blow-outs and wipe-outs

It all started yesterday when Meagan asked me if we could take a bike ride. Lucas got the bikes down and ready, only to find that I had a flat rear tire. So, not wanting to break my promise to her, I went to Wal-Mart and got a new inner tube. Lucas repaired the bike, and we were good as new.........we thought. We headed off. Thankfully, Lucas had switched Meagan's carrier to his bike so he could take the back wheel off of mine. We got to the end of our road, stopped at the stop sign, and looked for cars. No cars were coming, so we headed out onto the main road. I took about two pedals away from the stop sign when, all at the same time, I (a) heard a loud noise like a car backfiring and (b) felt my rear end drop an inch or so with quite a thud. It took me a second to realize that the two events were related. I looked down, and the tire was completely off the rim, shreds of the new tube were flopping out the sides, and a white cloud of baby powder was just starting to clear...I blew a tire!! It may have taken a minute for me to register what had happened, but Lucas, who was behind me, was laughing hysterically. He said when the thing blew, there was a big puff of powder that burst out everywhere like gun smoke. LOL! So, we busted a U-y (how on earth do you spell that?), and I had to hoof it back to the house. Thankfully we weren't all that far because I don't think I could have carried the back end much further than I did. Really, you don't see that every day!

So, that was yesterday's attempt at family fun. Tonight, we kept it local, and we hung out front-yard style. We had 2-on-2 (with a third floating randomly between teams, and in and out of the game all together) football - of sorts. It started boys against parents. We had hockey nets set up at either end of the front yard as goals. And it was some morphed form of football, which included lots of passing back and forth, running the wrong way, and tackles and blocks that I'm SURE would have drawn penalties had there been ref's around. Man, those boys are scrappy. I wiped out a few times, because they latch on around the knees and hang on until they've twisted and wound in and out of legs and you can do nothing but fall and hope you don't squish them. We had lots of wipe outs, and we all had grass-stained feet, but it was fun. I was the first to bow out of the game. Isaac took me down pretty hard once (I know, go ahead and laugh), and I banged up my hip and leg a bit (the same leg that had taken more than its fair share of helmet blows to the thigh). Ah, well. I was a girl, an only child, and a gymnast - all factors working against me when it comes to growing up playing football and taking beatings. LOL. But, clearly, I've got some practicing to do because I have a few more years of having boys around!