Samuel turns 15

Samuel turned 15 on the boat, but we still made him a cake when we got home.  

When Sam was little he wouldn't stop trying to tie his shoe until he was crying his little eyes out and I had to force him to stop practicing.  I would hear the beginning of his piano songs tons of time more than the ends, because if he made one little mistake he would start from the beginning, again.  He argues with us, incessantly.  He taught himself to do a back tuck.  And even though he is one of the shortest and skinniest kids in his grade, he is good at football and running.  What do all those have in common.  Stubbornness.  That kid just won't stop until he dies or wins.  Everything is like this big challenge he has to win.  I'm not sure it's the best attitude to have all the time.  In fact when he is trying yet again to win an argument with us, I can guarantee that!  I hope it will soften with age and he will learn that sometimes it's good to give up a little.  He has a cute face and cuter smile and that rugged charm from his face scar, so he gets away with a lot, too!

Emma finally likes him and invites him places with her.  The other day he saw some of Emma's friends and he turned to me and said, "Mom, tell Emma to put in a good word for me."  "Say, What??" I asked him which one he liked and he said, "I'm keeping my options open."  PLAYER!  I never thought I would here anything like that out of that kid.  

We went ahead and secretly betrothed him to this cutie, who left in July.

We were all so sad.  She is a great girl- down to earth, plays hard, willing to do all kinds of fun things, none of the mean girl, manipulative stuff and she is super cute to boot!  Sam and her and Jack were great friends.  

And now he is a freshman, 120 pounds, 5'4, playing football with men who have beards.

The last time he did that, he got that scar on his face.  He comes home every day now and moans.  I'm not so sure this is the best sport for this guy, but he keeps at it.  He won two awards at the all European Football camp he went to.  Most improved Receiver and Most improved Defensive back.  Most improved isn't always the most impressive of awards, but the fact that they knew a freshman by name in that big of a camp made it impressive.  And not just once, but twice- with two different sets of coaches!  They had people from Belgium, Italy, Czechoslovakia and all over Germany there.  This included local national teams.

Next order of business- bulk Sam up, somehow.  They were talking about putting him on the Varsity squad, but decided against it, thank goodness.  Then they wanted to use him as a running back, but decided he just wasn't big enough to break through.  It seems he will play starting as a corner back on JV now.

I wonder if Sam has friends still.  He does his own thing and when we ask him who he hung out with, he says, " everyone."  "Well who did you talk with."  "Everybody."  Emma saw him on the first day of school eating alone.  He said it was because his friend was being slow getting his food.  Everyone knows him, however.  We were talking to one of the 'men' on the football teams' mom and the 'man' came up and she introduced us.  I started to say that we were Sam's parents while trying to point him out and the 'man' stopped us and said, "oh everyone knows who Sam is- ever since football camp."  I guess there was a funny incident where they were playing 7 on 7 and you were supposed to 2 hand touch the receiver.  Sam slipped or dove or something and ended up doing a 360 around the receivers legs, instead.  Their team almost got disqualified for it.  They all think it was a riot.

He still won't attend a dance.  He is going to be just like his Dad in that.  I don't know what I am going to do with that kid.  It's not like I can force his stubborn body out on the dance floor.

He still gets all A's in school and yet still has no homework.  He got put in some AP class this year (I can't remember which one, because I am running hard for Mother of the Year this year and have no idea what any of my children are doing.) and he was not happy.  He would rather not have to have homework or work really hard at school, thank you very much!

Yet every once in awhile I can still get him to pull my hair for me (he used to do that all the time- I love it!)  He remembers his duty and does it without anyone asking at church, school and on the field.  The other day he saw that the Deacon's were low and so he just hopped up and went up and helped pass the sacrament.  Afterwards, he was the only teacher who remembered that their job was to clean and put away the sacrament, so he did it by himself without another thought.  Now if only I could get him to do that at home!