So, a week after Edward gave himself a fat lip, you'd hardly know he had been injured. It lasted longer than I expected, lingering into Tuesday or Wednesday, but by Friday, it had completely healed. That was good, because his burgeoning basketball skills, while improving immensely over the five weeks of our class, didn't keep him from taking a basketball or two to the face today. As they say on the court, no harm, no foul.

The class was called Start Smart, "the critically acclaimed program from the National Alliance for Youth Sports that helps kids prepare for sports. It’s a step-by-step approach that builds confidence, self-esteem, and makes sports fun. Parents will work together with their child in a supportive environment to learn the basic skills involved in sports."

That's a fancy way of saying, "for your $25, we can only afford to hire one instructor, so parents must contribute." That was fine, as it was better for me to work with Ed because I know his quirks. I know he's competitive and loves to count, so I could challenge him to do a few more of whatever it was we were doing than the time before: more dribbling, more shots, more passes. The class included drills on defense, passing, dribbling and shooting. He liked shooting best (as does anyone who has ever played basketball) and found his most improvement there. As he narrates when asked: "First two weeks: no baskets. Third week: three baskets. Last week: 10 baskets. This week (long dramatic pause): 20 baskets!

This was the set up and make for no. 16 of the day (that second shot is artfully blurry thanks to the glacial shutter speed on my smartphone). He really seemed to enjoy it, and told me tonight before bed that he was going to make 31 baskets next time... so we now need to find someplace with 5-foot baskets where he can go to practice.

He and Daniel are becoming quite rabid Hawkeye fans. They both know the fight song (Mary and I heard Daniel on the monitor last night singing it to himself as he tried to go to sleep) and have a lot of black and gold clothing. We and my folks took the boys two weeks ago to Carver-Hawkeye Arena for an exhibition basketball game to see the Hawks shellac the University of Illinois-Springfield Prairie Stars. They actually seemed to pay attention, with Daniel giving rousing applause at one point to a Hawkeye dunk.

The popcorn was also a big hit (and despite the fact that tickets were $5 and kids were free, you can see by the sea of empty seats behind them that the Hawks have their work cut out for them in their "Let's Be MAD Again!" campaign.


Today we took the boys on the Hawkeye Express, a train that runs from Coralville to Kinnick Stadium. For 99 percent of those aboard, that means an easy trip from their car to the game. For us 1 percenters, it meant a round trip taken simply to experience the train. The boys enjoyed it (this was their second time; my dad and I took them last year on our way to a game (Mary picked them up that time and took them to a park)).

Lastly, it hasn't all been athletics all the time at our house. Edward's (and by extension Daniel's) latest fixation is knights. He has read several books about them lately, and recently decided we should use our blocks to build a castle. Here is one of our grandest. That's Ed in what to the savvy eye is obviously a knight's helmet with the visor pulled down (to the less-savvy, it's a backward hardhat with the adjustable band pulled down in front).

I'll leave you with more exciting basketball action: