I've always been a firm believer in this philosophy, however...

Jared's not buying it...

"The boy who won the trophy"

I'm sure many of you have had the privilege of hearing me on my soapbox ranting and raving about trophies.  I am not a fan of the trophy...and even before Pat Gray dubbed the rising generation "trophy kids" I was taking a stand. 

I have a big sister who is quite accomplished.  As a kid she EARNED many trophies.  Some for winning tennis tournaments, others for placing in the Elementary Reflections Contest.  I used to marvel at all of her trophies sitting on her shelf in her room.  I myself had no need for a shelf because I had no trophies.  And I was okay with that.  (editors note:  I was the stick pull champion for my age group for 3 years in the Stake Olympics..I believe they gave me some sort of a medal)

Anywho...My parents came up this weekend for my twin nephews 1st birthday, and with them they brought all our "stuff".  I guess my sisters and I are officially "out of the house"!  Ann had a whole box full of her trophies. 

Sunday night we all went to Annie's for the twins birthday dinner.  It was lovely.  The festivities also included a haircut for Cael...pictures to be posted later...and a mean game of balloon darts.  For those of you who have not played balloon darts before, you blow up your balloon...don't tie it and then let it go and try to hit a target.  The person with the most points wins...or in our case when my dad is taking score, the kid who is the worst loser wins.  That would be Seth.  In this case the prize for the winner was one of Ann's old trophies with a sticker over the name plate that said "1st place ballon darts 2010".

While I think that the biggest contributing factor to Seth's poor sportsmanship is that people let him win too much...I do have to say that I was kind of glad that he got the trophy.  All his siblings have a few trophies for swimteam, soccer, and various other activities (of which they were NEVER in first place and therefore in my opinion should not have received a trophy). 

Let me tell you this trophy has already gone a LONG way!  He is so proud.  Yesterday he asked if he could take it to school to show his class.  I said, "Um, NO!"  He then asked if he could tell all his friends about it..."Sure".

Last night Luke's friend Ashley stayed for dinner.  Mid-way through dinner Seth disappeared and then returned with his trophy which was proudly displayed on the table and an inappropriate amount of boasting was done. 

Later in the evening, Jonah was trying to get Seth away from his school project he was working on.  He pushed Seth out of the way and Seth yelled, "Hey, don't hurt the boy who won the trophy!"  Clearly, the balloon darts win has really gone to his head.