Daddy, Tiger Woods scored a goal!

Let's start off with how great of a sports weekend this was.  Ryder Cup, college and pro football, and a couple of MLB races that came down to the wire.  Great weekend to be able to watch some big time sporting events on the big HD flat screen.

That is unless you have three little girls!

Normally on the weekends the wife and I take turns waking up early with Brigid. However, this weekend I did not mind waking up because I would be able to have some quiet time and watch the Ryder Cup while Brigid played. This would be possible because the matches were being played in Wales (5 hours ahead of us).  I would even get to watch the matches on Friday morning too!  And, as a bonus, Amy was able to either go to spin class or sleep in, which is great for everyone.

However, as is standard with any little kid, not just girls, Annie and Kelly decide to wake up earlier than normal on Friday. Thus, my first day of quiet time watching golf turned into non-stop questions about golf.  Now, you have to love curiosity from kids, because that is how they learn. And all kids do it, not just girls.  But it is the type of question that I believe makes up the difference between boys and girls.  Here are a few I heard Friday:

1. Why are they wearing those colors?
2. Does he have any kids?
3. Why is his hair so long and shaggy?
4. Are there cheerleaders at golf?
5. Do they like each other?
6. How did they get there?
7. Did they all come together?
8. Where do they live?

There were even more and I do mean more, but these were some of the better ones.  Also, since I was still half asleep, I have forgotten many of them.

Now, they also did ask many questions about the golf, which I happily tried to answer. But it was just the sheer volume of questions at 6:45 a.m. along with the questions themselves that just made watching not as enjoyable as I had first envisioned.  This is not new, or even just special, for when I watch golf.  It is when I am watching any sport. I know they are just interested in what Daddy likes and want to know more, but couldn't we just enjoy it in peaceful silence with a few simple sports related questions filtered in?

Once I got accustomed to a new question every 30 seconds, their curiosity started to turn to passion.  Although they did not always know what they were cheering for, they cheered loudly and enthusiastically.  Annie was even "booing" at the TV if the European crowd was cheering too loudly. They knew to cheer or boo also depending on my reactions which helped them.  They also tried to keep me updated if I had to leave the room for a minute.  Thus came Annie running in to me telling me that "Tiger Woods made a goal!"  Ah, you have to love them!

After trying to endure the questions and loud cheering and booing for some time I resigned myself to the fact that I would need to go get breakfast ready and watch the golf on our little TV in the kitchen. Thus I left the girls to watch Curious George on the flat screen TV. My 45 minutes or so of peaceful golf watching never happened and it was time to start another day.

The moral of the story for me is not 'enjoy every moment with your kid and take pleasure in all of their questions and enthusiasm.'  No, the moral of the story for me is that I need to teach the girls how to read the clock and not come down the stairs before 7:30 a.m.!