It's Soccer Season.....

What fun!! What fun!! High school soccer season is here just in time for the cold and wet weather!! :-) I jest, but really, Rachel has been looking forward to soccer season all year long. If you recall, she's a freshman at FHS and signed up for soccer. She's played soccer for many years now choosing it as her sport of choice over swimming several years back. She loves the team aspect and the strategy of soccer. I enjoy just seeing her enjoy it and get some really great healthy exercise! I've picked up some soccer knowledge of the years, but by no means would be considered an authority on soccer.

Soccer at the high school is all year long with the first semester consisting of conditioning, etc. and then tryouts for the teams in December. Rachel made JV White which is the freshman team. She's playing both goal keeper (01) and midfielder (21).

As with any other extracurricular activities these days, there is a very active booster club for soccer and of course..... fundraising! They had two fundraisers - a savings card for local Friendswood merchants (which were very hard to sell) and the purchase of an ad in the Soccer 2009 book. This is just basically a fancy way of getting the parents to write a check because you create the ad and send it to them. They get the books printed but with the costs of the ads.... and of course, a minimum that all parents must contribute, you're just writing a check. However, there is at least a cute twist to it.

So - here's the ad. There is a really funny story this picture brings to mind. I'll probably embarrass my daughter, but oh well, she'll get over it and parent's do this from time to time. Since the intent of this blog is to capture more of our daily lives and stories... well, this one is one I want to remember. This picture (of Rachel) is from our Thanksgiving Day trip up to Dallas for the Cowboy game. Rachel's choice when picking out clothing to wear for Dallas game was #82, Jason Witten's jersey. She has such a crush on him!! He's is mighty handsome (see picture at left) so at least she's choosing well!! I handed her my camera at one point in the game for her to take pictures while in the stadium and afterwards, when I was going through the pictures, it was like a Jason Witten tribute.... one would think she was stalking the poor guy!! We have pictures of Jason Witten talking, running, walking, laughing, crouching, scoring, helmet on, helmet off.... LOL... Rachel secretly thinks she wants to marry him!! Of course, the fact he's already married makes no difference to a 15 year old!! Jason Witten - if you happen to read this, my apologies, but you are the object of a 15 year old's crush!!

So... back to soccer!! FHS JV White had a tournament this weekend - the Clear Creek Tournament. Their first game was Friday at 5 pm over at Clear Creek and Rachel made Friendswood's only goal in that game!! See picture right here..... I don't know that I've ever seen her make a goal, so I was thrilled to see it AND to actually be lucky enough to capture it on the camera!! Way to go Rachel!! Unfortunately though, the game ended with a 1-1 tie, so they had to go to a shootout and they lost by 1 to to Clear Brook HS. Friendswood went into the Consolation bracket and played again this morning against Pasadena Dobie at 8:30 am and won. Then played the final game against Clear Creek at noon for the Consolation Prize and they won! Rachel played hard in all games and ended up with the wind knocked out of her and a mouth full of turf in the second game! Glad she was ok. The weather was muggy and about 75 at the beginning of the first game and about 9:30, the winds shifted, the cold rain came and the temps began to fall. The girls were soaked and cold by the time the game ended at 10:00. Luckily, it stopped raining but got colder as the day went on for the second game!

The victorious ones!