A Ton of Fun in 2021: Week 40 Recap

I believe I've mentioned prior that I am coaching the 5th grade volleyball team at Elida. I thought back to my younger years and remember going to an OSU game and sitting in the locker room with them on game day. I thought it was the coolest thing ever and couldn't wait until one day when I played college volleyball.  With my connections with ONU and also the coach, I thought it might be amazing to come have a little practice and tour the locker room and see the life of a college volleyball player. Coach Kuhn agreed to host us on Monday and both 5th grade teams met at ONU. It was as cool as I thought it up in my head!  The ONU girls warmed up with our players and played some games and worked on skills with them. Then one team at a time got to go see their locker rooms and the girls let our littles try on their jersey's. CUTEST THING EVER. 

On Tuesday, Kathie was passing through Ada, and we decided to meet at the Cask room. Being so close to her birthday, we were able to have drinks and celebrate her! We took a selfie lol

So up until this point, Elida fifth grade team is 0-4.  Probably my coaching! But I'm going to say they must have been inspired by Monday's practice at ONU because they came out winning! Our first wins of the season! Olivia is doing pretty well for 4th grade. She is one of the smallest and she struggles to get the ball over on her serves, but she did amazing today.  So proud of her in serve receive too. She's fearless and not afraid of the ball.  Makes this mommas heart proud. 

Friday night was ONU's Athletic Hall of Fame banquet. I was inducted back in 2013, but I love to go when I know the athletes being inducted. Well this year my volleyball coach, Kate Witte, was one of the five being inducted! But every year the athletic director Tom Simmons asks a past HOF person to welcome the new class. He asked me this year. It took me a few days to perfect the speech, but I ended up going with a theme of the Royal Flush and how these athletes/coaches being inducted were the greatest- similar to the Royal Flush in the game of poker. Andy and Kristi also joined Jeremy and I at the inductions because their cousin Liz was one of the inductee's this year too! It was such a beautiful night that I'll never forget. 

After playing Elida volleyball Saturday morning, we took the kiddos back to Ada for the ONU Homecoming Parade, festivities and football game. We really had a great time. We spent some time letting both kids explore the activities tent. Both Isaac and Olivia liked crushing the concrete canoe. From the loads of candy collected at the parade, to the tour of the engineering building, to the inflatables on the tundra, the activities tent, and the golf cart ride out to the football game, we had a really nice time telling the kiddos about all our memories on campus when we were students. This is our classes 20th reunion year- yikes. Doesn't seem possible! 

After we left Ada, we went back to Lima where my mom meet us to head to Olivia's Dance convention in Cincinnati. Since it was an early start, mom agreed to get a hotel the night before so we didn't have to drive in the morning. When we arrived, we had no idea what to expect.  Well the answer was, expect to sit around a lot watching Olivia and 100 other dancers learn technique and dances to grow in their knowledge. It was a LONG day.  Olivia was mad she didn't get any special call out or award, but I think it was eye-opening for her since she had never been to anything like this before. It was good for her to see all the potential she has to be an amazing dancer! Plus she got to do this convention with two dear friends from her team, so she loved that too!