A Divided Family

Obviously, Spencer is a devoted fan to the sports teams of Philadelphia. In fact, for a wedding present, I got him Directv, with a subscription to the NFL Ticket so that he could catch all of the games of his precious Eagles. Eight seasons later, he still loves his birds and doesn't miss too many of their games. He, of course, feels the same way about his Phillies. Although I wouldn't be considered as serious of a fan as Spencer because I usually find other things during Bear's games. The mall is usually nice during Bear's games. ;) I also always have high hopes for the Cubs as each season starts...this might be the year, lucky 100!!!

Superbowl Sunday 2005

Anyway, each of our "big boys" have already chosen their favorite teams. Charlie is apparently leaving his options open for the time being. Ben has declared himself a Phillies and Eagles fan and Drew and Jack have decided to be Cubs and Bears fans. When the boys were younger, Spencer and I used to wonder how this would pan out. I am around the boys the most...and buy them stuff,...and feed them, so, I really could have put pressure on them to be Cubs/Bears fans, but I didn't, and that probably wouldn't have worked anyway. Spencer's friends from the East Coast LOVE to buy the boys Phillies and Eagles stuff, but that didn't phase them either. The Eagles went to the Super Bowl when the boys were almost 3 and the Bears went to the Super Bowl when the boys were almost 4, but that didn't matter to them. The thing that made the decision for them was.....



PIZZA!!



Pizza is a topic that has worked its way into many conversations in the our household. Being from Chicago, I obviously only get Italian sausage on my pizza. Spencer being from, well, someplace else, prefers pepperoni on his pizza. The boys asked one day why 1/2 of our pizza is always sausage and the other 1/2 is always pepperoni. I explained the obvious answer to them. People from Chicago like sausage on their pizza and people from Philadelphia like pepperoni on their pizza. From there, the little wheels started to spin in their busy brains. People from Philadelphia like pepperoni on their pizza....people from Philadelphia like the Phillies....people from Philadelphia like the Eagles....pepperoni is MY favorite pizza so, the Eagles and Phillies must be MY favorite teams. And, visa-versa for my sausage lovers.



You think that would be the end of it. But, Drew started out as a Pepperoni/Eagles/Phillies fan, but, as he tells it, when someone asks him if he is a Bears fan "Well, I used to like the Eagles, but one day I had a bit of sausage on my pepperoni pizza, so, I tried it, and guess what??? I LIKED IT! So, now I like sausage pizza and I'm a Bears and Cubs fan". People are usually pretty confused, but he explains it perfectly as far as I'm concerned.



You may think that we are lucky that none of the boys picked a different team as their "favorite". Well, we could see that coming last year when Jack got very interested in watching basketball and football. He would pick who he wanted to win by the score of the game. He would always pick whichever team was winning and "change his mind" as needed. In fact, he was watching Illinois lose an important basketball game and insisted that he was rooting for the other team. Spencer told him that we should want Illinois to win the game because Uncle Craig went to school at University of Illinois. Jack's response was that "Uncle Craig should root for Illinois then, but my favorite team is the one that wins!" Anyway, one day, we explained to the boys that the choices for favorite teams are the Cubs, the Bears, the Phillies, the Eagles, the Bulls and the Sixers. When they are 7 years old, they can pick a different team if they would like, but until then, those are their choices. We were afraid after listening to Jack that we were going to end up with a lifetime Patriots/Yankees fan because of a bad decision a 4 years old.

So, that is where we stand...for now. ;)