Apple Orchard and Random Funnies

We decided to take advantage of the BEAUTIFUL weather this past Sunday and visit the apple orchard.  Kemper could (and would) eat 5 apples a day if we let him so we thought he may enjoy seeing where they grow and picking his own.  We loaded up and put the address into the GPS...I had found 2 orchards thanks to a MOPS group I am a part of and we decided to try the one that let you pick your own.  So we drove and drove (and drove) and when we arrived at our destination, it was a very sketchy looking house with some apple trees in the back yard.  There was one (tiny) sign that said apples and not a soul in sight.

After a minute of regrouping, we put the next address in and decided that maybe picking our own apples wasn't such a big deal after all.  So, off to Shade Tree Farms we went!

Kemper and Hudson checking out some apples.

This place looked MUCH nicer and there were signs of life instead of being all alone in the middle of the woods feel that the last place gave.  

Protecting his bag of apples.

They had a little store front set up with pre-picked apples and other fun apple products.  We decided to get a bushel of apples since Kemper enjoys them so much and James wanted me to try my hand at pies.  The nice lady let Kemper choose an apple to try while we began deciding which kind of apples we wanted to get.  We ended up with Galas, Red Delicious, Granny Smith and some Jonathan apples.  

Amazing how boys can always entertain themselves as long as there are rocks around.

While James was paying and asking if it was ok for us to explore the orchard a bit, Kemper found a pile of rocks to play on.  Hudson found the friendly farm dog and had a blast petting him and following him around.  

Off to explore.

We wandered around the orchard for a bit...they had peach trees as well as apple trees.  

Hudson wandered around with his apple.  I think this was his first time eating an apple without it being sliced.  He's normally not a fan of apples but he LOVED eating it straight off the core.  Now, anytime he sees the apples in the house, he freaks out and wants one.  

It's all fun and games until you fall on a rotten apple.

Hitching a ride with Daddy.

They had an awesome slide that the boys loved!  There was only one other family there and they left about 5 minutes after we got to the slide so the boys had it all to themselves.  They had a blast and probably would have played there the rest of the day if we had let them.  

Overall, it was a cute little farm and they were super friendly!  We didn't get to pick our own apples but we all had a good time and now we have lots of delicious apples to snack on!  

The weather has just been so beautiful lately.  We've been taking advantage of it and having plenty of park play dates!  Daddy decided it would be a good idea to teach Hudson how to climb this wall....yay.  If only he could teach him that attempting this wall is only ok when someone is there to spot you.  

Last night I had a coffee to attend so James had the boys by himself.  He met me at soccer practice and we traded vehicles so he could take the boys home afterwards.  They stopped to pick up Chinese for dinner which is one of Kemper's FAVORITE things!  He always asks for Chinese but mommy isn't a big fan so it's usually saved for special Daddy-Kemper nights.  

James said once they picked it up and were heading home, Kemper decided it should be a Boys Night!  Daddy and Kemper and Hudson could eat Chinese together for Boys Night...and then he said that Mommy could eat all by herself because that would be funny.  :(  What a stinker!  James assures me that when the boys are older, my feelings won't be hurt when Kemper and Hudson want to have boys nights with him and I'm by myself.  The more I think about it, maybe he's right....peace & quiet, a good book, a glass of wine....being the only girl in the family may not be so bad after all!  

This little fella is a daddy's boy.  When he wakes up in the morning, the first words out of his mouth are, "Dada? Dada?".  He asks for Dada constantly throughout the day.  If I ask him to say Mama, which is is perfectly capable of doing, he looks at me with a tiny smirk and says, "Dada!".  When James gets home at night, he gets the biggest grin on his face and runs straight to him.  He's also a pretty big fan of his brother which melts my heart.  If you ask him to say Kemper, he immediately says, "B!".  We're not sure where B came from but every time you ask him to say Kemper, that's what he says so apparently he's come up with his own name for Kemper.  The last few days, I've found myself referring to Kemper as B when talking to Hudson because he says it so often.  I love that he loves his daddy and brother so much!  

Let's talk 5-year old soccer...

So, soccer is a foreign world to me.  I had friends who played soccer growing up but soccer season was the same time as softball season, and lets be honest, there is a lot of running involved in soccer.  I'd rather sprint to first or trot around the bases ( :) no laughing!) than run up and down the soccer field.  Also, the fact that the time on the scoreboard doesn't match up to the actual time that the refs (umpires? officials?) keep throws me for a loop.  

Anyhow...Kemper requested to play soccer this year.  No prompting on our part (in fact, in years past, we've never brought it up because we're not really soccer people), just decided one day that he wanted to give soccer a try.  Not ones to dissuade him from being active and trying out different sports, we decided to sign him up on post even though we were told there was a better league out in town.  Reasoning behind that decision was that since he had never played before, we didn't need a super competitive league where all of the kids were already all stars.  

Team huddle before game 1.  Go Grass Kickers!

So, aside from the fact that I somewhat balked at the commitment this was turning out to be (hour long practices, 2 nights a week and games on Saturdays) for 5-year olds, we showed up for the first (actually second thanks to a military ball) practice with one excited little boy.  In true "parents of the year" fashion, he was the only kid without his own ball.  Apparently you supply your own ball for soccer on post.  Thankfully the coach had a few extras he was able to borrow for that practice and things got back to smooth sailing fairly quickly.  He seemed to love it and based on the drills the coach had them doing, he looked as if he was holding his own and that all of the kids were about on par with one another (with the exception of 2).

Practice number 2 is where we began to see the light.  Kemper is a pretty meek and mild kiddo...and when it came time to scrimmage, just picture the soccer ball as a flame and the kids as moths.  It was a giant swarm of kids with legs kicking every which way.  Kemper hung about 4 steps behind the giant pack of kids.  Does this phase him?  No, not really.  He still seems to enjoy it and have fun but most of our attempts to get him to jump in there have failed.  He seems to understand the concept that if he gets open, theoretically, someone should pass him the ball.  But nobody ever does despite his yelling and jumping up and down.  It's kind of a free for all.  

Getting ready to start the first game.  Kemper is #14

So, game 1 rolls around and luckily, James and I have smartened up about proper soccer sideline viewing etiquette.  We show up with our chairs (including an adorable kid sized chair for Hudson...which he sat in for approximately 5 seconds before making his first attempt to join the team on the field) and sat them as close to the sidelines as possible.  We did not, however, show up with an umbrella or pop up tent like 75% of the other parents did.  Silly us, we just put sunscreen on and figured we would be out there for an hour, at most.  The game starts and, much to our surprise, Kemper is starting!  Since this is 5-year old soccer, there is no score keeping and no official refs (umps? officials?) but the coaches stay on the field and guide the players through the game when needed.  From the moment the first whistle blew, I began to sense that we were in the minority in thinking that this was a "learning" league.  

Kemper's cheering section!

Some of these parents are BRUTAL.  My mouth may or may not have hit the ground a few times at the way some parents were behaving.  I can be just as competitive as the next guy but, for the life of me, I just can't get my hackles up when it comes to 5-year old soccer.  If the kids are having fun, GREAT!  Nobody getting hurt, GREAT!!  Learning a new sport, AWESOME!  

We have two kids on our team who are very good!  Their parents are VERY different.  Child A, his parents are respectful of the other parents, cheer the team on and encourage their son to let his teammates have a chance (no lie, he scored probably 11 times and broke away down the field many more times throughout that first game).  Child B's parents (well, dad) are very loud, have no problem criticizing their son (or any other player on the team) very loudly, and encouraging their son to only pass the ball to Child A.  Another parent, from the other team, ran up and down the sidelines screaming directions at her child the entire game.  

Kemper on the bench...where he seemed to prefer to stay after the game started.

 It became glaringly obvious that Kemper, while he enjoys soccer, is not the best soccer player on the team.  Refer back to the meek and mild section.  Whenever he was in the game, he kept up with the pack of kids but stayed 2-3 steps behind them.  He asked to substitute out a few times (and this would be where I get a bit frustrated) and seemed to enjoy his time on the bench.  He went through an entire Nalgene bottle of water and had to come have us refill his bottle mid-way through the game.  Game 2 and 3 went about the same, with him asking to sub out but he did get excited to play goalie for a bit in game 2 (albeit the coach hadn't really covered what the goalie can and cannot do so he didn't know he could use his hands...oops)!  

Pretty excited for the post-game snacks!

 We keep talking up and encouraging him to get into the mix of the kids and to go after the ball.  He's getting a little better as we get further into the season but is still content to just follow along behind.  He did seem to enjoy the mid-game goalie lesson that James gave him during the last game.  

The previous 2 pictures are of Kemper actually getting into the action during game 3.  His buddy was playing goalie and after a save, he saw that Kemper was open and kicked it to him.  He did great until the pack of kids caught up to him and then he shied off, as usual.  Either way, we were super proud of him and made sure to tell him following the game and praise him for how well he did when he had the ball.  

When it comes down to it, I just want him to have fun and enjoy his time on the soccer field.  If he finishes this season and decides he doesn't want to play next year, that is perfectly fine with me and I will be thankful that he tried it in the first place.  After each game and practice, my first question is always to ask him if he had fun.  He has plenty of time left in his life to worry about being competitive and winning. 

Throwback Thursday

I was going through some old pictures last night while working on a project and had such a good time reminiscing about Kemper as a baby so I thought I would share some of my favorites!  

6 months old

Bath in the sink at Myrtle Beach

Kemper and Gavin's first playdate

Right after we moved back to Germany, Lynse and I got the boys together to play.  Hard to believe they're 5 now...how blessed we are to be stationed with the Schmidts again!

7 months old

Kemper's 1st Halloween as an adorable lion.

11 months old

This was taken on our trip to Rome as we were touring the Pantheon

18 months old

Second trip to Myrtle Beach with MeMe and Pops

It's so much fun to look back and see the resemblances and the differences between Kemper and Hudson! 

Hudson's off to nursery school!!

This morning was Hudson's first morning of nursery school at the local Presbyterian church.  I was so worried about how he would do because the few times I put him in hourly care he went absolutely crazy when I left.  He's fine if I leave him with a friend but even the childcare at our MOPS meetings causes him to lose it.  

I'm happy to report that he did AWESOME!

The school has this really great playroom that has a Little Tykes outdoor climber, Cozy Coupes and other various fun outdoor toys and the one year olds start their day in the playroom.  So we signed in at his classroom and then walked down to the playroom where his lead teacher, Ms. Jennifer, was waiting.  She spoke to him and he immediately turned his head and buried it in my shoulder but then we turned the corner into the room and he saw all of the cool toys and was trying to jump out of my arms.  I sat him down and he was off...he never looked back.  I said a quick goodbye to the teacher and high-tailed it out of there!  I had to go down to the office and then run back to his cubby to grab the key card (hooray for a secure building!) and didn't hear any crying as I walked by on my way out.  

Ready to load up!

When I got back to pick him up, I peeked in to see him happily playing with his little friend Harper.  I signed him out and as soon as he spotted me, he burst into tears.  Both the lead teacher and assistant said that he had a great day and hadn't cried a single time until he saw me.  They were so excited that not one of the kids had cried up until that point!  I was able to convince him to wave to his teachers on our way out but he was definitely holding on tight as we walked out.  

I'm so excited that he'll be spending 2 mornings a week playing with other kids his age.  We started Kemper in the CDC at our post in Germany when he was only 9 months old and it was so helpful to him in learning to play well with others and in learning how to listen and follow directions for adults other than mom and dad.  I imagine that drop off on Thursday won't be quite as smooth but don't think it will take him long at all to adjust and have a great time!