Tag: ping pong

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Be The Best.

Balloons are fun?

I needed to get some balloons for the cemetery on Friday.

See any words that don’t sort of go together already?

So, I ‘googled’ dutifully and found a great supplier nearby…’Balloons-R-Fun’.  Seriously!?

I actually had a good telephone chat with the small biz owner and suggested she might change her business name as she told me how often she helps people with memorial situations.

Maybe something like, ‘Balloons-R-Fun and Maybe-They-R-Not-That-Fun’…or something like that.

In any event, she was very kind and Max picked up 20 helium filled balloons that afternoon.

One thing one should do when releasing balloons is check the wind conditions.  We had other things on our minds so when we released the first batch of balloons at 2:32 and 41 seconds, they flew right up into the big tree above Chris’ Dogwood wall.

What was actually very cool was Ethan’s balloon, which was the only one with a written message on it, got ‘stuck’ on the end of a branch out above the wall.  It was sort of like it was saying a special hello.  Ethan later sent off another balloon which you see in the video.  He’s wearing Chris’ Johns Hopkins lacrosse hoodie which is a lifetime classic and now proudly owned by Ethan.

Things got even more interesting when Chris’ friends let go of the four balloons we had left an hour or so later.  I didn’t realize what had happened until I saw the video later.  Three of the four balloons stay together and the fourth balloon is also moving upward, just slightly separated.

Pretty powerful symbolism.

Perhaps Balloons-r-Fun…or at least symbolic…

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Be The Best.

Yogurt and Toast.

All day long the texts, emails and comments kept rolling in.

We appreciate everything and all of those thoughts and prayers!

The Brookswood gang dropped by in the late afternoon and we had a very unique opportunity to toast Chris.

As I’ve mentioned before, Chris had the ability to eat yogurt without a spoon.  He would sort of squish the bottom of the yogurt cup and slurp and drink the yogurt, usually in one ‘fluid’ motion.

We know there are young readers of this blog and as parents we’re not endorsing this form of yogurt consumption!  We were just happy Chris and Max would pound back yogurt instead of cake.

In this picture you can see the toast just getting underway.  Including yours truly taking the picture, that was an even dozen toasting Chris with a yogurt salute and down the hatch it went.

Ingrid was left wondering how it could be done as she ended up with yogurt in a few places on her face.  I know Chris had a laugh at (or with) all of us!

What an amazing day it was.

I’ve got a few more stories to tell you so tune in tomorrow!

We ended the day knowing that Chris would be very, very happy…and we were too.  As tough as the day was, it was really incredible.

Who knew yogurt was made for toasting?

Ingrid, Cooper, Marshall, Cam, Lucas, Beau, Alan (front), Dylan, Jesse, Max, Devon
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Be The Best.

Ping Pong…it’s a sport.

I take some razzing at work because I like to play Ping Pong.  Yah…capital letters.

It’s a sport.

Some call it an activity, pastime, club; but that is totally incorrect.

Last year I had the opportunity to play a police officer from Berlin during the Police and Fire Games held in Vancouver.  The Ping Pong tournament was held at BCIT.  You can see some footage below.  She kicked me…hard.

In any event, I love to play.

Chris loved Ping Pong too, but it was played slightly differently.  Sure, he would play with his Dad from time to time, but when his buddies came over, the real Pong started.  They took off their shirts and up to 6 of them would run around the table taking turns hitting the ball.  In short order, someone would miss.  The guy at the other end of the table who had taken the victorious shot was then given a chance to smash a ball as hard as he could into the other guy’s bare chest or back.

Ever been around 16 or 17 year old males?  This is actually pretty normal.

They would laugh, smash balls at each other, admire the welts they had made and do it again.

It’s called male bonding and I loved to see that gang have a great time…as long as their parents weren’t worried about where the welts were coming from!

In any event, my nephew Steve, when he was up in September surprised me with a birthday gift.  It was a sandpaper Ping Pong bat custom designed with a Be The Best logo and a CF2 on the other side.

How cool is that!

I’d play with it, but don’t want to take a chance of wrecking it, so I’ve settled for a little online Ping Pong as pictured below.

Remember…Ping Pong is a sport.

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Be The Best.

Brothers

I remember when we had both Max and Chris as young dudes in piano lessons.

One night, they had a piano recital.  They were both scared.  It was sort of comical.  Here’s why.

Brothers are brothers.  That means always a punch or comment or wedgie or attempted wedgie or something.

That’s what brothers do.

Here’s what else brothers do.  They have each others’ backs.

During this piano recital, the fooling around was over for the night..or at least until the ‘stupid’ recital was over.  It was simply, I’m gonna support you and you’re gonna support me and we’ll get through this horrific event of playing this instrument in front of people we don’t know.

Love it.

Brothers.

Forever.

Chris goes for 'atomic wedgie'...yah, that's Max's head in there somewhere.

Chris and Max ham it up at Disneyland.

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Be The Best.

Trucker hats, running shoes and walking the new normal.

First, a thank-you to all of you for the thoughts and prayers and support for my Dad going into surgery today.

The Docs were pleased with how things went and Dad (Jake) will be spending the next 5 days or so in the hospital getting stronger.

He was already joking with the nurses with some bad puns tonight…hmmm…wonder where I get that from…

So what do you do before surgery?  Go for a walk of course and get some exercise even if you haven’t eaten in 2 days.  Of course you do….if your name is Jake Friesen.

We had a great walk today and I realized that Dad was wearing the trucker hat Ingrid and I had given him from Chris.  This was Chris’ favourite hat at the time of his passing and his Grandpa was the logical person to wear it.  If you haven’t yet, you can see Chris trying it on Grandpa last New Years and the related blog post.

I also was wearing my hand-me-up sneakers from Chris that I wrote about the other week.

So here we were having a little stroll and Chris was with us as Dad prepared for his fight with cancer and surgery later that day.

Couldn’t imagine a better Be The Best moment.

And as I put at the end of the little video, anytime is a good time.

In other words, anytime is a GOOD time…ie, even though our family is together here to support Dad through his battle (and Mom with hers), we can still have fun, laugh and get a little exercise.

The other meaning of course is that ANYTIME is a good time to go for a walk, have a chat, build a relationship, play tennis, go skiing, go hiking, play scrabble, have dinner with family, play ping-pong or anything else you can think of.

I loved that Chris joined us today too.  Love ya kid.

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Be The Best.

Kids these days.

A gang of dudes (and Hope!) came by tonight for a little ping pong and socializing.  Talk about a great group of kids…again!  I have been so incredibly impressed with all the young people that Ingrid and I have met over the past few months.  It makes me very excited about the future of our community and country to know we have such a great group of young minds ready to take a leadership role in the years to come.  Of course we were just playing ping pong, talking about Chris, sports and catching up, but I know good character traits when I see them! btw, any employers out there in the Langley area, a few of these students still need some summer employment, so send me a message and I’ll set you up!  (no, they didn’t ask me to write that bit)

I know as a parent, you are never sure if the things that you say and model actually are absorbed by your children.  Since Chris’ passing we have heard story after story of what he was like and I have to say it has meant a huge deal to us to hear about how many of the things we taught him (and hopefully role-modeled) came through in his life and with his friends.

I know many parents reading this probably wonder if it’s happening with your own kids.  Are they really listening?  The short answer….YES.  You probably just won’t hear too much about it!

Hope, Chaz, Beau, Ingrid, Cooper, Devon, Some Old Guy
Devon smashes a return.
Chaz goes backhand Michael Jordan style.
Cooper muscles a forehand serve.
Beau tactically places serve.
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Be The Best.

Ping Pong and $20,000.

It was quite a day.  Firstly, Ingrid played ping pong tonight after some pizza and watching a little NBA action.  That doesn’t usually happen, but Beau and Cooper (more of Chris’ gang from Brookswood) were over and she was right in there.  Max captured the action on camera.  Good games by all.

Earlier this afternoon we got some amazing news from Simon Fraser University.  The CHRIS FRIESEN MEMORIAL AWARD FUND has reached and surpassed the $20,000 goal!!!  This is amazing news as it means Chris’ fund is now set for life and will continue to provide opportunity for lacrosse playing SFU students for decades to come.  THANK YOU ALL!  What an amazing accomplishment.  This is WITHOUT, the dollars raised from the lacrosse sticks and AC’s incredible donation of proceeds from Love Shines which are still to be added and will continue to help the fund grow.  Wow.  We are humbled, excited and are looking forward to making the first presentation of the Chris Friesen Memorial Award in January 2011. From wristbands to cheques to thoughts and prayers you have all contributed to making this award a legacy fund.  We are incredibly amazed at the support and generosity.  THANK YOU!!!

Now, let’s get back to some ping pong!

Beau powers a serve while Randy does something...
Cooper pounds a return while Max thinks about how Lost ended.
Look at that concentration.