Matching Tracksuits

fun in fours

Soccer Practice

The Boy's team notched a significant win this weekend, beating a previously-unbeaten team, and that decidedly. What does a wise coach do on Monday practice? Run drills? Work them silly? Burpees and suicides? Of course not -- he just let them play.

And the sun did a little playing with the clouds as well. That photo looks excessively edited, but I did my best to make it look just as it did when I took it -- some of the most brilliant and rich colors I've ever seen. Only the ground is too dark...

Sunday Walk

The Boy has joined the Carolina Youth Symphony. Their mission, according to their site:

Our mission is to encourage artistic excellence in a nurturing environment by providing the highest quality orchestral training and performance opportunities to qualified musicians, grades K-12, and make participation possible through many financial aid and work study programs.

CYS Website

Auditions were in May, but since the Boy's middle school band teacher is one of the conductors for the CYS, he pulled some strings and got the Boy an audition in September.

Practice is every Sunday from 1:15 to 2:45, and it takes place on the Furman University campus in the north of the city. It's a private university with a lovely campus complete with a lake and its famous tower. So while E plays, I go for a walk.

K and the pup went with us today since she had the free time, and we went for a four-mile walk while the Boy rehearsed with about 50 other local kids.

Of late, the Boy has really become focused on his music. We have an hour-long private lesson for him every Tuesday, and he returns home from that lesson and plays for another half hour or so, usually on the back deck. He told me that someone once shouted "Good job!" at him when he finished playing.

Goal!

It's not often Emil scores a goal: he plays left back most of the time, so defending is his thing. But the coach put him up front in the second half of today's game, and he got a free kick.

Materials for the First Concert

Polish Dancers

Saturday’s Soccer

International Festival 2025

End of Season

Tuesday

I was speaking with my current students about how differently I teach this leadership class than I taught English classes. I told them how much work I gave the students, how hard the assignments were, how stressed some of the students were. When they laughed that they were glad I'm not their English teacher this year, I also revealed that most of my students found English in high school to be very easy after my class. Several students then changed their story: "You need to teach us English in eighth grade!" they exclaimed.

But do I want to teach English anymore? I'm enjoy this too much.

Walkathon 2025