By Nicole

I am blessed to have married a man who doesn't watch any televised sports.  Maybe a Superbowl at someone else's house.  We don't have cable or satellite. I am so blessed. But, our boys play Little League... so our life is all about football.  Practice, practice, practice.  Game, game.  Practice, practice, practice.  And so on. Tonight they brought the whole bundle of kids, football players and cheerleaders, out on the field during half time at the high school home game.  I must admit, I like a little Friday night Forks football. And tonight was a good night to be there.  We beat a team we haven't beat in a decade!  Our nemesis. The kids were pumped.  My husband was excited to watch a good football game.  And I did my own little bit of cheering tonight. Tomorrow is more football.  Little League all day long. But now....  Now, I'm researching how to dry and roast sunflower seeds. Maybe we'll eat them at next wee...

Yes, we did watch the last part of the Superbowl game today.  And yes, I know what it is.  I even understand some of the rules, and I know the names of a lot of the teams.  But, we are not a sports watching family in general.  I dislike spending my time watching any kind of sports (I like to waste my time on other equally frivolous pastimes, as you all know).  It makes me very happy that my husband is not a sports watcher.  I think I might even love him more because of it.  Previous boyfriends of mine have been the kind that would watch ANY sport on television and had at least three or five different teams, sports, etc. that they HAD to follow religiously.  Seriously.  So today, on the way home from church, we were explaining the rest of the day's schedule to the kids.  We planned to go over and watch the Superbowl at Grandpa's house after we finished some other chores.  The boys started asking what it was, and after Jason had exp...

On our way to our dentist and eye doctor appointments earlier this week, the kids and I got on the topic of school and sports.  Connor asked me if he could play football this year, and I said, "Not until 3rd grade, bud."  Well, this proceeded to break his heart, just like it does most of the time right around the different sports sign-up times.  And we had a long, drawn-out conversation where he cried and I apologized and tried to help him understand my point of view.  Every season, we seem to have the same conversation, and it gets longer and more dramatic the older he gets.  At the beginning of preschool, I set up a "rule" (like I think most parents do with their kids, especially their first-born kids). The rule is: No sports until 3rd grade, and then only one (or a max of two if Dad undermines me). The first-born rule I remember my mom had for me was about ear piercing.  She said not until I was 16.  Well, through man...