Leyton's Soccer - Striped Tigers

Today was the last game of the season for Leyton's soccer team - Striped Tigers. For those of you who didn't know, Leyton was playing in his 2nd official soccer team. After our experience with him last year when Leon was the coach of the team, we had vowed to not be as involved so that maybe Leyton would be less distracted by our presence. That didn't last too long as Linda became the "Team Mom" and Leon shared the coaching position with Coach Christine. The team played 11 games every Saturday that started back in early September. This season went great as Leyton was much more attentive to the game and really enjoyed playing and making friends with is teammates. We've learned that Leyton is not the aggressive type on the field, he likes to run along the hive of players until he sees an opportunity to get the ball. His one and only goal (and first ever) of the season came on a day that happened to be when Leon wasn't there. Both sides of the family and most of the cousins and grandparents were there to see the goal but unfortunately it wasn't on film or video. It just happened to be a game that Linda filled in as coach and therefore was on the field, the only time the whole season that she wasn't taking pictures. We were very fortunate to have had a handful of very skilled players on the team that made the games very exciting and fun to watch. In fact all the players on the team were very much into playing soccer, not like it was last year when we had to drag kids out onto the field to play. Leyton was also fortunate to play with his buddy Brandon, who also happened to be one of the leading scorers on the team. One other highlight of the season was to watch Lincoln through this whole process. If he weren't a 2 year old and was just a little bit bigger, we would've thrown a uniform on him and let him play with the team. You have to see it for yourself to believe us but your eyes would be amazed to see our little 2 year old dribble the ball down the field and score a goal. He so loved playing soccer and wanted to be out there with his brother and all the other kids. Since practices were run by both Leon and Linda, Lincoln would also participate in the activities as well. During games, he would warm-up with the team and wait patiently until half time when he would jump out of his seat, take the ball, dribble down the field and score. It was a great season, a true pleasure to be a part of the team and watch the kids play and we are so looking forward to next year when both boys could possibly be playing!

Here are some highlight pictures of Leyton's soccer season (with some shots of Lincoln too). Click on the image to go to the photo album: