Soccer, Reading and More!

We'll start off with some exciting news!  Delaney's Crown Point team won their sectional!  With those games, their record is now 12-5-1.



If you can't tell from the grin in the second picture, she is very excited with their achievement.  Their first sectional game was against Lowell; they won 6-1.  Delaney was mentioned in the article about the game.  There was even a nice picture of her included with the article too:



Their championship sectional game was against Kankakee Valley; the final score was 2-1.  The girls played hard, and they were rewarded with the 2013 Sectional Championship title.  Here is the article for that game.  Delaney's family came out in full force to cheer her on!  She had her grandparents, aunts, and cousins all in the stands as well as a few of Kenny's soccer buddies -- Adam, Pat and Mark.  Thanks to everyone for taking the time to come see Delaney play!  Kenny even snapped a picture of me cheering Delaney on:



Tomorrow their first Regional game is going to be at Valparaiso vs. Hammond High at 5:00pm.  The Valparaiso Soccer Stadium is located at 1600 Roosevelt Road, next to Thomas Jefferson Middle School.  Here is an article talking about the upcoming Regional games in the area.  Very exciting!

And as many of you know, I have LAM (a rare, progressive lung disease).  I usually keep it out of our family posts, as we have a separate area for LAM updates and fundraising, but sometimes I like to share in the spirit of education.  :-)  For the lady who said I was "lucky" because I got a ride to the soccer fields to one of Delaney's games.  I was polite and didn't say anything, but I have to say that "lucky" is not how I would describe it.



As a friend nicely posted in response to our Facebook post regarding this same topic, please remember that not everyone's physical problems are visible.  It took years for me to get a diagnosis; several doctors were stumped!!!

Kenny attended the ICE (Indiana Computer Educators) Conference in Indianapolis for a few days, from October 9-11.  Kenny said it was a great experience, and he brought back a lot of ideas to help Hammond's teachers.  He was there with a group from the Hammond school system:



And he even shared a quick picture of one of his classes one morning to me:



Delaney and I thought this was great, because we're always telling him how sweet Pinterest is.  :-)

Last, but certainly not least, Kyle got an awesome shout out in the Solon newsletter from Mrs. McCarroll, the librarian at Solon.   He apparently finished reading all of them before she did!  This is his second year reading all 20 Hoosier books.  Great job, Kyle!!!  He's almost to 300 AR points too.  Woo-hoo!



Is it really sad that I'm already desperately looking forward to Fall Break?!?

Love,
Ken, Dani, Dee & Kyle
 

Keeping Busy!

Let me tell you, we are ecstatic here over at the Benich household.  Seriously.  I am definitely NOT trying to glorify being busy (I am always looking for ways to simplify things).  But with all the kids' activities and school work, Kenny's commitments with work and other events, and everything else we have going on... sometimes it is just too much!  Our last post was the beginning of September, I seem to be getting into a monthly post schedule.  I think part of it is just being too busy at times to do it more often.  :-)

On September 6, Kenny was invited to a wedding reception.  It was for one of the girls he used to coach for Riley -- this was before Delaney was even born!  Here's a picture of Kenny and Sara from the old team picture:



Sara is in the top left corner, and Kenny is obviously in the bottom right.  He was pretty much just out of college, and we were married and living up in South Bend at the time.  Now, here is a picture of the two of them at the wedding reception:



We were thinking that Delaney is now about the same age that Sara was when Kenny started coaching her.  Times flies, right?

Kyle is off to a great start to his reading this year in school.  He just finished reading all 20 Hoosier books!  There were some really great ones this year: a few that made both of us cry, a few that were so sweet, and we learned some new things with the non-fiction selections.  (I obviously read some of them with him too.)  He's also got over 200 AR points this year so far.  Great job, Kyle!!!  Again you can follow all of us at Shelfari if you'd like to keep up with what we're reading.  I can be found under Danielle Benich,  Delaney is Dee44, while Kyle is under Sopts4.  It's a quick and easy way to keep track of what you are reading and see what your friends are reading too!

It's also hard to believe that this year is Kyle's last year in grade school.  Gasp!  Kenny and Kyle attended their last Solon BINGO night, and Delaney was able to go too and visit with some of her former grade school teachers.  Kenny was announcing that night, while the kids had a lot of fun playing, visiting, and eating yummy ice cream.  A good time was held by all!!!

Kenny and his buddies also had their annual trip to Gulf Shores.  They played a lot of golf, relaxed at the beach, and ate a lot.  What else can you ask for?  They even made a new friend while golfing:


 

 


And as always, we have soccer!!!  Delaney's high school CP soccer team is still doing very well.  They are currently 10-3-1.  Their one tie game was only played around 50 minutes and cut short due to weather, with a 0-0 score.  Their first loss of the season was a hard one; it was with Chesterton and involved two overtimes and penalty kicks.  Definitely a tough way to lose, since the girls played great.  Their other two losses were down in Indy with Hamilton Southeastern and Brebeuf.   Since the player's stats online are out-of-date, we are guessing that Delaney currently has 7 goals and 6 assists.  WTG, Dee!

Delaney made the paper again for the win against Kankakee Valley, sneaking in a goal with only around 40 seconds left on the clock.  It was definitely a very exciting game, handing KV their first loss of the season.  It helped her be named the "Athlete of the Week" from September 23rd to 28th. 



Tonight they play Munster at home, and it is senior night too.  They then have a game in South Bend this weekend, then sectionals start up! 

Today the CP soccer team dressed up today to show their spirit, and Delaney was a crazy cat lady:



The cat on her shoulder even meows, if you squeeze its stomach.  She had a lot of fun putting this together.  The sad thing is that we had that many stuffed animal cats to use, right?  (And we didn't even touch any of their Webkinz collection!)  The underclassmen also made posters for the seniors too.  Delaney made one for CC:



Between her costume (and all the cats), the poster, her regular backpack and schoolwork, and her soccer backpack... she was a bit overloaded on the way to school this morning.  :-)

And we are all caught up for now!

Luv,
Ken, Dani, Dee & Kyle