Saturday, September 24, 2005

10 kids in the yard.

Today was a dream day. L scored her goal in the morning at her organized game. This afternoon we had tons of neighborhood kids in the yard and our cousins A and P.
I thought it was a perfect time to get a pickup soccer game going. We only played for about a half and hour, but it was really fun. I played and passed with the girls. I think it was great for L and T to see some older kids play the game. They saw some good passing and dribbling and hopefully got some ideas for their games.
I loved having all of the kids around the house. My theory is that if neighborhood kids love to hang out at our house, then so will our kids. We we all be relaxed and hopefully can talk about anything as we play soccer of whiffle ball or whatever.
I also love mentoring A and P. A taught me how to do some gymnastics moves. She helped me do a walkover with a little help from M's baby slide. I walked up with my feet on the ladder while doing a bridge with my hands on the grass. Then I pushed off on the ladder and went up into a handstand and over onto my feet.
Later, A, P and my family went apple picking. P (11 years old) pondered how many apples were in the orchard.
"How could you find out?" I asked.
"I could count them." Replied P.
"How long would that take?"
"About 10 years." She replied.
"Could you estimate?"
"I could count the apples on one tree. Then I could find out how many trees are in the orchard and I could multiply."
I was blown away. That seems pretty brilliant for an 11 year old.
"Fantastic. How are you going to find out how many trees there are?"
"I can ask somebody in the barn."
"Great idea."

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