LOOOOONG weekend...

Son number one

(he's starting to look BIG!)

son number two

( in Greek God Pose - note the tie to his shorts hanging down, as usual)

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The Silver Bullets. Final tournament rank - 5th place

The Vipers- final tournament rank - 4th place

This weekend was the end of the recreational soccer season (well, sort of - but more on that later). For the Under 10 boys and above, the season ends with a tournament.  Three games mandatory plus, if you do well in the standings, you get to go on to determine 1st through 4th place.

Which, when translated into English means that we had no LESS than six games this weekend, with a possible eight in the offing. Son number one's team ended up placing (his team actually missed going to the 1'st vs 2nd's battle by 1 point). For a team that started off rather soft, they ramped it up by the end of the season.  The final game they played turned out to be against the season's top champions (there was a fluke kick in one of the three games in the tournament and the season champs DIDN'T end up in the 1st / 2nd game.... which is how weird tournament play can be). Son number one's team played one of the best games I've ever seen them play and held the other team to ONE point for the entire game.  The one point was again, a fluke kick that bounced back after our goalie thought he had it.

Son number two's team wasn't quite as lucky.  They missed the consolation game (that's for 3rd & 4th place) by ONE POINT.  For this team that was amazing. They managed to make fifth place in the tournament by kicking ONE GOAL in the three games leading up to the finals -- my husband said : only in soccer can you make one goal, win one game, tie one game and lose one game and still end up in 5th place.  Strange things do happen.

In the end, we participated in seven games over two days time (and unlucky us, we got TWO games that started at 8:00AM -- nippy, frozen ground that turned wet as soon as people started running ). 

So -- end of season. Time to rest right?

NOPE.

Both sons tried out for the next season of play -- around here called mini season -- where you do some traveling. NOT the big league traveling, but as far away as an hour and half (ish).  Two games per Saturday per boy.  I don't quite know how they'll get from place to place.... my husband is going to be a Soccer Dad whether he wants to or not... but we'll do it.  We're just hoping for a mild winter. (No indoor soccer here -- it's outdoors the whole winter long, rain, sun, wind, fog...)

And now it's on to Scouting for Food this week with both sons.  Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday, walking, walking, walking.  It's a good service project to do and we don't mind the walking (hey, they RUN most of the time anyway).  (for those not in the know - Scouting for Food is where Scouts go out, put empty grocery bags on doors in an area, then come back & pick up any donations of food items for the Salvation Army).

And don't forget- Next week is Thanksgiving.

And THEN it's the PASADENA BOOK FAIR!