The Competitve World of Pre-K Athletics

Paige and McKenzie listening intently to the half-time speech.

Paige had her first soccer game this morning. I don't think it was that big of deal for her, but for Traci and I, it was yet another anxiety-ridden momentous occasion.

For all of her incessant chatter around our house, Paige is incredibly shy around others. Luckily, she has really taken to the idea of "teacher" lately, which has made for good experiences in both preschool and primary. But she is still really timid around other kids. So something like soccer can go either way--a ton of fun for or an endless amount of tears. And that means a lot of stress for mom and dad.

Fortunately, I was able to get most of the worries out of my system on Wednesday when I took her to her first practice. To my delight, we got to the field and she ran right over to her team. She started stretching out with the others (that's the sign of a great coach, he has a bunch of 3-year-olds stretching out before practice) and didn't even look back at me.

She did really well through much of practice, save the few times where she and her buddy Mackenzie had to stop and throw grass or hold hands and skip. So I was expecting her to be a regular Christian Ronaldo at the game today.

Um, not so much. She seemed to be having fun, but every time the ball (or the swarm of kids around the ball) came her way, she headed the other direction. She was, however, very happy when her team scored a goal and just as happy when the other team scored.


Paige on a breakaway? No, she's running away from the other kids.

Her favorite parts of the game were when she got to sub out because she got to come sit next to me and pet the coach's wife's dog.

The coach is really good to include all of the kids and gave Paige a chance to kick off after a goal. She walked up the ball in super-slow motion, tapped it about one inch and then ran away.

But she had a great time, which is all that matters. (She wasn't nearly as good as the girl on the other team who was about a foot taller than everyone else and kept scoring all the goals. Clearly a ringer.)


Curtis trying to sneak onto the team.

Curtis loved it as well. When he wasn't running out on the field, he was stealing the corner-kick cones and using them as bullhorns.

Yay, sports.