Declaring his independence

How ironic that it is almost the 4th of July. Maybe I should have saved this entry for the 4th.

Anyway, we are very blessed that the boys seem to genuinely enjoy being together. It is a good thing because they are together a lot! Although they are separated in school, all of their other "extra-curricular" activities have always been together.

You know that *I* love that they are all playing t-ball together, but the reality is that although they all like it, I can see that they have varying degrees of liking it....from LOVING it to just kind of tolerating it. This is true for all of their extra-curricular stuff.

I think this is fine for this year because they are still so young and really just learning about the different activities, but as time goes on, I really want each one of them to find their nitche and get involved with activities that they really enjoy and activities that make them fell good about themselves...regardless of what their brothers are doing. It has concerned me that even as they get older, they will continue to participate in the same activities as their brothers just because that is the easy and "safe" thing to do.

For the most part, I don't want them to feel like they have to play baseball or anything else just because their brothers do. And, I REALLY would feel horrible if they choose not to participate or decide to not give a new sport or activity a try because their brothers are not interested. This parenting stuff is hard!

So after all of that....

My big announcement is......

dat, dat, dah, dah...

That ONE of my boys....

has decided to play soccer next year....

on a team....

without his brothers!!!!

And, that boy is......

BEN!!!!

Yay Ben!!!!

Woo Hoo!! My very shy child, that would not talk in preschool, is branching out on his own and I'm so proud.

It is sorta a funny story how this all came about. Ben mentioned about a month ago that he wanted to play soccer. I was busy at the time and said that I "would look into it". A few hours later, we were riding in the van and Ben asked me if I have "looked into it yet" and could he play "today". LOL! I explained to him that it takes a while and we'll see when a new league is starting.

Fast forward a month...registration is due for the fall soccer season. We have been busy the last month so, Ben hasn't brought it up. On Monday, I asked him if he was still interested in playing soccer and that he could start in the fall. He told me that he was. So, I asked Jack and Drew if they were interested and they both said "no". We were in the van so, I looked in the rearview mirror at Ben and I could see that it registered with him that if he was going to play soccer, it was just going to be him. I was a little nervous that he was going to change his mind, but he didn't!!! The 5 of us dropped off his registration form yesterday!

This is so cool! I think he is really going to enjoy it and I think it will make him feel sooo cool when we all come to watch him play and cheer him on. I'm also hoping that this will start the wheels turning for Jack and Drew and they will start thinking about what they might be interested in doing, on their own, because it is something that interests *just them*.

But for now.....Yay BEN!!!!