The Taj Ma Haught: What's Your Kid Doing?

Well well well, it seems my kids have been busy putting your kids to shame. First off all, a short story:

Jackson started soccer. At practice when they would scrimmage he would fall on the ball and put it between his knees or dive on the ball and hold it with his hands so no one could get it. Cut to a red-faced father who wanted to strangle his son for stopping down soccer practice. So the day before his first game we went out back for a little one-on-one soccer practice. The first lesson only lasted 3 minutes and ended with me spanking him. After that we worked on three things that I had him repeat to me moments before his game. But before that I sort of hoped he'd get sick and not be able to make it to the game. No such luck. My prayer request to all my friends was that Jackson would not shame the Haught name on the soccer field that week. Finally Saturday arrived and we headed to the game.

So before he ran out onto the field I said, "Jackson, what are we NOT going to do?" "Fall down, touch the ball with my hands and cry." Hmm, this kid has promise. I wonder if David Beckham repeats that before each of his games.

The whistle blew and an amoeba of kids surrounded the ball and then the heavens opened and a miracle occurred. Jackson broke away from the pack and in a fast break (that happened in slow motion) took the ball all the way to the goal and missed it by about a foot. Nevermind the missed goal, I was 99% sure he was going to start crying and fall on the ball. I seriously teared up. More proof that miracles happen and therefore the existence of God. Take THAT atheists!

Meanwhile, we took the training wheels off of Ellie's bike and she rides like Lance Armstrong on steroids. Which he never took during his career. Take THAT France!

And Ellie finally took the plunge in the pool and went under water. Sounds like nothing unless you've done everything you can think of to get her to do it for 2 summers straight aside from dunking her. Another feat tackled thanks to great parenting.