Schuetz

Bachelorette parties are intended to be full of fun and frolic for the bride-to-be and her friends. A wild bachelorette party to revel with her closest friends without any inhibition or guilt is the desire of most brides-to-be.

The conventional bachelorette party involves close friends, relatives, and bridal party members meeting at home, a friend's place, a restaurant, a far away beachfront location, or a resort to have fun. Guests at a bachelorette party generally include intimate pals, co-workers, and acquaintances who have not been invited to the wedding.

Anything related to fun goes well within the definition of a bachelorette party. In wild bachelorette parties, males are objectified and generally ridiculed to gleeful laughter. Male strippers and masseuses, female professional sex seminar speakers, lively concerts in bars, and dancing with strangers to funky music are all part of wild bachelorette parties. Hot items include special t-shirts or hats, erotic novelties, and male blow-up dolls. Buttered Peas, Apple Football, Balloon Sit, Hot Potato, Dirty Pictionary, Honeymoon Mistakes, Truth or Dare, and Pin the Tail on the Male are some of the hilarious games.

Thematic dressing always impresses guests. Scanty costumes and wild painting on party wear are other interesting ideas. Wild bachelorette party gifts include theme outfits, stunning lingerie, super-hot 'come-hither' shoes as well as outrageous wedding night decorations; these gifts also serve to create the ambience of a pre-honeymoon shopping spree. The general idea is to make the bride-to-be shy and blush in front of everyone. A wild bachelorette party often involves consumption of a lot of alcohol; it is, therefore, always advisable to arrange for transportation for the guests.

Spa bachelorette parties are special in that they offer mud baths, massages, manicures, pedicures, exfoliations, yoga lessons, and a health-conscious diet.

A wild bachelorette party is thus an occasion for the bride and her friends to really 'let their hair down.' An outrageously creative party is a truly inspirational way to "jump start" a passion-filled marriage.

Making Your Coaching Job Easier

Most coaches start off on the wrong foot by just digging in the first day of practice without setting ground rules for the players and parents. Ive found that most people will put up with most things as long as they know ahead of time thats the way its going to be, most people hate surprises.

Its something I learned in business. Lets imagine for a moment that you are selling a product that has a quality rating of 1-10, with 10 being the best. If I have a product that is lets say an 8, most customers will accept that as a fair product for the price I am quoting. However if I tell them the product is a 9, while 8 is acceptable they now have the EXPECTATION of 9. Typically even though 8 is just fine, they are now expecting 9 and receive an 8 and are dissatisfied. A better strategy is to present the product as a 7 and the customer is pleasantly surprised when they realize it is an 8. The best strategy is to under promise and over deliver. Thats what we do in football as well.

We start the first practice with a 30 minute mandatory meeting for all parents and players. Our job here is to set expectations for the season. We hand out and review our player and spectator contract. Both spell out what we expect from each player and parent as well as our team rules as far as attendance, effort, academics and sportsmanship.

I then go into a set speech on what we expect from both parent and player. While I certainly review the fact we are going to have fun, play to our potential and that most of our teams play well, I paint a fairly bleak picture. We talk about;
Playing time.
Listening
Obedience
Respect
Attendance Requirements
Academic Requirements
No negotiating by player agents (parents)
Practice Organization
Set Offense and Defense
Overt Sportsmanship Requirements
Positions (whats best for the team)
Playing to Potential
All Decisions are Final
We are not the right fit for everyone.
Our overt sharing of our faith in Jesus Christ and prayer.

After we paint this fairly bleak picture we take a short break and then get into our two lines to start practice. Before we do that, I tell everyone that we arent perfect but that none of what I talked about was negotiable. If they felt uncomfortable moving forward with our program, that was great, if not I have in my pocket the names and phone numbers of other local programs that probably needed players. I have yet to have anyone take me up on that offer. However I have had a parent or two that 2-3 weeks into the season I hand that slip of paper to. Sometimes I wait until the end of the season and send them a letter that says they will not be invited back along with the phone numbers listed of the other programs.

By having that talk and that contract signed, you have the moral authority to move forward in the direction you want as long as you hold up your end of the bargain. For our coaches, we have a coachs contract that spells out our expectations as well. This spells out what we expect and offers hardcore guidelines for their behavior in regards to sportsmanship, playing time, scoring margins etc.

Everything is laid out in the open to coaches, players and parents about what we expect and that our contracts are non-negotiable. This puts you on very solid ground as you move forward to start your first week of practice, If there are any problems, refer the coach, parent or player to the contract they signed, if they dont comply, its time to move on with someone else.

Its always best to get this taken care of right off the bat. Football Plays

If you're like most people, at some point in time or another, you've sat down with your children to carve pumpkins. But do you know why you carve Jack 'o Lanterns? Most people don't. Supposedly, it started with a man called Stingy Jack, who tricked the devil and in turn after his death wasn't allowed into hell. Instead, he was forced to wander the earth with only a coal to light his way. Stingy Jack put the coal in a carved out turnip, causing people to start referring to him as "Jack with the Lantern".

Soon, people began placing similar lanterns in their windows with carvings to scare Stingy Jack away. And so, the Jack 'o Lantern was born. The history channel has an excellent article on the full story here: http://www.historychannel.com/exhibits/halloween/pumpkin.html

If you're looking to start this age old tradition with your children, or are interested in kicking your carvings up a notch, we've picked some great websites to help you get started.

For the novice pumpkin carver, head on over to PumpkinCarving101.com where you will find everything you ever wanted to know about carving your jack 'o lantern and then some. Learn about different tools that can be used, traditional pumpkin carving, carving with stencils, the lifespan of a carved pumpkin and how to grow your own pumpkins. Don't miss the articles on the proper burial of your pumpkin, how to juggle pumpkins, and how to take photographs of your pumpkins. This site might seem a little obsessive to some, but it's full of great information that's sure to help any pumpkin carver achieve their goals.http://www.pumpkincarving101.com

If you've been carving pumpkins for awhile, and are ready to do something new, try these great free pumpkin templates. You'll find many patriotic images (American Flag, the President, Statue of Liberty) as well as a mix-and-match section. If you don't see what you like, for a small fee you can subscribe to their even larger collection of templates.http://www.spookmaster.com/pumpkin-carving-patterns-freebies.htm

Another great site for both simple and complicated templates is Jack-O-Lantern.com. For the true computer geek they offer an assortment of emoticons, as well as a set of templates to create a "haunted forest". All templates are free, forever.http://www.jack-o-lantern.com

If you're looking for more fun and childish templates, be sure to stop by aHowlingGoodTime.com . This pumpkin farm has a very nice assortment of pumpkin faces. Choose from happy, sad, scary, howling, and more.http://www.ahowlinggoodtime.com/carving/patterns.shtml

Tips, tips, and more tips. That's what you'll find at Walt's Pumpkin Carving Pages. Learn how to get those templates from your computer (or book) onto the pumpkin, which carving tools do what, how to make your own patterns, as well as how to select the right pumpkin to carve.http://wls.wwco.com/garden/pumpkin.htm

To read more articles from the Best of Halloween for Kids series, click here. http://www.raisingourkids.com/hol/halloween/index.shtml

Saturday night Carolina Panthers center Justin Hartwig had a successful surgery on his groin on Wednesday. It was Panthers coach John Fox who disclosed the good news about the player after Saturday's practice.

Hartwig was placed on the injured reserve since Nov. 24th because of a groin surgery ending his disappointing season. This season, he has been sat out while there were only two games remaining. Coach Fox explained that he preferred Hartwig to undergo before the end of the season. Hartwig is scheduled to spend between eight to 10 weeks in rehabilitation. But the Panthers expect Hartwig to be back fully healthy and at his mawimum for the next season.

The former Titan signed with the Panthers a five-year, $17 million free-agent deal during the off-season. When Hartwig signed the deal with the Panthers, it was regarded as one of the richest contracts for a center in the NFL.

He joins the Panthers as a replacement for aging Jeff Mitchell. Indeed, the panthers decided to cut ties with Mitchell declining to re-sign him. The Panthers expected Hartwig to bolster the roster and big plans for the former Titan. Unfortunately, Hartwig has never been healthy this season.

Hartwig was forced to miss a portion of training camp because he had to undergo hernia surgery. Then Hartwig strained his groin in the season opener against Atlanta. He was benched for six games before playing sparingly against Dallas on Oct. 29th. Eventually, he re-injured the groin lifting weights a few days later and was placed on the injured reserve.

Before re-injuring his groin, Hartwig explained that he believed the groin injuries were related to the hernia and was expecting to undergo surgery. Now that surgery is over, he will have to focus on rehabilitation to come back on time for the next season.