Dom and the NCAA tournament

Dom is our sports guy.  He will tell you this as soon as he meets you and warms up to you.  He loves just about all sports.  In fact, when a friend of mine had them at her house and she happened to have a cooking competition on, she said he was completely enthralled with it.  The irony is, that he is the least competitive child I know.  He doesn't care if he wins or loses, he just likes to play.  If it appears he will lose, he just picks someone else to root for.  Generally whoever happens to be in the lead when he realizes his fate.  We are working on him sticking with a team...

So, you can imagine his excitement over the NCAA Tournament.  Arguably the best tournament ever.  We had him fill out a bracket this year online.  And he loved it.  Will did one, too, and they went back and forth switching picks until the day before the tournament started.  The one constant was the KU won it all.  Both boys were pretty upset when they learned that Eric had not picked KU to win it all.  I believe Dom's first words to Eric after this revelations were:  "You're Fired!".  If they knew what it means to divorce, I think they would have been a little concerned about the state of our marriage as they did keep asking me how I felt about the whole situation.

Along with the brackets, Dom also likes to color pictures to support various teams.  While KU is in the tournament, he mainly colors Jayhawks and maybe one picture of the opposing team.  This is the picture we have of last year's tournament:

(He refused to smile, but just kept his mouth slightly ajar because that is was a Jayhawk looks like...note the Michigan page on the right...)
 
  During the Big 12 tournament he made posters and Will got into the spirit as well.  But, Dom much prefers me to print off pictures we find on the internet.  Now, the Jayhawks have a lot of pictures to choose from.  Other schools not so much.  For example, I could not find a single picture for the University of Dayton or Stanford.  Finally, I told Dom he'd just have to make his own.  This is what he came up with:

 

I'd even contacted our sports loving priest in Dayton to see if he knew of any coloring pages.  But, I'm very proud of Dom for coming up with his design and not being overly upset.  I know it disappoints him every time I can't find a picture and he never whines.  He makes a few suggestions of other words for me to google, but eventually comes around to the idea that I've done the best I can and moves on to plan B.

Now the 4 teams who made the Final Four were a different story.  Wisconsin and Florida had loads of pictures.  Surprisingly, Kentucky, not so much.  But I did enlarge a car decal picture I found and then there was this generic basketball picture that Dom was fine with.

UConn was even more pathetic.  Turns out they have changed mascots several times in the last 20 years or so, maybe that has something to do with it?  Or they are just lame...yeah, that is probably it.  So, I made up a poster all by myself.  Again, with a car decal I found and a few pictures of Huskies.

Finally, Dom took it upon himself to recopy the bracket of the tournament.  He'd been filling in the winners diligently on a different one, but last week decided to do it more neatly.  #Handwritingpractice #homeschool.  He even attempted to get the neighbor kids involved.  They weren't quite as enthusiastic.  As this tournament winds down, he is already looking forward to next years.  It's been quite the month. 

Meanwhile, William has discovered Mystery Mosaics.  These are color by letter pictures that are revealed as you color.  Honestly, these are suppose to be mine...but, Will was so intrigued that I quickly let him have a hand at it.  (Don't worry, I ordered myself a book yesterday.  I'm not that self-sacrificing of a mom)  Pretty cool, huh?  Last night he colored a Flamingo.  So look forward to a post in the not so distant future of Will's mosaic display!