Grace had her first soccer practice Tuesday night. She loved it. It looked a lot like herding cats to me but she had fun. There are a dozen kids on her team and basically the coaches tried to show them how to "dribble" the ball, stop the ball and pointed them in the right direction, which is harder to do that it sounds.
The "coach" setup a line of little orange cones for them to dribble the ball around one kid at a time. Did I mention there were 12 kids? You can imagine how long THAT took and how patient they were waiting. The team is composed of 3, 4 and 5 year olds and one little guy that has to be two. He just sits on the field a lot.
At one point the coaches asked for a couple of the parents to go down and stand by the goal to encourage the kids in that direction. I went down there and when the first kid, some little boy, got to the goal he goes, "YOU aren't the COACH!" Well duh! You are going to be a little rocket scientist aren't you?
I didn't last much longer after that. It was hard to keep my mouth shut though because it was PAINFUL to watch them flailing around like a bunch of chickens with their heads cut off. Of course I know NOTHING about soccer so I really have NOTHING to offer except for my turn at snack day, but still, they could have had TWO lanes of cones on one side and been kicking goals on the other so all the kids were doing SOMETHING all the time. Trust me, as a former teacher I CAN tell you that the ENEMY is free time. Free time will get you eaten alive baby, regardless of the age.
I wasn't expecting too much along the lines of organization today, but something clicked for them because after about 5 minutes they all (okay MOST) got the hang of it and our team (RED Jaguars) won! We aren't supposed to SAY we won because they are little kids and THAT would be gloating. We won. 4-1. Grace made two goals all by herself and her new little friend Mattie made one too. Chris and Austin and Grandpa all came to the game to cheer her on. She did great! Grace and Grandpa and I all went to Freda's to celebrate afterwards and Mattie was there with her folks too. They were revved up!
Now just five more Saturdays in a row and a weekly practice until complete domination.
Life is good.
I just love hearing about your hectic life, Lisa! It makes me feel so much better about mine on the opposite end of the spectrum!! ho ho, I know!!
ReplyDeleteI've heard it called "herd ball" in the younger years of soccer. I can see why they call it that : ) Ethan has his first game tomorrow! Go Grace and Ethan!
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