Sports Weekend

A couple of weekends ago we had a sports-filled weekend. On Friday night we went to the local High School (Duncanville High School) football game. We've done this in a few of the places we've lived. For me it's a fun reminder of my high school days. I loved being a cheerleader and especially loved football season. Plus, if TV/movies ('Friday Night Lights', 'We Are Marshall', 'King of the Hill') are any indication, high school football is pretty big in Texas. It's a nice, relatively cheap activity for a Friday night. It was a lot of fun. The game was pretty exciting and or team won right at the end.

Micaiah sat with this face for much of the game. He was so mesmerized that he didn't put down his train or tickets for an hour.


Go Panthers! There was a very large paw print in the middle of the field. At some point during the game Orin noticed it and said, "Look, it's a big clue!" (from 'Blue's Clues')


This is Orin's new "cheese" smile.


Saturday was another night of sports. It was a little bigger than High School football. Damien's co-worker had 4 tickets to the Dallas Stars (professional Hockey) game and couldn't go. Damien loves hockey, so he was very excited when he was offered the tickets. I was a little worried about how the kids would do having to sit there for three hours, but they did great. It was nice to have the football game the night before to do a little 'test run.' We were at the very top of the stadium and it was incredibly steep. I got a little nervous each time one of them stood up. They were great the first period and just sat in their seats in awe of the game. We didn't feed them dinner and brought a bunch of food which kept them busy through the beginning of the second period. By the end of the second period they were ready for a break. We took a walk during the break and got ice cream. We returned in time for the third period and eating the ice cream kept them buys through most of that. By the end, they had settled down to just watching the game from their seats. It was actually a pretty exciting game. It was pretty high scoring for a hockey game and by the end it was tied 5 to 5 and went into OT. Sadly, the Stars lost in OT.

Orin is pretty scared of loud noises (fireworks, thunder, etc...). I totally didn't think how that might play out at the game. The noise is at a different level in an enclosed arena compared to an open football stadium. The first incident occurred about 5 minutes after we got there. The lady was singing the National Anthem: "...Whose broad stripes and bright..." and when she said "stars" everyone (and I mean everyone) in the arena yelled out "stars" with her. I was even startled. Damien was holding Orin's hand and said he felt him jerk in his surprise. Then he sported the saddest face I've ever seen (huge lower lip sticking out and all) and he started to cry. He's just like me - I hate to be startled. You'll never catch me watching a scary movie. We were able to calm him quickly (thank goodness). It then occurred to me that there might be another "stars" in the lyrics. I quickly went through the rest of the song in my head, just in time to cover Orin's ears for the other "stars". The second incident occurred in the first 10 minutes of the game when the Stars were the first to score. The entire arena (including us) stood and screamed. That didn't go over to well with Orin either. But after explaining to him that it was because we scored and that people were really happy, he totally got it. We told him to yell along with everyone. After that he would just yell out randomly during the game. It wouldn't have been too unusual except for the fact that his cheering sort of sounded like a dying cow. It was hilarious. When the Stars scored again, we could tell Orin was a little concerned, but he quickly joined along with the cheering and recovered. He was fine after than any time the Stars got a goal. I was very proud of him.


Another "cheese" smile.


It's hard to tell but this was right after Micaiah's only break down of the evening. He did great the entire time and was the first one to stand up when others were (even when not everyone was standing) and would make me stand as well. He cheered and yelled with the best of them. His only moment of weakness came when there was about a minute left in the game and the Stars scored to tie it up. Damien was holding Micaiah and yelled VERY loud which Micaiah didn't like much. He didn't cry long. The nice thing about their few crying incidents was that they came during loud moments, no one around us could even tell or was bothered by it.


Yum - probably the best part of the game for them. Or it might have been the bag of marshmallows I brought along with me that they finished off during the second period.