Spring Sports

Last Friday, Jericho had his first track meet of the season.

I quickly found out why it's called a track meet.

Just try keeping 'track' of all of one son's events around the track while your husband is working the meet calling out all the events via a megaphone...all while keeping 'track' of a rambunctious 4 year old who wants to do everything his big brother is doing, and you'll understand exactly what I mean.

For instance, one of Jericho's events is the 200 meter dash. They all line up at their respective starting points, and take off on the shot. (Jericho is to the left of the little boy on the sidelines).



Judah was fascinated with the gun that the Athletic Director used. "Is it real? Does it shoot bow-wets? Can I shoot it?" Lord, have mercy!

When he disappeared in the milling crowd moments later, I thought it was to go find the man with the gun. Instead, I found him out trying to get out on the track to run with all the big guys. If big brother could do it, then he could too (or so he thought).

I finally dragged him out of the way and managed to get a photo of another race. (Jericho in the center).



Later, Judah found his friend E, whose big brother seems to participate in all the same sports as Jericho. Together, these boys are quite a handful.

I spent my time running interference for both Judah and E, trying to keep them off the track and out of the way of the long-jumpers. E's mom was a tad preoccupied with her other son (who is about 18 months old), and who at the time of the following incident busy teething on the edge of a garbage can which happened to be his perfect mouth height. Blech.

So, it came time for Jericho to do the high jump again. I'd been trying to get a picture of him leaping over the bar...but Judah someone kept getting in the way of my picture-taking.

Finally, Judah and E were quietly playing with toys at my feet and my camera was poised and ready to go.

Jericho went loping around in a semicircle and flung himself up and over the bar...



and landed, a perfectly executed jump.

They raised the bar and he went again.



It was a beautiful thing.

And then, to my horror, on the 'overflow' pad beside the giant landing pad, I saw this



Judah apparently thought the landing pads resembled a giant bed, and thought that jumping on it would be great fun.

Embarrassed, I chased him off of it and we were just heading over to watch the 4-by-100 relay when he and E took off like a shot.

Seeing how much fun Judah'd had jumping, E had joined him and the two raced headlong back to the mat.



Before I could get them both off the thing they'd managed to each get in a couple of good belly slides.

When I finally rounded them up and told them not to do that again, I heard E say, "But...we love doing the penguin slide." Apparently that is the name for track events in their little world, lol.

Anyway, once again I missed Jericho's Kodak moment, but was pleased to learn that his team took 1st overall in that event.

To keep the little boys from causing the high-jumpers to have to stop circle back and re-run for their jumps, I dropped E off with his family and took Judah across the track where one of my friends from Bible study was sitting with her family. Her daughter was racing for another school.





I realized something for the first time: Had my friend had a son instead of a daughter, I might not have been quite so gracious about cheering on one of my boy's competitors, lol.

While we chatted, Judah played pretty well by himself, having found a motorcycle toy and rider in my purse. There may have also been a bribe of gum involved.

He even met a boy there, and though I don't recall them ever exhanging names, they were soon fast friends.

You just have to laugh when you hear little boys of this age play together. There is always this sense of urgency. "Hurry...da zombies are gonna get us!" with lots of running around and imaginative play. This little boy seemed to go along with whatever Judah thought up. "Don't step on da wrocks...only da grwass, or dey'll getcha." They pretended pretty well together for quite a while.

When they tired of that, they began hopping around like jackrabbits or kangaroos or something.

E found us again, and before long they were all turning somersaults.





But alas, the boys families soon moved on to their respective siblings next events, and having gotten distracted, I once again had to chase Judah off the track in just the nick of time.

Judah hadn't had a nap and was getting pretty cram-all-I-can-in-before-I-crash-from-exhaustion squirrelly, and it was about all I could do to keep up with him through the remainder of Jericho's events.

Jericho went back to the high jump once again because each time they raised the bar he kept clearing it.

His last growth spurt has made him all knees and elbows, but that's worked in his favor. He had the perfect lope necessary to clear 4 feet, 4 inches. He sailed right over the bar.

While waiting in line for them to raise the bar again, some athletes from other schools were asking him, "Dude what grade are you in? You're GOOD." Turns out they were all bigger 8th graders. He was the lone 7th grader making it to that level.

He attempted 4 feet 6 inches, but bumped the bar. Bummer.

Anyway, he was delighted to take 1st in the high jump overall for JV, and learned after placing in every event that this might mean he's been bumped up to Varsity for that event.

THATTA BOY, JERICHO!!

**Ahem**. Sorry for the outburst.

Anyway, in spite of all the keepin' track this mama had to do, it was a fun afternoon.