Tennis Lessons

Have I mentioned that I am taking tennis lessons?  A friend of mine from playgroup/church/school invited me to join her and a group of friend in taking tennis lessons at the Cooper Clinic on Thursday mornings.  Our instructor is a tennis pro and bears a strong resemblance to Harrison Ford.  He has been a great coach - we initially signed up for 6 lessons, but have extended it for at least two more and will probably start again after the holiday season and the colder weather passes.  I am by far the least experienced member of the group.  Four of the six of us played on a team in high school and the other girl has taken lessons before.  Brannon played on his high school team and so when we met in college he tried to teach me to play, but a back injury interrupted my progress and I haven't played since.  It has been fun learning the game and getting to know some new people.  And I have been really surprised at how much exercise you get playing tennis - I have been wearing my heart monitor during our lessons and have been very surprised and the number of calories burned during that time.  No wonder all these tennis pros look great!  

Last weekend Brannon and I finally got to play a little tennis with each other.  It has been at least 7 years since he has picked up a racquet, but he did say that he was surprised at how much I had improved since we played last.  I'm gonna go ahead and say his memory may be a little impaired - we've moved three times and had three kids since then!  My guess is he was just trying to flatter me so I would play him again.  We've learned that we can't play for points though - it isn't good for the marriage.

One of the other ladies in our tennis group has also organized some lessons for our kids (we all have kids about the same ages).  So next Monday, Madeleine and James start their lessons with Coach Betty Sue.  Both kids have shown an interest in playing, especially James.  Ever since Brannon showed him how to hit the ball with his "rocket" (as James calls it), James has been wanting to play tennis every chance he gets.  I will be very interested to see how the coach teaches their age groups.  I've tried helping James and it's hard!  Madeleine's class will be 45 minutes long and James' class lasts 30 minutes.  Hopefully our kids will fall in love with sports and be active and healthy for the rest of their lives!