We left Santa Clarita right on time and arrived in Burbank at 5:20a.  Our 7a flight had a 6:30a boarding time, so we were in good shape.  Until we saw that McD’s was not open.  McD’s was closed Christmas day, or at least was opening late.  Denny’s was open and we got Moons Over My Hammy sandwiches for take out.

We arrived right on time in Portland after our very early flight.  Christmas dinner was slightly delayed when the Wasson clan (8 members) had some motion sickness on the trip from Olympia to Portland.  All in all, there were 19 people for Christmas dinner.  It was great fun.

Camille didn’t feel well the next morning, so we drove to Eagle Crest on our own.  This place is nice.  Toby gives this place 5 out of 5 stars for the layout of the condo.  She loves that the master suite is on the second floor (thus the fact that she is able to take long naps).

Sunday morning we woke up to a very light snow.  The kids were so excited for the snow.  Lucy made a snow angel and we had a mini snowball fight.  We met a nice family at the local playground who let us borrow their sleds.  The resort is on a golf course, so there are lots of little hills to sled down.

Don and Camille arrived later Sunday afternoon.  We ordered pizza from Cibelli’s.  We thought that we would order 3 large pizzas for the 6 of us in order to have some leftovers for the rest of the week.  When I picked up the pizzas that Toby ordered, I was quite surprised at the size.  These were 24” pizzas.  I’ve never seen a 24” pizza before, and I carried out 3 of them.  Below is a picture of 1 of the boxes, with a piece of letter sized paper for reference.

  
Yikes!  Each slice was a foot long.

We have a lot of pizza to eat this week.

Max’s team ended up in 4th place for the AYSO Area 10W.  Area 10W covers north Ventura county and south Santa Barbara county, including:

• Ventura
• Camarillo
• Santa Paula
• Santa Barbara
• Ojai
• South Oxnard & Port Heuneme
• Fillmore
• North Oxnard & El Rio
• Carpinteria

I was not able to figure out how many under-10 boys teams were in Area 10W, but I know that Carp had 10 teams and Santa Barbara had 42.  Santa Barbara has a couple weeks of tournament play to select the 2 teams that will go to the Area playoffs.  I imagine that Ventura and Oxnard have similar numbers to Santa Barbara.  Whatever the actual number, the initial pool of teams was very large and to advance to 4th place was quite an accomplishment.

Max’s AYSO soccer team won their game today and so has advanced to the semi-finals tomorrow.  These games were supposed to be played last weekend but the whole weekend was rained out.  We have an 8a game tomorrow.  The teams are supposed to check in 45 minutes before the game starts, and so we will be leaving for Camarillo at 6:30a.  Yikes.

(Max is number 5, towards the left)

Today’s game was a real nail-biter.  In the first quarter the other team scored 2 goals.  In the 2nd and 3rd quarters The Vipers did not let them score, and scored 3 goals themselves.

The referee seemed to be making all calls against The Vipers.  Coach Jack had his work cut out for him helping the ref to see reason.  The ref made our players back up very far from a free kick.  Jack reminded him (not so gently) that the rule was 10 yards, so the ref stepped in off and the boys lined up much closer.  Many throw-ins were called back (I think 5 total) for our team, but none for the other team.  Once, the ref made a call without looking at the line judge who had a flag raised.  Coach Jack pointed out to the ref that the line judge had a flag up.  After conferring with this line judge, the ref reversed his call.

This back and forth rose to a head at the end of the 3rd quarter when a blue player was off-sides and the ball dribbled into The Vipers’ goal.  I don’t know a lot about the rules, but Coach Jack was nearly apoplectic when the ref didn’t call back the goal due to the off-sides.  The ref agreed that the player was off-sides, but disagreed with Coach Jack that the player was involved in the play (apparently being involved in the play matters as to whether a foul is called).  After a few tense minutes, and Coach Jack throwing down his hat in disgust, the goal was allowed to stand.  This set the score at 3 to 3.

The 4th quarter was scoreless for both sides, so the teams went into overtime.  Overtime in soccer (at this level) is 2 five minute quarters.  After the second quarter, if the score is still tied, there is a shoot-out.  The teams went to the shoot-out.  5 players from each team take turns kicking the ball one on one with the goalie.  The shoot out  ended in a tie, 4 to 4.  This leads to a ‘sudden death’ shoot-out.  Each team gets a chance to score a goal.  If both score, or both miss, then another pair of boys tries to score a goal.  If 1 boy scores and the other misses, that is the game.  Our first kicker for the sudden death scored a goal, and the shot from the opposing team was successfully blocked!  The Vipers won!!!

There are 2 games tomorrow.  If we win the first game, we play at noon in the Finals.  If we lose the first game, we play at noon for 3rd or 4th place.  The first and second place teams from this weekend advance to the Regional tournament which is in Bakersfield at the end of January.

We couldn’t wait.  Although we are not finished downstairs, we decided to have a thankful Thanksgiving dinner in the new space.  Our wonderful friends, the Allens, joined us.

After a great meal prepared by Toby and Steph, we went down to Rincon Beach to walk it off.  The web descriptions of this beach describe it as ‘often covered with driftwood’.  Here is a driftwood structure that the kids enjoyed playing in.

One of the things that Toby wanted to do on this day was to take a family picture.  Toby had some crazy ideas for what she wanted.

Max has started drawing comic strips.  Lucy was inspired yesterday to do one as well.  This is one of her and buddy Emma going to Vons, the shopping mall, the hair styler and the candy shop.

Max has created a character named ‘Phony’ who is based on Shaggy from Scooby Doo.  Here’s his strip of Phony’s search for some food at a strange diner.

Here’s a zoomed in clip of one of the squares – of a van liked Scooby and Shaggy’s Mystery Machine.