Fall Soccer

Blogger hates me right now and despite my best efforts to get the pictures and text where I want them, even in the html view, it will not cooperate. We spent a lot of time in September and October at soccer games—a lot! I took very few pictures and hardly action shots.  I vow to do better, this requires actually bringing my camera, next season.  There were some fun times, but I'm so glad the season is over. Seth played rec soccer again this year. He had a lot of fun and improved a lot in terms of paying attention and hustling around the field. In terms of making contact with the ball and trying to score not so much, but it was fun. His team got beat by at least 10 goals every game—very painful at times. He spent the entire season in some hand-me-down cleats of Luke's that were too small for him. We kept saying we'd go get new ones and it never happened. It was literally a workout to get his feet in there and then they were bulging at the seams. Our cute neighbor Sammy was on Seth's team again. At the last game out of the blue Seth said, "When it's time to sign me up for soccer next time just don't sign me up!" I actually already paid for spring but we'll see. I don't take much coaxing to simplify. It is good exercise though, and he's so darn cute out there. Whenever he did something good he'd stop and find us and give thumbs up.

 Ian also did a little soccer camp this fall. He pretty much gets dragged around to all his brothers' stuff and doesn't do much of his own. He was so excited about it. I'm not really sure he learned much about soccer, but he had lots of fun and he loved his uniform and ball. The coaches were extremely patient with a bunch of three-year-olds that included the whiniest child I have ever met (that was not Ian by the way)!

 Luke played his first season of competitive soccer this year. It was a learning experience for all of us. We are committed for the rest of this year and then we need to re evaluate. He had a lot of fun at times but grumbled and was tired of it at others. Luke is a pretty good soccer player, but he really struggles to focus and give his full effort. He just doesn't have much competitive drive yet. His team really struggled at first and we had lots of losses, but they learned a lot. They ended up winning three games including their last two in a row. They played their last game against the "A" team of their same club. They won! That was definitely a great victory and way to end the season. Luke's coach is a very nice guy. He was one of the guys that drove around in the car w/hydraulics in the movie Napoleon Dynamite. Luke thinks that's so cool. The fact that Luke has had lots of fluid on his ears since the beginning of September didn't help much. He cannot hear very well at all and will be getting tubes in about three weeks if it doesn't get better. Anyway, the verdict's still out on our future with comp soccer but winter conditioning starts next week. If nothing else it's great exercise!