Family Vacation

What a busy year! We stopped long enough to notice that the summer was almost gone and the kids were scheduled to go back to school in a couple of weeks and we haven't even done anything as a family this summer.  Looking ahead at the next couple of weeks we decided that we had to make something happen right away or we were not going to get it done this year at all. 

Grandma Marge has been wanting to take the grandkids to see the Noah's Ark Musical at Sight and Sound Theatre in Branson for over a year, so we decided that since the show ends in October that it was now or never.  We packed up and headed to Branson on Thursday afternoon and took Grandma and Grandpa and Kaiya with us.  We spent all day on Friday at Silver Dollar City riding everything in the park several times.  The kids had a blast but you could tell after 12 hours of walking the hills and standing in lines they (we) were starting to get tired.  We headed back to the hotel where John and Mona came down to meet us for the show the following day.  Saturday morning we got up and went to the outlet mall for a while to fight the crowds, forgetting it was the tax-free sales weekend in Missouri.  We were able to find some great deals and picked up a few things for the kids to start back to school.   After lunch we arrived at the theatre for an incredible show that amazed everyone.  The live animals and set were amazing to see in person.  After the show we started the trek back home for a day of catching up before everyone had to go back to work.  It was a very nice trip and was something that we all will remember for a long time.

Wildcat Cheer

I think I have mentioned it before, but Lizzy started her Freshman year by making the Blue Springs High School Varsity Cheerleading Team and has really enjoyed meeting some new friends this year. They have been practicing at least a couple of days a week since back in April when they had tryouts.

Her team attended a three day Cheer Camp at Northwest Missouri State University in Maryville back in June and competed at the Kansas City Regionals where they qualified for the Missouri High School State Championships that will be held at the University of Missouri - Columbia Campus in October.

The "Cats" waiting for the awards presentation

The High School Football season begins tonight with the annual Purple & Gold Scrimmage.  Next week will be the Jamboree and then August 26th starts the regular season with a big home game against rivals Rockhurst High School.  GO CATS!!!

Xtreme vs. Panthers

Mother Nature finally eased up a little and allowed us to reschedule our games with the Oak Grove Panthers friday night from the rain out last week. You could tell that it had been over a week since we had any live action as they looked a little rusty both at the plate and in the field. It was a cool, dreary night and it was just hard to get into the baseball frame of mind - it was much more like football weather.

Kendall had a pretty good night other than taking another hard hit ball off the right shin.  He was playing pitcher at the time it was a line drive shot right at him with very little time to react.  After a few minutes of attention by the coaches he stayed in the game but moved over to play second base for the remainder of the game.  He is a pretty tough little guy!  Overall the Xtreme didn't fare so well - they dropped both games.  Hopefully they will come back next week after the Memorial Day weekend a little more focused and ready to play some baseball.

What happened to my Little Girl...?



WOW - My Little Princess

Lizzy had her 8th Grade Formal at Brittany Hill Middle School on Friday night, and WOW - overnight we lost our little girl.  As always she amazes us with her abilities, not only did she look stunning - she proved to be a very mature young lady.  Fonda picked her up from school that afternoon and headed off to get her hair and makeup done and arrived home just in time to put her dress on as I presented her with her corsage and off for some pictures with a few friends before the dance started.  After the dance several classmates gathered at a friends house to continue the fun for a little longer.  Following that party, Lizzy had a few girls over to spend the night.

Friends being Friends

With these kids about to wrap up another school year - they are about to make some big changes moving over to the Blue Springs Freshman center with about 1200 other Freshman from the district.  Many new challenges will be ahead but I have no doubt these kids can handle whatever they are faced with and I am very proud of them and what they have accomplished so far.

Great start....

Single - Right back up the middle

The Xtreme Baseball Team picked up where they left off from the pre-season tournament and won their first double header against the Irish on Tuesday.  They had a great outing both offensively and defensively with some new players stepping up and making some key plays.  Kendall played shortstop again the first game and started in the outfield for the second game until we got behind a little and then the coaches decided we better bring the solid infield back together to hold the Irish offense back while we scored some runs.

Rounding second base looking for the Third Base Coach.

Getting out of the gates...

Burning up the base paths...

Take me out to the ballgame

Showing off one of the new uniforms.

The Xtreme 8U Baseball team opened play this weekend with the Queen City Preseason Tournament held at Mill Creek Park in Independence.  They played two games on Saturday and will finish the tournament with one more game this afternoon.  It was a real eye opener to see where the team stacked up to other competition in the area, and it gave the coaches a chance to see our strengths and where we need some real attention.

Shortstop keeping an eye on the pop-fly.

Winding up to throw to first for the out.

The first game was very lopsided as they played the A's and they are obviously a veteran team that has played together for a couple of seasons.  We spent most of the game moving our key players around on defense to cover for their big bats. 

Perfect day at the plate - got on base every time at bat.



Took a bad hop and then off the knee.

The second game ended in a one run loss, even though they had a tough defensive outing they were at least able to rattle some bats and score some runs.  We look forward to seeing some improvement over the next week before the regular season starts.  Keep up the hard work and it will get better...

Sportsmanship Winner

Recently Lizzy wrote a very nice essay about Sportsmanship for the MSHSAA (Missouri State High School Athletic Association) and it was submitted by her Language Arts teacher in a state contest.  On Friday she found out that her essay had won 1st Place at the Regional Level and had been forwarded to the State Level where she placed 4th in the State. 

We are very proud of her accomplishments both athletically and academically. With this award it shows that she has become one of the best at both, not only is she a star athlete and a great cheerleader - she has also learned some very valuable lessons and is a great leader.  We look forward to watching Lizzy over the next few years as she made the Varsity Cheerleading Squad at Blue Springs High School for her upcoming freshman year.  Keep up the good work!

U.S. Finals - Champions!!!

N10CT Rocks!!!

The Intensity girls kept getting better as the year went on, in fact they won their last two competitions and peaked atjust the right time.  At the COA Championships, the girls won first place and brought home awesome black Championship Jackets.  Well, just when you thought it couldn't get any better they tweaked their performance a little and won their division at the U.S. Finals to bring home beautiful white Championship Jackets. Now the big question is which jacket to wear what day.....?

Lizzy - We are so proud of you!

Keep your talents and enthusiasm going right into your

High School Cheerleading years, we look forward to watching you on the

Varsity Cheerleading Team at Blue Springs High School next year.

New Ride

Although it was way overdue, I was able to find me a car this week.  I have been shopping for a new car since back in November before we wrecked Fonda's Jeep Grand Cherokee on our trip to Bloomington, Illinois.  Needless to say, that put a slight delay in the ability to purchase something and replacing Fonda's vehicle became more inportant.  I have been very particular this time as I wanted something that I could drive for a few years and didn't want to just buy something to fill the need - I got something that I really wanted.  I searched the internet and drove around to all of the local car lots any chance I got, I even drove around to some not so local lots on a few of my days off and found nothing that really hit me.  I finally ran across a dealers website and found one that I really liked and made arrangements to go test drive it and check it out one night after work.  Wow, I fell in love with it right away and felt comfortable with the dealer and salesman (which is not so easy anymore).  The winner is a 2005 Nissan Maxima SE.  It is in pristine condition inside and out with all the bells and whistles.  I have never owned a vehicle like it before and I can't seem to take my eyes off of it or wipe the smile off my face when driving it. 

Jam Live - Indy

We were back in Indianapolis the first week of March for the Jam Live Cheer Competition.  As always the girls made us proud and ended up posting one of the top scores in the whole competition, but the division was very tough and the girls ended up placing third - with less than two tenth's of a point seperating the top three teams. 

Jam Live is a unique competition as the girls approach the competition floor via the "Red Carpet."

Lizzy and Coach Delanne on the Red Carpet

Lizzy showing off the Cheer Muscles on the Red Carpet

Proud Mom and the Star strutting their stuff on the Red Carpet

Intesity is about to wrap up the Competition Season with two more local competitions.  This weekend they have COA, a two-day competiton at the Kansas City Convention Center and then April 16th they will finish with the US Nationals in which they won a paid invitation to from a great performance earlier in the year.

JamFest Super Nationals - Indianapolis

The BIGGEST Competition of the year - JAMFEST SuperNationals!!!

This was a real travel event! The gym chartered two buses and the teams

departed at 5:00 am Friday, January 14th headed for Indianapolis, Indiana
for the weekend.  They arrived in Indianapolis around 3:30 pm and immediatly
checked into their rooms and prepared for team dinners in downtown Indianapolis
and then they were off to the Indianapolis Convention Center for practices that evening.

 

Saturday morning they had breakfast at the Hotel and then off to the
Convention Center again along with about 475 other teams to compete
in the first day of competition.  Intensity had a little tumbling trouble on the
first day and had to come together to gain some ground on
their competition the second day of performances.

They left the Hotel a little earlier on Sunday morning to make a few changes
to their routine for the second day.  It paid off and they had a wonderful
performance and were able to gain some points on the rest of the teams
and raised their standings into the top 10.

After totalling scores for the weekend, they placed 10th in their

division.  Pretty impressive for a National Event where there were
about 500 teams competing from all over the country and Canada.

Keep it up girls - we are so proud of you!!!

Twisted Athletics

N 10 CT!

It was worth the travel excitement when the girls got to perform on Saturday in Bloomington, Illinois.  As usual they made us very proud and represented the gym very well. The Intensity Cheer Team placed first in their division and enjoyed getting to travel to new areas and experience different things. 

Most of the competition was from the Illinois, Indiana, Ohio area and I think the girls really enjoyed themselves.  They really looked good and have come a long way since the beginning of the season.

OUCH!!!

Well, if you haven't heard by now we had a little excitement with our travel to Bloomington, Illinois in December for the Twisted Athletics Cheer Competition. We were all enjoying a nice ride and we were just about 45 minutes from our destination as it started to snow and the next thing you know we were fish-tailing down the highway before losing total control and spinning down the highway and I was just doing my best to steer into the spins until we came to a stop.  Just before we came to a complete stop we were facing back into the traffic that was coming at us and another vehicle couldn't stop and struck the front end of the Jeep and spun us around one more time and we ended up in the median.  Somehow I was able to drive it out and we contacted the people that hit us and exchanged information before driving the remaining few miles into Bloomington.  As we were sitting at the traffic light waiting to turn into the Hotel parking lot - a young teenager was driving in the snow for the first time and unable to stop rear-ended us. YES... two accidents within about 30 minutes of each other.

Luckily there were no injuries to any of us involved and we were able to drive the Jeep home after the Cheer Competition without any further incidents.  We then took the Jeep into the local body shop on Monday to get it fixed as we just bought it in July and planned to keep it for a while.

After we went through the whole insurance mess and them finding out that there was more damage than we originally thought, they decided to total it and we negotiated with them for a few weeks about the value of the vehicle - we finally settled so we could get on with finding another vehicle since it is not practical for a family with two kids and all of their activities to just have one vehicle.  Wow - so much excitement in one weekend!

Beauty and the Beast

Wow - What a performance!Brittany Hill Middle School performed the musical Beauty and the Beast this past weekend.  Friday during school hours they performed for the other 7th and 8th graders, Friday and Saturday evenings they performed for the public and Monday morning they had their final performance for the 6th graders.

 Lizzy played three different characters and done a wonderful job at each one of them.

They had a sold out show both evenings that it was available for the public and she had lots of family and friends there to support her each night.  I think I can speak for most - it was an incredible performance!