sweet home colorado: soccer stars

This Spring Nolan and Heath both played their first seasons of soccer!

Heath played indoor at the Parker field house.

And Nolan played outside at a field at an elementary school in Parker. Outdoor Spring Soccer is definitely a commitment...the weather was crazy. Warm one week, snowy the next!

Here are a bunch of random photos of their season.

Heath had fun but struggled with independence. He wanted Mark out on the field during most practices. And he preferred to be goalie, still hesitant to get in the mix and chase after the ball during their scrimmages.

Nolan did great and really grew in his skills. For this being his first team sport, he really was very independent. He tried so hard, chased after the ball, and by the last practice he was actually bumping a kid or two to get to the ball.

Heath loved the fun drills and games that his team played and doing a little team cheer at the end of each practice was one of his favorite things as well.

The first couple of practices, Nolan was so careful to do the drills just as the coach instructed. He even said to us, "I'm the only one doing it perfect." Ha! The son of a Type A Mommy. So we worked really hard on getting him to let go, to not worry about being perfect, and to just go for it! We'll continue to encourage him to "Be aggressive, Be, Be aggressive, B-E-A-G-G-R-E-S-S-I-V-E, BE AGRESSIVE, YEAH!" Sorry the cheerleader in me just came out!

Heathy playing Monsters vs. Aliens!

working on passing

The lighting in the field house wasn't great for pictures and I take most of my photos on my iphone now, so this pic isn't the best, but if you look closely you can see a HUGE smile on Heathy's face! I think he just liked running around like a crazy person more than anything else! OH, and he loved jumping over cones and doing headers too!

If you zoom in on this one as well, you see Nolan giving me a thumbs up! He is a kid who THRIVES off of positive reinforcement. So he often checked in with me during the games for a "Two Thumbs Up"! Just this little signal always gave him a boost of confidence to keep playing hard!

Both of the boys teams did not play formal games. They worked on skills and played games and then scrimmaged their own team.

Both of their teams also had a wide variety of abilities. Some kids had played before, some hadn't. Some kids ran around in Lightening McQueen pajamas because they didn't want to wear their jersey, and some had real cleats. Some kids laid down on the field, and some scored goals. Some kids cried or pouted, and some kids gave it their all. Some kids looked for bugs and spun in circles, and some kids relentlessly chased the ball. And some kids were all of these things in just one hour! But it was fun to see them all have fun, work hard, work together, and grow in ability.

After a great practice one day, I treated Nolan to a little FroYo!

At Heathy's last practice, Nolan joined in, he practiced for 2 straight hours that day and was completely exhausted by the end. (Check out Heath's cool kick in the background!)

Heath showing off his ribbon that he earned on the last day! He was so proud of his "tificate", you know, slang for certificate. Love this kid!

This is what kept Brooks happy during most of Nolan's games. He was a trooper hanging out for 2 practices in a row, each Saturday, during his normal morning nap time.