Teed Off

The boys have never been golfing before.  Can you believe that?  I take that back.  Austin has once at a friend's birthday party.  If you know me well, that should strike you as a little strange.  However, eons later I still can't get my high school golf coach's voice out of my head.  Girls, I don't want to hear of you swinging a softball bat and ruining your golf swing!  You can field the ball and throw the ball, but there will be NO batting practice until the golf season is complete.  Yes, I know.  My conscience seems to have a mind of it's own as that was almost 25 years ago that voice started in my head!

Since my boys are both baseball players, I've always figured the golf swing and baseball swing needed their separate place in the summer thanks to my coach, Jean Mowry :)  Well...they have been begging to go all summer and I vowed to wait until Carter finished his All Star baseball season.  Then the weather had to go and be a million degrees for the rest of July. It was almost too melty hot for the pool some days let alone several hours on a golf course! Just the other day the boys asked again when I was going to take them golfing.

Baseball done.  Check.  Beastly hot weather gone.  Check.  Only a couple more days before I had to go back to work.  Check.  I guess it was time!

I decided if we were going to do it, we were going all out and letting them play a full nine holes.  I knew the courses in Ames were usually pretty busy, so I thought we'd make a day of it and head over to Hubbard on the course that my parents used to let my brothers play holes 2, 7 and 9, the three shortest holes, when we went with them.  I figured it would take us awhile and was hoping the course wasn't too busy so we wouldn't hold too many people up.  Thankfully I was right. We practically had the course to ourselves.

What an unbelievably fun day it was!  The boys were in hog heaven and really couldn't get enough of it. Surprisingly, they weren't nearly as horrendous as I thought they might be.  They even humored me and listened when I told them about golf etiquette and gave them some tips on their swings.  I hate to admit it, but each of them ended up out driving me a couple of times throughout the day.

I figured after the three and a half hours it took us to play the first nine holes, they would be done.  Oh no!  They were rip roaring ready to go for another nine.  I think they were a little motivated to try and beat me, even though they didn't come close the first round :)

We headed out for another nine, and I really think they could've golfed the entire rest of the day.  They had so much fun. There are a couple of holes that are lined by fields along the right.  Needless to say, Austin spent some time searching the beans and corn looking for a few of his errant drives.  I just had to giggle because I can remember searching for lost balls in those fields growing up.  He was lucky and actually found his ball nearly every time.

The smiles on their faces at the end of the day said it all.  They had a blast! I'm so thankful that I got to experience this with both of my boys.  I'm sure we will be spending many more hours on the golf course in the coming summers.