Halliday Family Blog

Part 2 of our very busy Saturday consisted of football and the Metea Valley High School Homecoming Dance!

Zachary had his football game and played pretty well.  He is still starting at center and today, he didn’t have a single missed snap!  What a cute little football player he is.  He is trying really hard to get a Crunch bar, given out to one offensive and one defensive player each game by one of the coaches.  He hustled better today and ran up to the line every time after the huddle!

Unfortunately, they lost again!  The poor little team hasn’t won a game yet.  It seems like they are TINY compared to the other teams that they are playing against!  They don’t give up though, and even though there are some tears, they keep playing hard.  The coaches are great with them and treat them like winners.  We’re glad that he has coaches that care and want them to have a positive experience.  🙂

This afternoon, the girls got ready and went over to Gaul’s house (Sarah’s and Brittany’s friends), and started partying for the homecoming dance!  They had dinner and then got all dressed up, did hair, etc., etc., etc., etc.  Sarah and Brittany both invited friends from church to go with them and so they had a group of 7 kids.  After getting all dressed up and pretty, they went and took a bunch of pictures…

One of the highlights for me was that I got to be a chaperone at the dance.  Myself, Ken Gaul, and Lonny Greenwald volunteered through the PTSA to help out.  We all were pretty excited to be able to hang out with the girls tonight.

We drove the kids up to the school and had a great time at the dance.  For the first part of the dance, Ken worked at the refreshment area, while Lonny and I helped out at the extremely busy coat check (which was more of a “shoe check”).  I don’t think that there was a single girl there that left her shoes on.  When you think of it, it’s kind-of gross.  600+ girls walking around in sweaty bare feet around the dance floor.  Sounds like the boys locker room!  🙂

All three of us finished up the dance at the refreshment table.  Lonny had to leave a bit early because he’s running the Chicago Marathon tomorrow!  I don’t know how people do that!  🙂  We wished him good luck and then continued our work.  We had a great time talking to each other about all kinds of stuff, talking to all the kids who came to get refreshments, etc.  I tried not to get too close to our kids, however, due to threats from Brittany that I better not hang around them!  🙂

It was so funny being there and comparing dances we had growing up vs. the dances now.  Back when I went to dances, if you didn’t have a date, you just didn’t go.  Now, there were probably about 60% of the kids there that came as big groups without dates (either mixed boys and girls, all girls, or all guys).  They just stand in the middle of the floor, jump around, and dance with everybody.  It seems like our larger dances were more formal and nice as well.  How times have changed.  🙂

After the dance, the girls all came over to our house for dessert, snacks, and a movie.  Most of them didn’t make it through the movie.  We had to wake them up to go home at midnight.  🙂

Today, the Metea Valley High School Marching Mustangs went to a competition at Northern Illinois University (NIU) to perform.  They didn’t “officially compete” but were on the program to give them a competition-like experience.  The Fine Arts Department Chair, Mr. Devany (who is also the band director), doesn’t really believe in the full-fledged “competition model” and so the marching band won’t be doing any of these, but go and participate anyway.

The girls got up to the high school early to warm up and get dressed in their uniforms.  I arrived with the rest of the “Pit Crew” shortly thereafter, and we got the bus loaded up with all the pit instruments. Mr Schneider, one of the band directors got a present for his son and decided to put it on himself!  It was hilarious watching him dancing around singing Winnie the Pooh!  🙂

When we arrived, we got everything unloaded and got ready to perform.  The staging area was quite a walk from the stadium, so we had to wheel the pit carts quite a ways.  🙂 Brittany was really excited to be there and really likes hanging out with her fellow pit members.

The kids performed BEAUTIFULLY and they sounded amazing!  Since I was down on the field, I didn’t get any good pictures of the whole area, but did get a couple with Sarah and Brittany both in the shot.  I’m trying to find a video of the performance if possible and will try and publish the link.

After the performance, we hurried and packed all the equipment on the carts, wheeled it back over and packed up the truck.  The girls stayed after that and watched a few of the performances.  I left to hurry and get back to Zachary’s football game and tailgate party.

Zach played great!  They lost again, but that’s OK.  He is having fun and that’s all that matters.  He is still the starting Center and loves it.  They have a REALLY small team compared to the others that they play.  Some of the teams that they have played look like they have 2nd and 3rd graders on the team.  It’s crazy!  I guess we just breed them smaller in our neck of the woods.  We originally thought that Zach was big and built like a football player, but after seeing a bunch of the kids he has to go up against, he doesn’t look so large!  🙂

After the game, the team had a great tailgate party with hot dogs and brats.  There were a ton of desserts, chips, drinks and everything.  The kids probably loved that more than the game!  🙂  Kirstyn and Ben had a great time eating too!