What Does A Soccer Mom Do When Soccer Is Over?

Thing 2's soccer season capped off yesterday with a thrilling win for the championship title. The boys were undefeated, though they tied twice in the regular season. Unfortunately, Thing 1's team lost their game on Sunday and tied their Saturday game. Next week is her playoffs and then we are done with soccer. No more driving someone to a practice four weeknights a week, no more four soccer game weekends. What to do? How to plan for the future? By signing up for more soccer of course.

I didn't even wait until the next day before I started the push to get Thing 2 on an indoor soccer team. You see, Thing 2 loves soccer and he is very good at it. Thing 1 likes soccer well enough and though she too is good at it, she said she did not want to play indoor soccer. What will Thing 1 do then? Basketball.

Why do we sign up for sport after sport, effectively signing away our nights and weekends when multiple practices are multiplied by two kids? Because they like these sports and we want them to get the team experience and keep fit.

Thus, there is the usual rush at our house, where are the water bottles? Is the uniform cleaned? Did you close the door when you ran out of the house? Are we supposed to bring oranges and juice? These are the questions that fill our brains. Then, once we get to the games, we try to control ourselves and not shout too much from the sidelines.

For the most part, I try not to coach from the sidelines. Yet I can't resist being true to my vocal self. So I try to root for all members of the team with words of encouragement: "Nice kick Geoff!, Way to go Daniel! You get the idea. Of course, I must admit that I don't always entirely behave myself on the sidelines.

Recently after a game, my husband asked Thing 2 about a "trash-talking incident" Thing 2's coach had written to the parents about. I volunteered tongue in cheek that the trash-talking guilty party was probably me, his mom. I couldn't resist suggesting that the referee remove his sunglasses when he didn't see an intentional shove by the opposing team. I've been behaving better since, I swear (but not loud enough for anyone to hear-that's not allowed on the sidelines).