Our Mr. Hockey

This past weekend, the kids and I made a trip down to Madison to see my brother-in-law Tyler play in the Wisconsin State Hockey Tournament. They played their first game at state on thursday night and won and then played again on friday night and won. (We were planning on them winning all along so that we'd be able to see them play in their last game on Saturday night.) The championship game was Saturday afternoon in Madison, so we left Saturday morning. (Matt wasn't able to go b/c he was on-call, but he did get to watch it on TV.)



Wyatt was so excited that he woke up by 6am on Saturday to go see Uncle Ty at state. (He also prayed for "Uncle Ty, Cody, Brad, JD and all the Edgewood guys" when we said prayers right before bed on Friday night.) He wanted to wear his hockey jersey and was so proud of Ty. His eyes were just huge as we walked into the arena and he saw all the people that were there to see Uncle Ty play--as he put it. Of course Wyatt wanted to get as close to the ice as possible, so I walked down into the student section with him and all the students were asking if he was a cousin of Ty's (notice the name on the back of Wyatt's jersey). Wyatt proudly told them Ty was his uncle. And everytime Ty skated by, Wyatt yelled "Go Ty!" A few funny things to note: Wyatt has gone to several of Tyler's games and has come to learn the names of several of the players. For awhile, he was saying "Bread, the goalie" and couldn't understand that it was Brad. He also keeps saying that the reindeer in one of his books from Christmas looks like JD (not sure what the connection is). And he calls Cody "Cody Strange". It just cracks us up.
Unfortunately, Ty's team didn't win, but we were so proud of what a great season they had and how it ended in the state championship game. My Dad went down near the glass with Wyatt at the end of the game and Wyatt just hung on and watched as each player on both teams was given their state medals. We couldn't pull him off the glass, even after both teams had shaken hands and left the ice. But we had to leave and we had to go say congrats to Ty. When Ty came out of the locker room, Wyatt was so bothered by the fact that Ty and the other guys were sad. He kept saying, "Why is Ty sad, Mommy?" He didn't really get it. In fact, that night when we said prayers before bed, he prayed that Ty wouldn't be sad anymore and thanked God for all the Edgewood guys.
We had so much fun seeing Tyler captain his team and lead them to the state championship game. Tyler had a great season and was even a finalist for Mr. Hockey Wisconsin. No matter what the outcome of the game, Ty is always Mr. Hockey in our house and everything Wyatt does in hockey is "just like Uncle Ty."