How to thank great coaches...

I've talked here about my Son's love of basketball, and how having great coaches has really fostered that. Well, this session, we have been lucky three times over - our team has three exceptional coaches. Coaches that teach the game of basketball, but more importantly, coaches that treat each kid like an All-Star. And these kids have responded in spades. There's this girl - youngest of 4 kids with 3 older brothers, all players. Shy as all get-out in December, now, an impressive dribbler, and someone not afraid to get under the boards for the ball.

We're also lucky that we have a great team of parents - there's a core group of us are at all the practices, at games we cheer not just for our team, but every other team, we know almost every kid in the league by name, not just our own team. I like to think that this has also made a difference to the kids.

But the coaches. Coach Roy, Coach Max, and Coach Bonnie. They are the best. One of the other mothers and I have been taking pictures throughout the season - of the kids singularly and in team situations. My son and I have put these together, using the pictures, some stickers and other paper craft items. Framed 'em up (You can get scrapbook page frames pretty inexpensively). I think the coaches will like them. Not all people want this kind of stuff in their homes, I know that. But I've done a little research this season, and all three of them collect remembrances of their teams, so I'm in luck. We had so much fun doing these, and had so many pictures, and I can get the other stuff pretty cheaply, we made a page for each kid (not framed - just in a plastic protector. I wouldn't normally do this for a team. But this team is different. They have really gelled and grown together and I want to mark that. Next weekend's final tournament for the year is going to be a sad occasion - it's going to be tough saying goodbye to some of these kids, but we''ll see them through the summer, and next fall.