We've been busy the last couple months with soccer! This season Penelope, Scarlett, and Leon all signed up. I got really lucky because all their practices were at the exact same time. Scarlett's and Leon's fields were right next to each other and Penelope's was only like 2 minutes away. I rotated who's practice I watched and we had a good system down. Because games were Fridays and Saturdays we had soccer four days a week, but I loved it.
Penelope got to play in the 9-11 all girl age group. There was a huge size difference among the girls and Penelope was definitely on the small side. She did great though and held her own. It is nice that she is getting a little older. I was able to drop her off early and pick her up late, because I needed to be at the other practices.
One of her coaches moved during the season and the other wasn't very reliable so she had a few extra coaches as well. One of them wasn't very nice and I had to email and ask him to not only play the girls evenly but to be kind to them. I don't feel like I'm over protective, but the girls should not be leaving the game in tears because the coach is telling them they played badly. I really don't care if they win, but I do want my child to play their fair share of the game regardless of skill. The whole things was a little funny because Penelope plays pretty well. I'm not sure why she sat out almost an entire game and other girls played the whole game. It is not like they are in the professionals or even a team that they had to try out to be on. We are in it for fun, and that is what this league is supposed to be about.
I was only able to take pictures of one game because of Beatrix and Calista. Too bad it was a night game and they played against another pink team so the girls had to wear the pennys.
Penelope's team, the Flying Flamingos, even had a few away games that she had to travel on the bus without us for. She was very nervous about that, mainly the lunch part, but she did it. She had to be gone all day and was scared to order her own lunch at the food court, it was good for her to get out of her comfort zone a little bit.
Leon totally rocked soccer this year. He had never played before and so we were surprised when he was getting like 9 goals in a game. He did awesome and ran really hard. I think it was because he is used to roughing it with his older siblings. Toward the end of the season he did stop scoring as much. I'm not sure if it is because the other kids got better or what, but even on those games he did play the about 90% of the games.
His coaches were kind of lame. They kept cancelling practices and didn't even show up at all for the last game. There was no communication about that so we were all surprised. A parent of the other team was able to step in for us. One of the coaches had twins so whenever they didn't show up they were three kids down. Hence Leon got to play a lot. They usually only had one or two subs. I shouldn't really complain about the coaches because they were volunteer and I wasn't willing/able to do it myself.
Leon's team was called the Sharkdragons and they were a coed 5-6 group.
Leon was nervous at first to play because he had never done it before but he really ended up loving it. I expect he will want to play again next year.
Scarlett's team was called the Jellyfish and they were coed 7-8 year olds. Her coaches were pretty good and fair. Out of all the coaches I think I liked them the best. They didn't seem to care at all if the team won. And by that I mean all the kids played all the positions evenly. The coaches always showed up to practice and seemed to know what they were doing.
I was surprised that Scarlett even wanted to play soccer this year, but she did. In general she doesn't like to play running around games as much as the other kids, but she really tried hard for soccer.
Her last game was probably her best and her worst. She was guarding the goal and someone scored on her. The ball rolled right past her and she totally missed it. Then one of the other kids made some sort of comment and she started crying. I felt really bad for her. She had also told me earlier that when the scrimmage some of the people try not to be on her team and they say they don't want to be on her team because she is the worst one. We had a talk about how that made her feel and how she wants to never make others feel that way. Anyway, later in the game after she totally missed the ball she scored a goal! It was her first of the season and very exciting. She even dribbled it down and took a legitimate shot. It wasn't just a right place at the right time type of thing. I kind of got a picture of it.
I am proud of her for working hard all season even though it isn't something that comes as naturally for her. She even said she wants to sign up again next year, but I think that has a lot to do with the fact that she will be old enough to be on the same team as Penelope.
I'm really happy with the sports program here on base. It is very affordable and pretty low key. Now for a break before basketball starts.
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