If you follow me on Instagram then you saw that Tyler has another concussion. He took a helmet to helmet hit in the game on Sept 8. He started feeling bad Sunday and saw his sports med doctor on Tuesday. He’s not happy. He is out of football for at least another week then he can start the impact return to play protocol so he’ll probably miss 2 games. He is very unhappy about it but his brain matters more. So far this week he’s made it to school for full days and then come home to sleep. Tomorrow he goes back to watch practice but he can’t participate. 

I got some good pictures of him in that game from another parent who was down on the sidelines take photos. 

While Tyler was recovering and taking it easy I got to spend some one on one time with the little kids. I like to take them one at a time when I run errands just to hang out with them. Mason went with me to Aldi and to pick up the Walmart order. He’s such a funny kid. He was looking out the skylight finding shapes in the clouds and all of a sudden he yelled out “I found Jesus.” Talk about swerving on the road. Ha!

Then I took Zoey with me to Lowes to buy some caulk for the hot tub tube that’s leaking. She found a new friend. And named him Bones. Then we swung past Sam’s Club and I fed her dinner by walking past every single sample stand in the whole store…twice. No shame in my game. 

We rounded out Saturday night with the Clemson & Louisville game. Tyler actually was able to watch a whole quarter of the game before he needed a break. That’s the first thing he’s been able to watch on TV in a week so progress!

So the first thing I noticed about this picture was the bump on his nose. Remember he broke his nose back in April during football drills? Well it healed with a slight bump. We could have gotten it set properly but he would have had to sit out this season in football and he said no. So we left it. And last week he took another shot to the face in practice from a freshman who was messing around. Said freshman will be keeping a 100ft radius from Tyler for the rest of the season. Ha! I don’t think his nose is broken again thankfully, just sore and a bit swollen. The second thing I noticed was the eyebrow. That’s what happens when a teenager tries to trim up his bushy eyebrows and yawns in the middle. Ha! Matt and I called him Vanilla Ice for days. These are the moments I live for as a mom. 

This lil lady turned 7 years old last Thursday! She took cupcakes to her new class to celebrate and just had the best day. We ate her favorite dinner (biscuits and gravy) and enjoyed rainbow vanilla creme cake for dessert. She’s such a fun kid. She’s spunky and sassy. She loves art and music and funny animal videos on YouTube. She’s the perfect youngest kid for our family. 

Friday morning. I posted this on Instagram with the caption: “Every morning feels like we’re the pit crew in a NASCAR race. Drag kids out of bed, make breakfast, help them get dressed, brush hair, find missing shoes, assemble lunches, check book bags, load them in the car to leave by 6:15am. After they’ve left Matt and I collapse on the couch in shock that we pulled it off another day.” These early mornings are killing my soul, y’all. My alarm goes off at 5:30 and it takes us the full 45 minutes going full speed to get all 4 kids ready and out the door. If one of us gets sick or runs away from home the remaining parent is going to have a really rough morning. Ha! 

Friday Night’s Football game was awful. We played a team that we never should have been playing. They’re a private school who recruits players from all over to play for their team and gives them “scholarships” to cover the $25,000 yearly tuition. We are a lottery based charter school. We cannot compete with that kind of program. It was just ugly and our guys are really banged up. 4 starters out with injuries including 1 concussion and 3 players under observation for possible concussions (including Tyler). Tyler played a good game but it was a hard fought battle on both offense and defense.

Saturday was a busy one. Zoey chose to have her bestie come sleepover instead of having a party. Maia also invited one of her new friends from school to sleepover. Tyler escaped and went to the movies with some of the football guys and then slept over at one of their houses to escape the giggling girls at our house. The girls watched movies, ate cupcakes, made ice cream sundaes, played balloon tennis….it was so LOUD in our house. ha!

The little girls finally settled down around midnight but didn’t fall asleep until nearly 1am! And they were up by 7:30am. Matt and I were dragging butt. But I rallied and made some Pumpkin Spice Cinnamon Rolls for the crew. 

Sunday was basically cleaning up, doing laundry, and watching football. We’re anticipating some serious rain and wind in our city today and tomorrow from Hurricane Irma so I did all my errands on Saturday to avoid having to do any in the rain. Tyler started feeling really bad last night with a headache and some nausea. He woke up this morning feeling a lot worse but he toughed it out and went to school. I called his trainer and she’s evaluating him for a concussion along with a few other guys. I’m hoping he’s just tired from a busy weekend but I have a bad feeling. We’ll see. 

We had a fairly busy 3 day weekend. I don’t think such a thing as a calm weekend exists in my household anymore. But it’s fun, so that’s what matters. At least that’s what I’m telling myself on a regular basis. But anyway, let’s take it back to last week. 

Tyler had to get a new helmet last week because his trainer discovered a giant crack down the side of his old one. And it was a new helmet this season! He took a few massive hits in the previous game that cracked his helmet. Yeah, that’s not concerning at all. So Wednesday night he and Matt had to adjust his new one, which is a bit tighter than his old one. Hopefully it keeps his brain safe. 

The varsity game was moved to Thursday night last week because of the heavy rain expected from Harvey. It was still rainy and windy but nothing like the storms we got on Friday night so definitely a good call by the athletic director! Tyler had a great game- the whole team had a great game. We won 45-0 and most of the starters got to sit and watch the second and third string play for most of the 2nd half. It was weird to see them sitting on the bench watching but they also really encouraged and cheered on the younger guys so that was nice to see. The starters celebrated the 2nd and 3rd string players getting a touchdown as though they’d been on the field themselves, which was awesome!

Decked out in ponchos, ready for the rain!

Starting offense on the bench watching the 2nd string.

The starters watching the 2nd string score a touchdown.

Celebrating with his best friends after the victory!

Saturday had us making a trip to Sam’s Club. I’ve decided to go back to monthly trips to Sam’s Club. We spend too much when we go every other week and end up with stuff we don’t really need. Plus it’s time consuming and I’d rather only spend one Saturday afternoon there. The kids came along and ate lunch from the samples. I’m loving my grocery list app- it’s called List Ease and it gives me a confetti party when I complete my list. I feel appreciated. 

Sunday had me taking Tyler to the sports med urgent care. He hurt his arm in the game on Thursday night and the trainer felt like it might be just a strained muscle. He also jammed 2 of his fingers on a helmet so they were swollen. His arm wasn’t any better after their practice on Saturday and his fingers started turning black and blue so the trainer had us go for xrays. Verdict- the arm is just a sprained muscle but he has a broken knuckle on his hand. So he has it taped and is just playing through the pain. The kid is tough. He also took a shot to his face in practice as you can see in the picture but at least he didn’t break his nose again. He’s going to be the death of me. 

I didn’t even take any pictures on Monday. We grilled, hot tubbed, swam, and relaxed. It was amazing until Tyler had to go to practice. I’m so excited for a short week. I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that waking up at 5:30am might kill me. It’s already killing my soul. 

Man. School schedule is kicking my butt, y’all. For real. I’m surviving on coffee and Jesus at this point. And it’s only Tuesday. I swear I’ll get my act together. Not today….but probably soon 🙂

So our dryer broke. Again. This stupid dryer is less than 18 months old and it’s broken twice. I think we have a lemon. The service guy came out and the blower motor went bad. He had to order the part so we were without a dryer for 5 days. Normally that wouldn’t be an issue but my kids have 5 days worth of uniforms for school. So our house looked like this as I air dried laundry. The service guy came to install the new part on Friday afternoon. Guess what? The new part is broken. I swear. I can’t make this up. So he had to order a new one and I am once again air drying uniforms all over the house. Because nothing adds to the fun of the beginning of the school year chaos like a broken dryer. 

On a more upbeat note, we had a heck of a tailgate Friday night before Tyler’s football game. I’m one of the team moms this year (don’t ask how that’s going) and one of the things we are doing is planning the tailgates. Lots of families came out to have fun before the game and there was a ton of great food! 

We had the best weather Friday night! It was low 80’s during the tailgate and only about 72 degrees once the game started. I love Fall. I love it so much. A couple of friends sent me these next 2 pictures from the game. Zoey and her bestie enjoying the game together. They are two peas in a pod these days. The next one is me with my fellow football team moms. I’ve made some great friends from football and these are 2 of the best. 

The game was not the best. Our opponent plays a division ahead of us so they were bigger and had more players to rotate in the game. It wasn’t awful, but not a great game for us and we lost 6-22. Tyler had a decent game but nobody was happy. 

Our next game is against a private school team who recruits heavily so we’ll see how that goes. The rest of the weekend was spent doing more laundry, cleaning my filthy house, and trying to create some form of organization for all this lunch box stuff.