Goal!!!!!!

So, I don't want the fall to get away from me before I mention our first experience with organized sports.  We signed Connor up for soccor this fall with a local city league.  At first, I'm pretty sure that we were more excited than he was about the whole thing.  Our little home-body was fairly slow to warm up to the idea, until he found out that daddy would be one of the coaches.  For me as a mama, this is truly the kind of thing that I'd been waiting for, so I was double-y glad and relieved that his fear of the unknown turned to excitement.

 The Cubs were not unlike the bad news bears in their abilities and in their desire to win.  It was comical to see how many clouds or butterflies were more interesting than the soccor ball whizzing past these kids on the field while the exasperated dads/coaches yelled,"go, kick the ball...go get the ball!" 

Connor really enjoyed the getting ready part for a practice or a game--for instance, the uniform (which consisted of a navy blue and white t-shirt, his own shorts, and shin-guards).  The shin-guards were his favorite--and, they were.very.cool.  He loved the high fives, the huddle cheers, and the end-of-quarter-water-breaks.

I guess it was merciful that he didn't care as much about the fact that they got creamed at about half their games.  It was really sweet how clueless they were.  Of course, their age-group division was without scoring and had no goalies, so the odds were that most of the kids had no idea how they were playing til they looked over at their cheering squad in the bleachers.  And, ours was full of "go get 'ems" and "good hussles" and the like (so, they won every game).

It was exactly how I pictured my first time as a soccor mom.  My bag was packed with brand new water bottles, my camera, and special surprise snacks for half-time.  At first, I was a little shy to cheer; but, it didn't take long for me to swell so with pride that I was belting out those "way to go Connor" cheers with no hesitation.  I'm not going to deny either that giant lump in my throat as I watched him go out there that first day in the blistering TX heat, my little brave man, and run his little heart out even though he was probably really scared b/c he didn't know any of the kids.  And, my heart leaped when I realized that he was quickly making friends and began to not only enjoy being out there with Richard, but also he really enjoyed that HE was out there.period.  He looked forward to going to games.  I could tell that he walked a little taller (and a little farther away from me) over the course of those short two months.    And, just to top off the whole experience (for mom and dad), he scored a goal--his only goal--the last second of the last play of the last game of the season!  GGOOAAALL!  I almost cried as a watched Richard pick him up and toss him into the air.