Soccer

It's soccer season. This time of year stirs up so many memories. Early Saturday mornings at the field, bright sun shining through the morning chill, the slight breeze pinking your cheeks while running across dewy grass, the excitement of a great block, and the pure thrill of a perfectly placed kick and GOAL! Okay... so really, those are more like Steve's memories of soccer. Mine would be more accurately a little something like this: Standing with the other defenders chatting about who-knows-what, practicing cartwheels because the forwards are pretty good and the ball rarely comes to you, making dandelion crowns, anticipating snacks and those little orange wedges with the peel still on them... Yah, so I wasn't a real competitive player. Anyhow - it's soccer season.



Matthew had kind of a weird experience with soccer last year (long story), and wasn't so sure he was going to play again this year. We are so glad he decided to. His coach is amazing! He had the same coach for basketball and the guy is wonderful. He teaches the kids about the sport, but he also teaches them how to play hard and fair. He praises the kids and builds them up - a stark contrast to last year's coach who yelled a lot and ran around acting like he was pulling his hair out because the boys were "blowing it." Now, I know I really shouldn't be judgemental here, as the coaches are all volunteers, but we'll just say that we are super fortunate to be where we are this year.
There is a boy on Matt's team (who was also on the basketball team) who has some delays. He's a good kid. Sometimes he's right with the game and trying to keep up and other times he's lying on the ground kicking his shoes off. :) We have been so impressed with how the coach works with this boy. He's awesome. During the last b-ball game of the season, Coach pulled the kids together during the last half of the game. He told the team that their one goal for the rest of the game was to get the ball to this one boy so he could shoot. Now, our little friend had not scored one basket during practice or a game the entire season. So the whole team just kept playing with the mere purpose of passing the ball to this one boy. What a great coach and what a great team of boys! The last five minutes of the last quarter of the last game of the season, our little guy scored! You'd have thought that the coach had won the National Championship by the way he was running up and down the court jumping, screaming, and cheering! The whole team was cheering and going crazy. All of the parents were yelling ourselves hoarse and sucking back tears. Our team won only a few games during the season, and I can't even tell you what the final score of that game was, but every single boy left feeling successful and proud. Amazing.

One thing about soccer in Logan is that one week you're sitting on the sidelines freezing your knickers off, and the next you're toasty and smathering sunscreen on to avoid sunburn. The last game (no pics) was played in the pouring rain. Steve braved that one while the girls and I stayed warm and dry inside. Love spring in Utah.

Steve and I love watching the games and cheering for our team. The girls do their best, but don't quite feel the love like we do. :) We come to each game prepared with our arsenal of snacks and treats. It usually works for about half the game.

Rachel put together this lovely soccer-watching ensemble. She wore her homemade foamy visor because of the sun and the flowery giraffe spotty leotard over her clothes because... she could. She's usually "bored as a baby" (not quite sure where she got that) by the end of the game, but she does tell us that she's going to play soccer, too when she's a little bigger.