Soccer Season is Here
Our weekends for the next two months are dedicated to soccer. Jonas is finally big enough to play (he’s so excited after two seasons of trying to run into Eliza’s games to play with her!). His first ever game was last Saturday, as was Eliza’s first game of the season. I wanted to record a few details of their first games, because I’m big on recording in the now when the details are fresh in my mind instead of waiting until I’m ready to combine photos and words with pretty paper later.
*Most of these photos are cropped in on Eliza and Jonas, but there is a bit of blurring because I don’t share photos of other people’s kids without permission.
Jonas is a little fireball! His games are split between a half hour of practice and a half hour game, and we missed the first bit of practice (we’re generally late to everything). Jake had to miss the games because of an all day node.js course he attended, and I miscalculated how long it would take to get both kids into uniforms, socks, cleats, and shoes with everything else we need. Sometimes getting out of the door is the hardest part.
During the practice portion, Jonas didn’t really want to do the drills. He just wanted to take off with the ball! He ran right off of the field several times and I had to go and herd him back. When it was time to play, he was so happy to run around. He also wanted to block the goals–though he jumped in the goals and blocked them after the ball went in and did it to both goals–hah! The concepts will sink in over time.
It was a little tricky to get him to stay still and watch his team mates when it wasn’t his turn to play, but a few of his friends are on the team with him (which is so cool), so I was able to get him to concentrate on cheering them on.
Towards the end he was less focused on chasing the ball and more focused on hugging / encouraging his friends. Jonas has two modes: full on crazy man and super sweet snuggle bunny. There’s really no in-between with him. He just happened to show off both sides during the game.
Eliza had a great time because several of her friends were there too, cheering on little brothers and sisters.
Eliza had her first game of the season a few hours later. She has hour long games and then hour long Sunday practices. She loves everyone on her team (it’s awesome that they are all from the same school) and was obviously ecstatic to get to hang with her old teammates and a few new girls. She was not happy that the other team was from her school too–she didn’t want to be up against her best friends!
That didn’t seem to stop her once the ball was rolling, though: Eliza kicked the ball more in this game than all of her previous seasons combined! I don’t know what clicked. Before she was nervous to get in and get the ball. She’d hang back as if she were waiting for her turn. (Which was totally fine: we’re into sports for the fun, the exercise, and the team building. Not so much for the championing.) This time, she was “brave” (her word) and got after it. Go Eliza!
She loves defense the most, and her coach nicknamed her “Stonewall Eliza” because she did such a great job of stopping the ball during the game.
I also want to remember the way she runs right now. She leaps high like a gazelle, but sometimes runs with a bounce like she’s dancing and throws her legs to the side. I’m sure running in her special funny way expends more energy, but man is it obvious that she is totally completely happy when she’s doing it.
During Eliza’s game, Jonas played with a friend from his team, got his nails painted by some nice older girls, played in the dirt, and some how got into a fight with some much older boys. Like I said: two modes. We need to work on his Hulk-outs.
Do you have fond memories of your kids playing sports or of playing sports yourself? Leave some in the comments!
