. I would give anything to have a third of that flexibility back.
Fast forward to my adult life....Your first born you always are so excited when they finally reach the age they can actual do a sport or lesson. Thomas did soccer at 4 and never did figure it out that year. Dane was in school, we had one car, two kids and Dane was the coach. We made every game all four us and every game we lost. Oh the joys of being on the other side of sports.
Well, those joys of being on the other side of sports took a toll on my nerves. I am very competitive and when my kids are up to bat or playing soccer my stomach turns and turns. But despite that we have always participate and dragged the little ones along. When I had 3 I thought it was cute to have 2 play and match Tyler's outfit to the sport. I remember hauling play pens to the games to keep him from running off. Most the time Dane worked on Saturday's so this was my endeavor. My nerves never did well. But it was fun.
Then came Katie. So now I was dragging 4 kids to events. (I make a very good pack mule) Nerves were always fried all day knowing there was a game. And when Kaylyn was catcher.......Oh my. She was involved in every play and I was chasing and running after kids and usually panicking every night of the week. So we started weeding out sports. Thomas stopped baseball. Good call for us.
Kaylyn was an awesome catcher. But I still would laugh and chuckle inside watching her play. Why? Because you see she was my daughter and I was total opposite of her. Playing in the dirt? Sweating? Not for me but for her. My Grandma Jane had the chance to see her play. I remember her laughing out loud because that was my daughter playing catcher. Yup. That's my girl. Kaylyn would also never have been Cinderella for Halloween or taken a dance class. But we like each other and I have learned to embrace our differences.
So as I would get Katie ready to go to these games and hear comments from Dane and Thomas about when she would play I would simply reply, "Katie's a dancer." No more competition for me please. Just give me a cute dancer. I brainwashed her from birth in hopes of her being a dancer. The year that we had all three playing soccer was just insane. I was coaching Tyler and Dane was coaching Kaylyn and Katie only survived thanks to dear friends. That was it. We started to re-evaluate was good for us as a family.
We took a year off and this spring I will have two soccer players, one dancer and another who will most likely play in the dirt. There will be one very happy mom on the sidelines cheering them on. Soccer is good in the spring. Less competition. Dance is good for me and Katie. Gives us a morning out. And someday just maybe Tyler will play again or maybe not. We will just wait and see.
So please let me indulge you with some more pictures of Katie later. You see I have been waiting an awful long time to have a dancer. Chances are she'll change her mind and drive race cars but I sure had fun watching her yesterday. So there you have it.... a little nostalgia and my reality.