The Weyland Boys do it again

Kayla has not stopped smiling since her team win at her first ever Cheer Leading championship. And good on her - she did a great job.

The boys, however, have just finished their Winter soccer season (yes, it is the last week of September and it has only just finished).
The only thing that can be said about this season and their efforts is "AWESOME".

Both Dylan and Tyler played Saturday mornings, all around the Hills, for Hahndorf.
They also both played Sunday mornings all around the Southern Vales for Adelaide Hills Hawks.
Coupled with training on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday nights, you can understand why Kayla would be happy to never see a soccer ball again.

They both have been rewarded for all their efforts though from the Hawks, and made Tracy and I very proud and feeling rewarded for the 10,000 Km of travelling between games we have done this season.
Dylan was awarded the "Coaches Pick" for just being an all round nice kid. playing anywhere he was told, and putting in a massive effort each week. Next year we are pushing him up a year level, so the work rate will hopefully be carried on.

And then there is Tyler.
Tyler was described at the club presentation, by his coach, as one of the moodiest kids in the team. That sums it up pretty well. However, the reason for these moods according to Tyler, is that playing in defence all year is boring and not giving him the chances he wants to excel.
The Hawks lost one game only, this year. That makes them the champions of the league for 2016. (I say it is because of our great defence)

Tyler is a fantastic defence player. Very, very rarely did a ball get passed him, and if it did, he got back in between that ball and the goals, and got it right back up to his forwards again. Exactly what a defender is supposed to do. I personally think he played the most minutes of any player in the team throughout the season, which is an absolute testament to how the coach feels about his ability (despite the moods!)
So for the second year running, Tyler wins the "Player's Player" award. This is where all players make a silent vote on the player they feel has done consistently well, displays leadership qualities and is an overall asset to the team.
In my opinion (and many others), this is better than the Best & Fairest.

Now to work on those moods...

Hahndorf presentations are in another 4 weeks or so. My bet is that my next blog is going to be about soccer again, and at least one medal.

Kayla has it too

Well it seems the talent in our family just keeps on appearing.

Kayla has spent the last 4 years of her life following the boys around their soccer games, watching them grow into the mini stars they now are. Very few complaints (other than "I'm bored", and "Do I have to go"...).
Kayla decided this year to graduate her interest from a weeknight session of Gym to start up Cheer Leading competition. It would have been nice to understand from the start that this meant the club might as well have a copy of our credit card, however, we couldn't really tell Kayla she cant do it.

So after only 8 weeks of practice (once a week), it is announced they are entering all girls into a State Championship competition.
Great.
It is also announced by my darling wife Tracy, that the boys and I are going to spend 4 hours on a Saturday morning, watching 3 minute routines (only one of which is Kayla) of dancers from all over the state. "Of course Sweety, I would love to."

So Kayla gets dolled up in 4 inches of make up as specified by the club, has her outfit on, is bursting with excitement, and ready to go.

Despite the boys saying they were bored a few times, I reckon they were secretly enjoying watching all the girls in their outfits doing some pretty amazing dance moves.

We did all get through it without any major complaints, and to top it off, Kayla's team actually got 1st price in her age group and division. This is a pretty amazing outcome, considering they only started dancing together 8 weeks ago.

What that in turn means, is that Kayla is now a massive fan of Cheer Leading, and wants to get better and do more competitions. Looking forward to that......

Congratulations Kayla

Soccer is NOT over!

In my blog posted on 17th September, I made a rather fool hardy comment that Soccer was over for the year... Here we are 32 days later and Soccer is far from over.
The weekend has just passed with a superbly orchestrated Junior Presentation day, thanks mostly to the flawless efforts of the Hahndorf Junior co-coordinator, otherwise known as Tracy Weyland, along with a handful of other committee members. And the near perfect 26 degree weather certainly helped as well.
The 10 or so junior teams all had their moments to come up and be presented with the various awards and trophies on offer, but the highlight of the day quite obviously had to be a strapping young lad called Tyler Weyland that won the Best and Fairest for the U12. To say he was a bit chuffed was an understatement. This award is judged by a different parent each week giving  a 3-2-1 player vote which is then tallied up at the end of the year along with the coaches count from each week.
All I can say as a proud parent is "That's my boy"... quite obviously he has a lot of Weyland blood in him.
Someone then made a rather stupid suggestion that we have a Dad's vs Lad's soccer game. The only thing more stupid than the suggestion was us all saying ok..... what could go wrong?.... barefoot, running, hot weather.... did i mention running? As it turns out, running is actually a skill that needs to be attained in order to play soccer. Running once up the pitch without the need for breathing apparatus from the local medic is also a good achievement.... something that the majority of us Dad's thought we could do, but pretty quickly looked as tho we couldn't.
Turns out that I am not the only dad in the club with the natural talent and ability to give Ronaldo or David Beckham a run for their money, and naturally we beat the kids convincingly, but then backed off so that it was a 3 all draw when the whistle went.
After an hour of recuperation and cleanup of the club, i took Tyler to his next Soccer event - Hills Hawks 2016 trials, where he has to prove his abilities once again against existing and new players looking for a spot in the team. He was also presented with another certificate from the 2015 season, this time the "Players Player" where all the kids voted for who they thought deserved it... and once again the Weyland name was right up there.... Well done champ.

Soccer is over

Just realised it has been a while since everyone has been graced with reading about something they probably end up wishing they hadn't started, so I am not going to let the suspense last any longer.

The kids soccer is almost over.... the serious rounds have finished, the Saturday carnivals have finished and now the sun decides to come out and shine during the day.....
The kids have proven themselves to have their old man's natural sporting talent and have excelled at the big game, and for a while there they were getting their action shots posted in the Hills Courier just about every week, for every one to admire.
Tyler has cemented his spot as a true defender, and almost seemed lost a few times that he was asked to play up forward, whilst Dylan has managed to play anywhere and everywhere, including as goalie, mostly dominating just like a true Weyland should.

A blog just for the sake of having a blog

I am not one to let the truth get in the way of a good story, hence my desire to start blogging about absolutely nothing.
Although I am commonly referred to as a Grumpy Old Man (mainly by my immediate family members and work colleagues), I do enjoy my camping, caravanning (is that a word?) and fishing.... and especially all 3 combined.
Late last year, we packed up the family into a 16 foot caravan for 3 months and explored the East coast of Australia. Check out that blog here. Man, if I could do that my entire life I would be setting off now.
We have also done various smaller holidays in the van. You can check them out here.