here we go...

so, it's finally happening.  Eleanor is starting her first competitive sport today.  we enrolled her in soccer this season, and somehow i ended up volunteering to be her coach.  i don't know WHAT i was thinking.  i haven't played soccer since i was about 8, and i've never coached a little kids' team before.  now i'm supposed to figure out a way to teach five little girls to play a sport i know almost nothing about.  fan-tastic.

obviously, i'm nervous.  of course i'm nervous.  i'm going to have four parents watching me at our first practice tonight, expecting me to know what the -f- i'm doing out there.  and i have to try to pull it off without looking like an idiot.  wish me good luck, charlie.

and yes, i watch too many disney shows.

but back to the point at hand.  my little bitty is growing up.  :( and :) 

and :(

but it had to happen sometime.  here she is trying on her new uniform for the first time:

isn't she freaking cute?!

see that smile?  that's pure joy.  she was SOOOO excited to put all this stuff on and kick her new soccer ball around the house.  she's so pumped about playing soccer that she actually fell asleep last night with her soccer ball next to her on the bed.

yes, she did fall asleep in her gymnastics outfit...

don't judge me, i didn't know she was asleep until it was too late

her excitement is awesome, and i think it'll make being her coach easier.  hopefully the other little girls are that excited, too.  and hopefully i can teach them something useful tonight, since we have our very first game tomorrow.  they don't keep score at this age (come on, they're 4 years old), but it would still be disappointing to them if we don't score any goals at all.  or maybe not.  again, they're 4 and 5 year olds, so they have about a 10 minute attention span.  by the end of a 40 minute game, it's possible they won't even remember if either team scored a single goal.

maybe this won't be so bad after all.

except for one thing.  :(  Victor asked me yesterday if he could be on my soccer team.  i believe his exact words were (imagine this in a little two-year-old's voice), "Mommy, i be best friend i be on your team".  i almost cried.  it's so hard to tell my sweet little boy that he can't play soccer on my team with his sister because he's too young.  kids that age just don't understand that reasoning.  it still breaks my heart to remember his little face when he told me that. 

and the little bastard has absolutely perfected his "sad" face.  it's truly heart-breaking.  i'll have to get a picture next time he does it to prove it to you.  your heart will melt.  i swear.

anyway...to sum up, i'm super nervous about coaching, but super excited because Eleanor is pumped, but super sad because Victor wants to play and can't.  what a friday, right?

TTFN