Well the kids went back-to-school and are as active as ever. What an incredibly short summer it was! The locusts aren’t even out yet – the true sign of summer. Not only that, but I haven’t even seen any lightning bugs yet either. Abby suffered her first set-back, sports-wise. Matt – who continues to receive weekly therapy on his shoulder and back – spent the final few days of his summer vacation either enjoying couch time in the playroom or out gallivanting with his best buddy, Andy. Luke began football practices, fulltime and man, what a difference a year has made for him. Sadly, JJ Cale – the father of the “Tulsa Sound” – died. He is the author of such notable classic rock songs as “After Midnight” and “Cocaine” (made famous by Eric Clapton) and “Call Me the Breeze” (made famous by Lynyrd Skynyrd). And we finally got new next-door neighbors, supposedly the South Decatur principal. But we start off the picture section this week by going back to last weekend where Luke competed in the end-of-season All-Star Seymour tourney. Also included are pictures of our lunch at the Seymour Tumbleweeds where I took and passed the En Fuego Burger Challenge and our dinner at Red Star Pizza with the entire team and parents. Also included at the end are three photos taken by a professional photographer who was at the tourney, taking pictures on the field…
On Monday morning, Matt got to sleep in as began an odd week where he will have practice in the afternoons only until next Monday, when full pads/full contact begins – per IHSAA regulations. Ann attended a parent’s meeting at Luke’s football practice while Bryan and I facilitated practice for the boys (and girls). It was packed and there was no place to park out there. When Matt got home that night, he asked Ann what had happened to her car. Apparently, someone with a small, green car hit her in the back corner of her bumper as it was all pushed in. I was able to pull 90% of it out, but it still doesn’t look right. Ann’s going to call insurance and see what our options are… Luke & I were pretty darn tired afterwards as we worked hard on blocking with the sleds and tackling the dummies. Ann made one of our favorites – garlic chicken – for dinner and I ran out to Bryan’s house afterwards for a coach’s meeting and some quality dock time with Bryan, Chad and Bob.
Matt returned to football practice on Tuesday morning. The dogs caught a possum that brought around a turkey vulture (we hadn’t seen one of those around the yard before). I attended Open House with Luke at the elementary school that evening. Luke has Matt’s line coach – Mr. Scudder, so the two of them hit it off. He and I also had fun catching up, as he is an FC alum who played football also (granted, he is a little younger). Luke went over to Memaw & Gigi’s house to help them clean out their basement and spent the night there – something he had been looking forward to all summer long. Meanwhile, Ann took Abby to have her hair done and then ran her out to the old Maddox building for her photo shoot with Artistic Photography. It was in front of the old brick wall on the west side. It is for the school’s role model program (sounds similar to the old SADD program they had in school in my time) where the slogan is, “Be the Wall.”
Abby had volleyball tryouts on Wednesday. After making the 7th grade team last year with zero experience, she is hopeful about her chances of getting significant playing time this year after playing on a high school CYO volleyball team (she was by far the youngest on her team) in the winter and spring to hone her skills. Not only did she start and play the whole game, but their team won the league title. So we are looking for a lot out of her this fall. I mowed over at Memaw & Gigi’s house and picked up Luke afterwards. Abby had a play date at the putt-putt golf course with Baker, a young man that some say looks similar to Matt…I don’t see it… We enjoyed a quiet night where we got caught up on our DVR’ed TV shows and the kids went to bed early.
We were all up early on Thursday morning for the first day of school. It was a little rough and we had to get the squirt bottle out for motivation. Matt and his buddies wore “bro tanks.” I think they got in a little bit of trouble, but nothing too much. Matt is all senior, as his response was, “I don’t care…” :0) Abby did the morning announcements at school. Luke put the kickball over the fence during recess and thought he was big stuff. Matt had football practice where he participated in the annual weight lifting championship, despite being against doctor’s orders. Abby had volleyball tryouts again and felt pretty good about the workout. In fact, she said her coach commented on how much she had improved in her serving ability. And Ann and I attended an overwhelming senior parents meeting at the high school, where we discussed post-secondary school preparations. Man, is there a lot to do this year! I could not get all three kids to stand together as Matt had to leave and meet up with his bro-tank buddies in the parking lot and Bu was running late. So I ended up having to Photoshop a picture together for this annual picture. It’s not perfect, but it will do…
Abby did the morning announcements again on Friday at the junior high school, as she apparently will be doing all year, along with her good friend Emma (Phyllis & Dick’s granddaughter). Matt had the conclusion of this weight lifting championship with the football team. We were pleasantly surprised to hear his numbers – 200 bench-press, 400 squat and 225 power-clean. That is very, very good – considering he is working with a surgically repaired shoulder and was only recently released to begin full workouts again. Way to go, Hammer! 😉 Abby had her final day of 8th grade volleyball tryouts. Although I felt she was a shoe-in to make the team, I was very disappointed for her when Ann told me she had been left off the team this year. She was pretty upset, obviously. So Ann took her out for shopping therapy and she was much better after getting clothes and a meal with Mom. Being such a gifted natural athlete, she has never known disappointment of this degree. I have to admit that I am surprised that she didn’t make the team. She has improved so much from last year with much more experience under her belt. In fact we think that volleyball may be her sport in high school – she has that much potential. But she’ll just have to work harder in the off-season, I guess. I’m not sure what to think, since her coach moved up from 7th grade to 8th grade this year as well and there was a little friction last year between the two of them and even Ann and I had words with the coach. I’m not saying that played a role in her decision this year – that would be sour grapes…I’m just sayin’. Bottom line, she has to improve more this off-season. She has to go back to the drawing board and start all the way over. We will likely look for a travel team and possibly a couple camps for her to attend. Oddly enough, Coach did offer to keep Abby on her team to be the manager (which she quickly declined…almost felt like a slap in the face!) and did say that if there was an injury, that she would like to pull her on to the team. Again, I’m not sure what that all means (I don’t do politics and drama very well), but we are looking forward to getting a fresh start with a different coach next year in 9th grade. So now we are discussing soccer for a fall sport…we’ll just have to see how this all plays out… We have several new Facebook and Instagram pictures to share this week, including Abby & Megan; Mike & Brayton Smith; Dad & Sharon on the beach (Dad is recovering from rotator cuff surgery); the Drake’s boys in their football uniforms; an old one of Bu, Megan and Alex from about 2004; Jake & Katie’s kids; Bu with friends; Abby & Luke at El Reparo; the new Rush stamp (I gotta get one of these babies!); Chris & Trish’s boys on the 1st day of school; and more of Bu and her friends.
Luke had football practice on Saturday morning where we worked on blocking/tackling with full pads for first time this year! He also ran the ball a few times (he got hit hard) and spent extra time after practice with Drew, Coach Messer and I working on kicking and pass routes with Drew. Uncle Robby & Aunt Sharon sent Abby some money for her upcoming birthday that allowed her to go get her hair colored/frosted/highlighted (whatever it’s called now) – and so Ann took her to get that done and she looks fantastic! In lieu of mowing the lawn (it can wait until next week), I took a long afternoon nap. I woke up with Mom & Gigi in the house for dinner and to celebrate Gigi’s birthday (a week late). Ann made Sandy’s favorite dinner – meatloaf, baked potatoes, fresh sweet corn and olive dip! Afterwards we played a game of euchre (the birthday girl and her roommate barely won, 10-9). We then sang to Sandy and had ice cream and brownie sundaes – yum!! They left fairly early which allowed us to take it easy and have another quite night at home where we watched all the other stuff on our DVR and got caught up on our sleep some more.
We slept in a little bit on Sunday morning. We got up and Ann took Matt shopping while the rest of us did our weekly household chores around the house and watched the NASCAR race at the “Tricky Triangle” – Pocono, where Jeff almost pulled one out and was leading with 2 laps left but couldn’t hold off teammate Kahne and finished 2nd. Another good thing was the first NFL game – our beloved Cowboys faced the Dolphins in the first pre-season matchup of the year. The game was the Hall of Fame game this year, which concludes the big weekend festivities in Canton, OH. Some of the inductees in this year’s class included the Cowboy’s G Larry Allen, DT Warren Sapp from Tampa Bay and the great Coach Bill Parcells. Luke played over at Alex’s house for several hours. And the BBC announced there will be a new Doctor Who (one of my all-time favorite TV shows) taking over during the annual Christmas episode – Dr. Number 12 will be Peter Capaldi.
Next up is our video section, including three new family videos and a few from around the internet…
It is time now for our favorite section – the Waybac pictures. 😉 Leading off this time, we have a few from the 40’s, including Grandpaw Brown in the early forties; Grandmaw Brown and Aunt Lou in the mid forties and Grandpaw with his car; then we have Mom and family at the quarry in about ‘52; the Lafayette Columbian Park pool on opening day in March of ’55; Grandmaw & Aunt Lou in August of ’55; Mom’s first communion at St. Boniface with Grandmaw in June of ’57; Aunt Midge hula-hooping in November of ’58; Grandpaw at the quarry in ’58; the summer cabin in Sept of ’59; Grandpaw in the newspaper in March of ’67; Robby at Christmas in LaPorte (our first in the Rockwood home) in December of ‘81 – love that Fisher Price ATV Explorer! I also had one as a young child…and even now as an adult (officially we bought it for Lukey to play with but I’ve kept it nice since then); then Mom and Rob the day after Christmas in ’81; Rob & Vicki in Lake Schaeffer during our last vacation at the Big Chief Lodge in Monticello with our good friends, the Crum’s; Great Grandpa Morgan at Uncle Keith’s house for Christmas in 1982; Grandpaw’s Die-Hard Cub’s Fan Club certificate form the 80’s; a Yeti loose in our kitchen in September of 2003; a sweet one of Matt and Abby playing in the playroom in the fire truck tent in about 2004; a couple of Sue and Mike during Week 19’s welcome party in May of 2007 (one of her last ones); and finally little Abby playing first base in her softball game in June of 2007.
And that does it for this week’s installment of the Scheu Family Blog. Thanks for keeping up with us this time out and we’ll catch up with you again next time. Until then, have a good one. We sure miss ya, Mom…
Later, Scheu
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