Last Friday Shane and I took the trip to Preston, Idaho.
Tacey had her first game that day. You know, she gets nervous like the rest of us, but she was VERY nervous this day. It was a bit
weird when we got there; they ran the JV and Freshman games at the same time in two different Gyms. That was a bummer because the other teams couldn't cheer for them. The Freshman team is very much a training team this year; there is lots of potential, but it was made known to them that they were using this year to train them and build for the future teams. Well,
Tacey likes that idea, as do ALL the girls. They are a very
coachable group. They came into this game with the coaches not expecting a lot from them. HOWEVER, the seven of them that have played together a lot KNEW they could win and had made up their minds to do so.
First there were captain duties to attend to!
Because they were running two games at once (which Shelley NEVER does) there was no one to keep stats for the
Freshman team. As Shane's cousin is the JV coach, and his Uncle is the Stats keeper, he got asked to fill in for the game. This is the picture of the major injury this game. This is just before the girl stabbed her in the eye. She came up blind, with her contact folded in half and lodged up behind her eyeball. That is also the Varsity and Freshman coaches watching her. They immediately pulled her out and she sat down on the bench. After a few minutes she ran to the locker room. I ran after her. Her contact had finally come out, but she didn't have any solution to help her put it back in. Going on in the game without the contact was not an option as it was her bad eye that got stabbed. The father of one of her teammates had
solution and eye drops in his car. He ran and got them for me, and we managed to get the contact back in with a great deal of pain. She was bouncing around and screaming
because it hurt so bad, but she wasn't going to sit out the rest of the game! She later had a knee injury, but she muscles through all of it, and was fine the next day! (Except for the broken vessels in her eye and the big bruise on her knee!)
She recovered nicely, and went on to play a VERY good game. She was
aggressive, shut down several of the other team's baskets, and shot more in that game than any 3 games last year. Okay, she didn't make any. BUT they were completely accurate, just lack the arch to make them drop. That can certainly be attributed to the adrenaline and nerves, so we expect that should improve.
She really took leadership as well, both on and off the court.
She never let down - not at all while she was playing.
In the end they won 33-29 in overtime! Yep, yep! It was also the FIRST time since she has been playing school basketball, that her team has won their season opener. Should I also mention that the JV lost 33-32 by a free throw in the last 3 seconds, and Varsity got spanked 62-39? I guess the P
reston Varsity team has several girls that can make 3 pointers. That is all they did the first half of the game: shoot 3 pointers. So, in the end, the little team that wasn't supposed to do
well was the only one that won! I talked to
Tacey's coach after the game and she said the level at which the girls played was completely unexpected. She even admitted to them that she
didn't expect them to win.
Tacey and the other girls knew they were capable; they set out to win and they DID!
So, Sunday night snow began. Monday it was deep and cold. We went from a very chilly fall, to this in just 10 hours.
McCade broke off the long icicles and wanted to eat them. I told him I didn't think that I would suck on ANYTHING that rolled off the roof. *yuk!*
You can see how the 40-50 mile and hour winds formed the icicles at an angle.
The discussion about whether or not it was a good idea to eat the icicles continued. . .
and continued. . .
The snow covered everything; so I decided to work on my picture taking.
Seriously, this bugs me. They plow, and move all the snow into the middle of the street. Then they bring this truck along that scoops it up and puts it into a dump truck. The problem is; I never see anything other than the plow. They leave the big piles there. Can you say 'Unfair temptation for small children?' or 'Driving hazard'?
It snowed all day yesterday and all night last night, and all morning this morning; television kept being interrupted by severe weather update. There was a Blizzard warning, and they closed ALL roads. The winds were 60 mph and above. By lunchtime the boys went out to play where the backyard used to be.
McCade standing in the snow. It doesn't really show how deep it is,,
because he's standing on some of it.
It is well above his waist, so he can't walk in in. It is more of an army-crawl situation.
And
Dallin has the snowball makers doing what they were created to do.
This is the perspective shot. The BBQ is at ground level. All that snow in 36 hours! I would say there is a good 3 feet out there.
Poor Shane had to drive home from Salt Lake in it last night. He barely made it. He plowed his truck through drifts as tall as the truck is. Then he spent most of the afternoon playing with a snow blower. Poor guy. Good thing he likes snow.
The kids are not as happy though. School is out for the week, but if we HAD school yesterday and today, it would have been cancelled. McCade is behind on his reading, so I keep sending him to do it. Tacey not only had Basketball practice and dance cancelled for the rest of the week, she also had her game cancelled. Both of them are in bad moods. Dallin has escaped into a book, and I am wishing they would all find some happiness somewhere. So much for a nice, peaceful vacation! As far as the snow goes, there is no end in sight. This has really screwed up my exercise routine!
Danielle
