The Game

Aaron and Jay have a general admission membership with Hawthorn. This is his 11th year as a member (I think) and Aaron knew he would be going to Melbourne a few times to games this year so he knew he would get the most out of an 11 game general admission membership. The problem with the membership is that we have to buy seats if we want to sit to watch a game, which means lining up as soon as tickets go on sale so we don't miss out. We do get cheaper seats though which is a bonus.

Kylie was nice enough to line up for us the morning that seats went on sale for the St Kilda V Hawks game. Kylie also has a general admission membership so we are often lining up together to get seats. She came home an hour later saying that seats were all sold out within half an hour!!! We couldn't believe it. In previous years Hawks members always got to buy tickets a week before the general public so we were very annoyed that this year we actually missed out altogether.

Aaron decided he would go early and try to get a seat on the fence. Early meaning something like 6 hours before the game! There was no way I was buying a general admission ticket and standing, so Aaron thought he would probably be going on his own. I'm starting to get into footy, but not THAT much!

As always though it seems like it is not what you know (or have in our case with our memberships), but who you know. I was very lucky to know someone 'in the know' and I didn't even think about asking them until I was telling them a few days before the game how we had missed out on tickets. Lucky they had 12 seats that they could sell us if we wanted, so I quickly rang Kylie to see if she still wanted seats and we were all very excited that we could go to the game and also that we didn't have to stand. I was very lucky as Di said she would babysit for us on Saturday so that I could also go to the game which meant we didn't have to worry about Noah or Kobe. I was so excited!! It doesn't take much to excite me - an afternoon with two boys (or three counting Aaron!) who sit and don't grizzle and getting to watch footy players run around and I'm happy! :)

Mum got in on the fun with us after a bit of persuasion from Harri :) We all put on some temporary tattoos -except for Aaron the party pooper! I think he was the smart one though as they seemed anything but temporary!! It took AGES to scrub them off and scrub I did - leaving huge big 'carpet burn' marks on the boys faces! Whoops! I love this pic of Mum - I think she looks really pretty.

The boys were really excited to go. Harri was cheering away the whole time and as soon as the Saints came out he was booing them!

It was absolutely packed out. Tassie sure does love its AFL.

It was all very exciting at first as we were hoping that the Hawks would have a big win, with lots of the Saints injured and not playing.

Unfortunately they had a shocker of a game. At half time we thought the game was pretty much over.

The boys didn't care but just enjoyed being there. Jay spent the whole time checking out things with Mum's binoculars and filling in the scores in the footy record.

Harri was cracking up everyone around us all the time as he just wouldn't stop cheering - despite the Hawks falling behind more and more. The St Kilda cheer squad was very close to us and they would chant 'let's go Saints, let's go' and Harri would yell 'let's go Hawthorn, let's go'.

About three quarter time there was a rainbow. I was hoping it was a sign the Hawks could come back, but unfortunately it wasn't to be.

I'm actually surprised as to how much I have gotten into footy lately - or should I say how much I am into the Hawks! Aaron has definitely brainwashed all of us, and just meeting the players regularly is great as you get to know them. Despite the loss I actually had heaps of fun. Aaron on the other hand didn't enjoy it quite as much as me as he is a bit more passionate about the footy than I am :)

These other passionate Hawks supporters at the end of our row weren't very happy either. Sorry Kylie! Hopefully the Hawks will be back to their old form next year.