For the Record

Lacrosse has started and I have loved it! Not so much loved the very little time I have to blog though. In four years of college lacrosse, this is the best I have seen my team!

Over President's day weekend, we took our annual trip to Santa Barbara. I was lucky enough to have a boyfriend and friend drive all the way out there to support me. "Best trip ever, best friends ever."

Just for the update:

First game we lost to FL 9-7 or something like that. My stick broke within the first minute or two so I finished the tournament with my coach's stick. Second game we beat Pitt. Third game we lost to Michigan in overtime. We were ahead the whole game and really should have had it.

Last we played Arizona and beat them. Came home from the tournament 2-2. I don't think the team has ever done better than that in Cali, kind of depressing!

After our last game, I drove with Gavin and Brent to San Clemente to stay with some family and take another couple days of vacation. On the way, we took a pit stop for food and I taught the cook how to make fry sauce.

Brent was supposed to fly home early but missed his flight. I'm sure he loved every minute of being with Gavin and I the rest of the trip. We went to a couple different beaches, ate at a couple restaurants, shared my cousin's house with two other families, played lots of scrabble, and should have taken more pictures.

Last weekend we went to Georgia for our second big tournament. The first team we were scheduled to play was Georgia, ranked no. 2 at the time. We had seen them play in Santa Barbara and were blown away with how good they looked. and guess what! We beat them! We were up 8-2 at half then they scored 4 in two minutes. We were able to stay ahead the whole time though and we were all super stoked about our victory!

Our next game was that night against Texas, ranked #5. Texas came out much stronger than we expected them to. They scored the first two goals but my team was able to respond with another three within a couple minutes. After 15 minutes of playing, the refs called the game because they saw lightning. We took cover and ended up being herded into a tornado shelter! We played Pictionary against Texas until we were free to go back to the hotels.

The next morning we played Maryland. They were supposed to be quite easy to beat. Something happened to our team and at half time, we were down 10-5. Well we won that game too! During the second half, defense didn't touch the ball for about 8 minutes, until we closed the gap in the score.

Minnesota was our next game and they are one of our favorite teams to play! The girls on the team have great sportsmanship and our coaches get along. We beat them. Not by as much as we should have, but it was a chill game.

Then we had the Texas rematch! Our coach told us they heard Texas saying we were over rated and I knew Texas thought they were going to have an easy win that night. I wanted to beat them as much as I had ever wanted to beat anyone. The team came out so strong and played the best game I have ever seen the team play. Our field was bigger than a football field, I don't know how our legs kept moving. We beat them at a whopping 12-6!

So I doubt anyone is still reading but I just wanted to record how great my team has been doing this season. I really hope we keep improving for a chance to win nationals! Considering we just beat West Minster 17-5, I would say we are well on our way.

Sit tight for more post game shows. Until then, hopefully I come up with something more fun for you non lax folks to read.

Old School

One lesson I've been taught recently: trust yourself.

I went Tribal West lacrosse because my plastic strings broke (for the second time in 4 months). I asked the guy working if I could go back to regular leather and he said I should try these new strings, with the circles. I told him that I had played with sticks strung with circle strings before and I would rather just use the leather that everyone's sticks had while I was in high school. "No," he said "these circle strings are new and improved and they are the best strings yet." I gave in. Now my stick looks SWEET, but the pink circle strings are too long for my pocket to be regulation size. I have been tightening and fidgeting with my baby ever since.

I went to the bank to get more checks and the banker said "You shouldn't use paper checks, you should use new and improved online bill pay." I explained to him that my grandma knows more about computers than I do so I should probably just stick with regular checks. "No," he said "this online bill pay is easier and safer and more reliable." I gave in. Now my rent isn't paid and I just spent an hour at the bank trying to cancel the check I supposedly sent to my landlady but she never received. I am trying to figure out how to get the money back in my account too.

If you know what you want, don't listen to anybody else.

For the Sake of Lacrosse

See you in 2 hours!

I'm Not a Runner.

Sprinter, yes. Runner, no.

But I just ran 5 miles and I know that's not great but I was pretty proud of myself because usually I just run between 2 and 3.

So if any of you other non-runners want those extra 3 miles I think the difference was:

1. I wore my power balance band. Don't laugh. If it works in your head it still works, right?

2. I used to wear spandex when I ran but I've learned that makes me sick. So I didn't wear spandex.

3. I stretched before! I told myself I didn't have to work out if I just stretched really well but after stradling and twisting for a while, I felt like I wanted to run.

So these are my new tactics and we'll see how far it gets me.

And this is now my motivational work-out quote:

Travelling with my team vs. Travelling with my Family

Stickbags and gymbags vs. Tupperware boxes,

Jammin to music vs. no one agrees on what music to listen to,

Talk about boys, roommates, and random questions vs. What are the people in the front talking about? I'm in the back and no one wants to listen to each others stories anyways,

Does anyone have clothes I can borrow vs. Who stole my clothes?

Bonding vs. Recording fights.

I love my family. I am excited to spend a week with them in California. But I may have really overestimated myself by agreeing to be in a full car with them for 12 hours.

Utah, see you next Sunday!

I love the creator of sports!

Something about a ball

Despite the disappointment of losing or the embarrassment of a mistake,

something about what you can do with a ball makes it so worth it.

With your hands, feet, a bat, a stick, or a glove,

How you kick it, catch it, throw it, hit it, or shoot it.

The injuries, the salty skin, the uniform tan lines.

So worth it.

The competition, the heavy breathing, the cramps in your calves.

Few things are better than seeing yourself and your team improve in what they can do with a ball.

I may never be the best at any sport, but playing with a ball is still

So. Worth it.

""

Ryann: Ooh did you see those boys?!
Me: Nope. That's the difference between me and you.

Coach: First one to 15 wins.
Girls: Why 15?
Coach: Cuz that's what they do in ping-pong.

Morganne: Do you think I am in the love zone with Chewy?

Morganne (To the tune of I believe I can fly): I swear I can fly...

One-liners that won today.

Regular

Here I am entering the home stretch of my junior year of school and lacrosse. Life is crazy. My weekend consisted of leaving for Colorado on Thursday, staying with a family in Golden, seeing the sun, driving home, going to conference, having dinner with my extended family, and playing 3-step-hiding. I have details of it all.
I drove to Colorado with 2 of my coaches, Anna, Brooke, Jordan, and Marie. We talked about cloth diapers (I'm converted!) and my coach's crazy ex-roommates who got her expelled for being seductive. We caravanned with the rest of the team and a suburban broke down just outside of Golden. Luckily, the suburban got to a dealership and Shelby's family helped us out by letting us use their suburban. When we got to our host family's house on Thursday night, the mom said "I have to warn you that we have a pet hamster... but we don't know where it is." I couldn't sleep with the blankets she gave me! But she was awesome and cute and made us crepes for breakfast :)
Friday morning we drove to the hotel in Fort Collins. We changed lanes on the freeway at the same time that a semi was changing into the same lane right next to us. We swerved in and out of a few other lanes to try and avoid the semi and luckily we were all safe. It was so crazy! Brooke has this theory that we all agree with- the only reason we survived was because Marie was in the car. The rest of the ride that day was full of jokes about Chris spearing a deer for us to eat.
We finally got to play in weather that wasn't freezing, but lacrosse was a little disappointing. I didn't get to play as much as I had hoped or expected, and we came home 1-3. We lost to CSU by 1 in overtime, lost to Santa Barbara by 2, lost to CU by 1, then finally had a win against Florida, 14-7. They were all great teams so it helps that we went up in rankings because of our close games and tough schedule. We are now #7!!! A girl on CSU layed on top of Kristin and didn't get called for it so that was definitely frustrating but really funny looking back on it.
I drove home with Chris, Gretchen, Marie, Brooke, and Emily. We played Chris's 'name' game for about an hour to avoid listening to baseball. I accidently kept giving Brooke w's. I doubt that makes sense to anyone, but it was funny at the time. We made the traditional stop to chick-fil-a and talked a lot about Marie's softball team and about how Chris can back us up if any boy treats us badly.
Sunday I went to General Conference with Gavin and Cassie and met Ryann, Newell, Chad, and Felicia there. It was great. I don't know how I had dry eyes through Elder Scott's talk, and I couldn't help but apply Elder Christofferson's whole talk to lacrosse. I can't wait to put all the talks on CD again so I can listen to them more and learn more from them! Oh yah, and church security gave us a ride back to our car after conference!
Then we went to my cousin's house in Saratoga Springs for Austen to be ordained an Elder. We had a delicious dinner and it is always fun catching up with the fam. Somehow Gavin and I ended up playing 3-step-hiding. This deserves its own post so I will put up videos of it soon. We played with my 2 younger brothers and 15 year old cousin...It is a very teenage boy game. So fun though! If you don't know what 3-step-hiding is, look up Hamish and Andy on youtube. I will just end by saying we spent at least half an hour trying to escape a young mormon boy with a car seat in the back of his car.