Practice #2

Practice time again and I'm pretty sure that has all we've been hearing about for the past couple days. Sadly I wasn't able to make it to his practice today, but Ashley and Grandma Karen were able to go and get lots of pictures and fill me in on all the details. Over all the practice was a big success compared to last weeks practice, Gabe fell a lot less and was able to get himself up all the time, but probably the best thing is that he listened and took direction from his coach. When they told him something he listened and did it :-) a big milestone for those that don't know him.

They did run a couple new drills to teach new techniques and better his balance. First one was skating from one side to the other with his stick above his head. This was great, so Gabe can stop relying on using his stick for balance and start to better his skating ability. We did get a kick out of the fact that Gabe wasn't able to lift his stick above his head because his helmet got in the way, but with a little help he did great. The next new drill was doing skate crossovers. This was done by having the kids hold on to the wall and walking around while crossing one skate over the other and then bringing the other skate back. This was teaching them to lift their skates and crossover which will be very helpful when start skating fast and start making turns and keeping their speed up. This was enjoyable because none of the kids could figure it out, once one skate left the ground and hit their other skate then they were on the ground just as fast :-) After that it was Gabe's favorite part, SHOOTING DRILLS!!!!! They passed the kids the puck and let them take it to the goal and shoot. When I asked Gabe how many goals he scored all I could get was "Lots", good job buddy!!!

Sorry this wasn't a little more detailed, next week will be better, or I may let Ashley write the details when I can't make it. I'll just load this post with pictures to make up for the lack of details.

Hockey Day!!!!

Well today was all about hockey/skating, which was great because we needed to try out those new skates and get Gabe some more practice skating. The day started at 9:30 at the Toyota Arena rink B where Gabe had his stick time practice where the kids are free to just skate around and do whatever they want to get some practice and have fun. So today was the test to see if these new skates were going to make the difference or not. So we were in the locker room getting Gabe geared up and ready to go, he was just about done when I was asked to help with a parent that didn't really know how to put the gear on.

I'm going to go off subject a little bit and talk about something that I hope follows us through Gabe's hockey journey. We had an opportunity to help out a man and his daughter today by lending them Gabe's skates that were too big and let her use them because they weren't able to get any. This man wanted to get his daughter out skating and see how she would like hockey and only has her Tuesdays and Wednesdays and every other weekend and so he was able to get her into the BP this year. However he didn't have any skates for her and we were blessed with an opportunity to help them out. And not 5 minutes later me and Gabe;s coach were talking about pad and skate sizes and she had noticed how small Gabe is and let us borrow her son's old elbow pads because Gabe's were to small....Got to love Karma. I hope that we will be able to help out others more through this and that other parents may return the favor when we need it.

Back to the main topic, Gabe was all geared up and took off to go on the ice with Ashley and I stayed back to help out the guy with his daughters pads. Not 2 minutes had passed and Ashley runs back into the locker room and yells "He fell, and got right back up by himself :-) :-) :-) :-)" (that's the only way I can show how big her smile was.) So the skates did the trick, Gabe was skating better and moving around better on the ice today and was getting up by himself every time he fell. Now practices should be alot better for him. :-)


Stick time went until 11:00 and then we had a little break before we went to Ashley's cousins birthday party at the roller rink at 1:00. I was so proud about how well Gabe did but was nervous because his roller skates are a bit to big too and so I thought he might have some trouble again. Quite the opposite happened... we didn't get him in full pads, just skates and knee pads. No helmet was kind of freaking me out because I've seen how this kid falls and it isn't pretty, but I figured we'd give it a shot. He did amazing!!!!! He was pushing off his skates like he was supposed to and gaining speed and was skating just as well as the kids twice his age and not falling at all. Gabe also won the limbo special at the rink and got a rollereana buck that he was able to use to buy a cool glow stick. We also got Kaden in some roller skates which was a kick because those roller skates weighed more then he did :-) He couldn't really do much with them but was having a blast and was actually able to pull himself up and stand up, another hockey played in the making :-)

It was a great family day and a great day for Gabe, his new skates are working great and we can see that he is already learning and picking things up from his practice and coaches. I can't wait to see all the things you are going to be able to do little guy, me and mom love you so much and are so proud of everything you are doing. Keep it up and always keep trying hard.

Fixing the Problem

As I made note of before, Gabe was having a little bit of a problem of getting back up on his skates after falling and we kept trying to figure out what the problem was. Well everything kind of kept going back and wondering if his gear, mainly his skates were too big. Now the gear that he got was a little big for him, but from talking to coaches and players the best thing is to have a good solid helmet and skates that fit perfectly. Well the helmet was good maybe a little heavy but that he can get used to, so then we looked at the skates and there was our problem. Gabe's skates were a size 11 and that would be great if he wore a size 12 shoe but he wears a 9/10 so he needed to be in a size 8 skate. So then the search began to find a pair of size 8 skates that wasn't going to break the bank. Well through a little bit of searching and thanks to closeout prices from Hockeymonkey.com we found a pair of Mission 7-1 yth skates that were only for sale in a size 8. Hurray!!!!! But then it came down to price. The 7-1 model is almost the top of the line skates for Mission and the retail cost of the skates were $129.99. Yikes!!! Thanks again to closeout pricing we were able to steal them for $34.99 plus we pick up some other things he might need.  All his gear that we ordered showed up on Friday and it looks great and we will be able to test everything out on Sunday when he has his stick time. Now lets just hope that these skates do the trick.

First Practice

On Tuesday March 29th, 2011 Gabe had his first official hockey practice!!!! Just to give everyone an idea on how the groups work for the BP they have different colors that are taped to there helmet to let the coaches know where they are placed. Orange is for group 1, the beginners, Green is for group 2, and Yellow for group 3. This is Gabe's first time in BP so he is automatically in orange but at any point can move up.

I wish I could say he did absolutely amazing and that he is the best hockey player out there but sadly no such luck, but what can you expect for your first practice :-) However we couldn't be more proud and excited for our little guy, from the moment we were putting his gear on to the moment he started crying because we had to leave, he had a big smile on his face. (Even while laying on the ice because he couldn't get up)

I think we will start with the things that didn't go so well at practice and then get to the good stuff. As I mentioned above Gabe was having some serious trouble getting back on his skates after falling down. We couldn't tell if his gear was too big, or if he wasn't strong enough,  or just wasn't getting it, and realized that we need to figure this out before it becomes a issue and he stops wanting to play. The other thing is for those of you that know Gabe, then you know he is incredibly shy when it comes to new people, so he spent alot of time on the ice just watching everyone do what the coaches said and he just stared back at them with his look of "I don't know you, why are you telling me to fall on the ice and drop my stick, just give me a puck so I can score a goal." (And that is probably exactly what was going through his head) :-) But now Ashley and I know what we need to work on with him and as time goes on he will warm up to his coaches and teammates.

Now for the good stuff that happened at practice. First off I want to say that the coaches are great!!! They easily recognize which kids need a little extra attention and give them one on one help to get them going and keep them encouraged to keep getting better. I know I don't have that much patience for Gabe sometimes :-) I look forward to how quickly he will learn from them teaching him. They next thing is that even though he had some hard times getting up after falling, he was staying up on his skates more then most of the kids in the class. When they had the kids skate from one end to the other most of the kids would take off flying and would fall once, twice, even three times on their way over, while Gabe would just skate at his pace and stay on his skates the whole time. And the last thing I noticed is that Gabe is pretty darn good with a puck on his stick. From trapping passes, one timing passes back, and stick handling to the goal to score, I felt he did great and think it'll be one of the strong points of his game, but we'll see. If anyone saw anything else then feel free to comment.





All in all it was a great practice and we couldn't be more proud of our little hockey star and look forward to much more to come in the future.

Recap Time

OK, I've fallen a little behind in what's been going on with Gabe's hockey, so it's time to fill everyone in on what's happened up to today. So there will be a few post today to help fill in the weeks events. Thanks for being patient.

Gabe's Hockey Journey

This blog is to share with everyone my son, Gabriel's, journey to become a hockey player. Just some background information about our family first though. We are the Millward family, I'm Gary (25); my wife is Ashley (22), we have been together for 5 years and married for 4; then there is Gabriel (4), Gabe for short, he will be the main focus of this blog; then we have Kaden (18 months) sometimes referred to as wreckage, if you ever saw one of the rooms in our house after he's been in it you'd understand. :-)

For those of you that don't know Gabe's journey into this world here is a quick background on his life. Gabe was born on December 9th 2006 but wasn't due until March 30th 2007, so yes he was born 16 weeks ahead of schedule. He was considered a micro preemie at only 1lb 10oz and measuring 12" long. During his long stay in the hospital Gabe endured 5 surgeries, three of them being eye surgeries. He wears glasses now and undergoes daily vision therapy exercises to get his eyesight better, but other then that he is a healthy, albeit small for his age, 4 year old. (Anything else you'd like to know about us you can check out my wife's blog at themillwards@blogspot.com)

Gabe has been hooked on hockey ever since his first Tri-City Americans game. The Americans are our major junior hockey team here in Tri-Cities, WA, they play in the Western Hockey League (WHL) and you'll probably be hearing alot about them too. My dad runs the clock/scoreboard for the Americans and so he always got a set of season tickets for free and so my mom always used those tickets. When Gabe was about 2 my mom started taking him to the games and he was just in love with the game, and this season we needed to buy him a set of season tickets for himself even though he always ends up sitting on our laps anyways. :-) (they play better when he sits on our lap) It didn't take him long after watching a few games to know that he wanted to play hockey.

It didn't take long for Gabe to turn everything into either a hockey stick, puck, or goal. Golf clubs, empty buckets, and blocks was all he needed to play. :-) I didn't think much of getting him into hockey, because it does get pretty spendy, until i watched him shoot blocks into a bucket with a little hockey stick using a perfect wrist shot and then turn around and backhand another block right into the "goal" and it occurred to me the it would be a shame if I didn't let him play. (I will be using quite a few hockey terms in this blog and if you don't know what I'm talking about I recommend going to http://www.howtohockey.com/ to educate yourself and learn some tips and tricks to, Awesome Website!!!! Thanks guys)

Then it was my journey to get him signed up into a beginners program, BP, and find him all his gear. At the time we wanted to sign him up he wasn't old enough, he was 3 and needed to be 4. So Santa brought him a net, sticks and roller skates for Christmas so he could get some practice getting used to skates and playing on them, which the net was destroyed the next day when dad decided to take a slap shot and hit the post, whoops... So we bought a new net made from steel, don't get the cheap PVC ones, and everyday was dad you want to play hockey with me, mom you want to play hockey with me, you be the goalie, watch this shot (luckily nothing has been broken yet, knock on wood...)  but we still need to get him in an actual program and lucky enough they started another BP at the end of March. So I signed him up but we still needed all his gear, which the way we got it was a sign that he was meant to play. I work for McCurley dealerships in Pasco as a car salesmen, and so happened to sell a car to a family that had a daughter in a BP program and had all her pads and skates left over, which a was able to get all his stuff for $100. So now he was all set to go play, and this is where his journey begins. I hope you enjoy seeing our boy learn and grow in this sport as much as we do as time goes on, and welcome any questions or comments from families that have kids in hockey that can suggest stuff to us or from families that want to get their kids in we will be happy to help. Thanks Everyone.