Basketball, Basketball and Even More Basketball!

I've said it before, and I will say it again....My boys love basketball.  All 4 of them.  It seems like every night during the winter, if we are not at a game, we are watching a game on TV.  If there are no games on, the boys are often discussing plays that happened at games, plays they might used in upcoming games, and plays that they have seen on TV, that they might want to work on during practice (for Noah's 6th grade team). 
There has been more than one time lately, where I have had to remind the men in my house that,
1.  It is just a game.   (Gasp, yes I dared to say it out loud)
2.  They are 6th graders.
But even with all the drama,  last weekend the 6th grade team won their first tournament.  There was much rejoicing in our household.  Here is their team picture that I took earlier this year.  If you look very closely, you will see all 4 of my boys in the photo.  

Yes there were only supposed to be 3, Noah, Randy and John.  Ben must have decided that he did not want to be left out, and he photo bombed the photo between two of the players.  

Just for fun, we have let Ben wear his Referee shirt to a couple of the games.  He loves running back and forth in the bleachers "helping" the refs make calls.  His favorite calls are travels, foul, block, but every now in then he will throw in a "holding, on the defense...first down".  Not quite the right sport, but pretty cute.

Ben also loves to make friends with anyone wearing a striped shirt.  It is funny to see him at away games stalking referees he does not know, waiting for them to notice him.  I'll give it to the boy.  It takes guts to just go up and introduce yourself to people, but he has no fear of anyone in black and white stripes and loves to get high fives and fist bumps from them.     

But home games are by far my favorite, (and the only place I will let him wear his striped shirt).  Most of the time we know the referees at the home games, and Ben will run up to them before the game for high fives, hugs and of course to practice making calls. 

His favorite referee is Mrs. Kuhlman, and the photos above are from the first day he got to wear his shirt at a game.  I love both photos, but the first one where there were looking at each other, is extra cute.  Mrs. Kuhlman and Ben even practice hand signals for call  when they see each other during the day at school.  Unfortunately this turned into a problem one day when Ben got mad at one of the para's and called a foul on her.  It was just a 2 shot foul and not a technical, but he still got in trouble.  I have heard it reported from school that it is hard to discipline the little guy when you are laughing and he is being so darn cute.  I know for a fact this is true and unfortunately I don't have any suggestions for them

The whole 6th grade team is great with Ben.  They let him warm up with them before games, letting him take his turn at doing a layup, even though he is not big enough to get the ball even close to the basket.  Ben loves sitting on  the bench, getting in the huddle and even playing trainer when needed.  We are so blessed to live in this community. 

                                         Ben helping hold the ice pack when a player got hurt. 

 

All 4 of my boys on the bench.