Tennis

There are three things we watch on TV with Jaydon:

1. Yoga Kids (took the no. 1 spot from John Deere - which is good because Brian and I have seen enough John Deere to last us a lifetime)
2. John Deere
3. Sports

The French Open (Tennis) is going on now, and thanks to the Tennis Channel, we can watch it just about any time of day. Hurray for HD, too! Jaydon has been really into it. In fact, he'll often ask to "watch tennis", and so we do. I love watching tennis (as does Brian), so we don't pass up on the opportunity.

Fortunately, the Tennis Channel has very "G" commercials - no "CSI" clips, weird movie trailers, or rough stuff (other than athletes looking intense and doing their thing). Jaydon doesn't mind these commercials. It was a different story with the Superbowl. Jaydon liked the football, but when the commercials would come on, he would say, "Turn it off. Turn it off." There were some really awful (gruesome, dark, rough, etc...) commercials running during the Superbowl. But I digress...

While the tennis is on, he'll say, "I play tennis, too". Then he'll follow the motions of the players. For example, when a player is serving, he'll hold a ball in his hand and move his hand up and down, up and down, as if he's bouncing the ball. Then when the player on TV swings and hits the ball, he'll wind up, twist his body, and throw the ball with all his strength. As you can imagine, the flinging of the ball is not a good thing. To allow some fun and avoid damage, we let him use a yellow foam ball, which works out just fine. Sometimes he'll even grunt like the players. During a point, he'll say things like, "Jaydon got it over the gate." He keeps referring to the net as a "gate". We've been unsuccessful in our attempts to correct him. The net really does look like a gate!

We were driving by some tennis courts this weekend, and as we passed, Jaydon said, "Mommy and Daddy play tennis. Jaydon play tennis, too." I can't wait 'til we all get to hit the courts. Our budding tennis player is working on his moves already. By next summer, you can be sure he'll have his first tennis racket. Oh, and he'll have some golf clubs, too. Age three seems about right for getting kids started with the sports, especially if they are interested! :)