Guest Post: PD, from Cricket Muse, on Grrs and Greats

photo credit: Never trust an Ewok via photopin (license)

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Sometimes, happiness and sadness is a matter of mere inches.

They say that in sports. Joe Hawley plays center for the 6-10 Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He told me Sunday that football is a game of inches. An inch here or an inch there, he reasoned, and maybe they’d be like the 15-1 Carolina Panthers and not third-place Atlanta.

Today’s guest post is about a world of difference – in a matter of letters.

PD Webb writes the blog CricketMuse: : A Writer’s Journey as a Reader. She once had a story published in Highlights for Children, ya’ll. That’s cool stuff. She blogs about reading and writing and also about just writing.

Guest Post: Jess from The Happiness Project, on 3 Books, CDs and Quotes to Share With the World

photo credit: Guys, we’ve gotta get off this rock!!! via photopin (license)

Jess Witkins has this endearing clumsiness to her.

And I do mean endearing. One of my favorite posts on The Happiness Project is about her busting her face at Circus World. It’s so pathetic it’s adorable. The whole world loves a the girl to whom physical comedy is a gift.

Jess wrote once of a serendipitous meeting with a favorite actor. Read it here because I don’t want to spoil it. You must read this.

She’s brought her show to the CD today to talk about the three songs, three books and three CDs she’d gift to the world. Jess has had, as have many of us, a whirlwind, topsy-turvy kind of holiday season so far.

Guest Post: Charlotte of My Pixie Blog, on Shifting with your Relationship

photo credit: “The Empire has a legion of loyal soldiers that are in endless supply.” via photopin (license)

Sometimes, a post comes along at just the right time.

It’ll show up in your feed like a fresh pizza on the buffet the moment you clean your 13th plate. It’s like, divine intervention. And it’s even cooler when this post comes through from a guest writer.

Charlotte writes My Pixie Blog, where she chronicles “love, life and lessons learned.” She writes on love and relationships, in an engaging, poignant way I’ve come to love. You will to, once you read her.

She came to Coach Daddy for a post about snacks – and left hungry. Today, she’s shown up with a post on relationships so incredibly timely and relevant that I can’t even set the scene.

Not a Guest Post, but More Random Smartphone Photos, IV

photo credit: Unboxing iPod touch via photopin (license)

My run of bad luck with smartphones continues.

The Apple phone my friend Tamara sent me all the way from Switzerland represents the asterisk in all this. Before the steady iPhone, my last flip phone found its demise in a vat (okay, a cup) of yogurt.

This one has a mystery illness. Honest.

One day, it just stopped working. Well, part of it did. I can still text, check on the blog and watch the carnage that is my fantasy football team. I just can’t, you know … talk on it.

Guest Post: Tiffany of Sounds Like Life to Me, on Raising a Girl

photo credit: “These aren’t the droids we’re looking for.” via photopin (license)

I’ve believed Tiffany’s words from the start.

“So my first time on your blog,” she commented, “and I’m hooked!” Sometimes you get sweet first comments like this. And then the person never comes back. I won’t find blame in this. You don’t know what life holds.

A year later, and she’s still leaving comments and has moved into that inner circle of bloggers you can rely on to read you if the rest of the world decides not to.

Tiffany, who writes the blog Sounds Like Life to Me, is here today, on my birthday, to talk about raising a girl. You should check out her blog. She writes lovingly of life with teenagers, critters and and amazing husband.

Guest Post: Rebecca, of Everyday Life, on Being a Boy Mom

photo credit: My secret travelling buddy this evening… via photopin (license)

The boy moms I know love the gig.

I swung and missed three times for boys. Instead, I got three girls who fix their hair and paint their nails. Right after (or before) they ruffle your hair and make you bit your nails, if you’re a boy on the soccer field, at least.

I get the best of both worlds, maybe?

Not exactly. The life of the boy mom fills both with a joy I won’t really truly know, but will always admire. Today’s guest shares her take on the journey of a boy mom with us. Rebecca Bryant blogs at Everyday Life.

Guest Post: Sara Letourneau, on Soccer Coach Dads and Passion Pursuits

Courtesy of Tamara Bowman

You guys have shared stories of your fathers with me, and it often leaves me with a hope – a hope that someday, someone will think of me this way as a dad, too.

Sara Letourneau managed to meld tales of her father the soccer coach with her own realizations as a writer. In molecular science, experts refer to this type of phenomenon as … well, they don’t have a term for it as yet. I love her insight, though.

Sara’s closing in on completion of a YA novel, The Keeper’s Curse (not a tale of Elise’s travails in goal, although that could happen someday.)

Sara writes a remarkable feature called 5 on the Fifth that you just have to check out.

Guest Post: Ashley of Post-grad Jitters, on the Love of the Game

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Today’s post is one of the shortest ever on Coach Daddy.

It’s definitely the shortest guest post. It’s from Ashley Mahoney, a fellow sports writer. She conveys a love of soccer so succinctly, she doesn’t need 600 words.

Ashley and I cover the Carolina Panthers. She for the Charlotte Post, me for the Associated Press. She reminds me of myself, in a lot of ways. Some not-so-obvious ways. See, when I was her age, I was the young reporter on the NFL beat.

You feel like you’re trying to run with the big dogs in the press box and locker room. Your paper might not have the circulation, but you’re trying to make a splash. It’s why you covered volleyball on your college paper and everything.

Guest Post: Lisa of Black Panty Salvation, on a Kid with an iPhone

photo credit: Unboxing iPod touch via photopin (license)

I get around to asking various bloggers to camp here on a Wednesday.

Once in a while, a blogger beats me to it. Lisa Bagchi of Black Panty Salvation chimed in on a post called A Guest Post is Worth 11 Smartphone Photos. Right? She came out and pitched her own guest post.

So I took her up on it.

One visit to her blog and you’ll know why. Lisa writes that her blog is about “motherhood, candy, pregnancy, TV, photography and birth, but not that in order nor in equal parts.” Her blog has morphed to one about IVF and infertility to one about breastfeeding and parenthood.

Not a Guest Post, but 11 More Smartphone Photos

photo credit: IMG_0477 via photopin (license)

I have a really cool guest post coming for you from a sportswriter friend of mine who happens to love soccer more than I do. It’s still baking, though. For now, let’s go with 11 smartphone photos again, shall we?

I did it by random again, no matter how embarrassing it might be – to me or the girls! So here we go.