Look out MLS... here comes Caiden!

My "babies" have been in CA for 9 days now, and I am missing them terribly!!! So since I'm new to the blogging world and have lots of pictures that I've yet to share with y'all, I thought I'd post and brag a little bit about Madi and Caiden. Caiden's up first....

So most of y'all know how much Caiden loves soccer. If I didn't give birth to the kid myself, I would've sworn that he was born with soccer cleats on and holding a soccer ball. Here's a picture of him at 18 mos. old, holding a soccer ball that was given to him by our waitor at a restaurant when we were on vacation in Spain.

So the biggest and most exciting news regarding Caiden and soccer happened about a month or so ago. I had seen an ad in the Sports pages of our local newspaper awhile back about tryout for a competitive soccer team, but it said they were looking for boys ages 9 and up. So I decided to do a little research and email one of the contacts to find out if they would let Caiden (age 7) tryout. I never heard anything back, so I kind of forgot about it and put it out of my head. On our way home from a soccer game one night back at the end of May, I noticed a bunch of kids playing soccer in a field. Oh yeah, I told Tyler, they're having those tryouts tonight. Let's go watch! So reluctantly, he drove back to where all of these kids were, and we sat and watched for a little while. I noticed some kids on the field that looked to me, to be the same size/age as Caiden. So I persuaded Tyler to go take Caiden out there and get the scoop. Long story kinda short, we found out that these kids were 9 & 10, and they don't typically make exceptions to the age rule, but the guy who's in charge of all the teams, agreed to let him go ahead and try out for the last 10 min. and if he liked what he saw, Caiden could go back the following night. So Caiden, who by now is rushing to put his cleats back on and lace 'em up, went out there with these 9 & 10 year olds and basically played as well if not better than a good deal of them! He was invited back the next night, and then again to the 2nd round of tryouts which were held the 2nd week in June. After those tryouts we found out that they didn't have enough kids for the U-10's, so they grabbed some kids down from the U-12's and made an U(nder)-11 team, which they have asked Caiden to play on!!!! His coaches love him and are SUPER impressed with him!!! And Tyler and I couldn't be more excited and proud of him either! This is going to be a brand new experience for us... the world of traveling, competitive soccer, but one we are all very much looking forward to! Here are some pictures from the last game of the Spring Soccer season (Madi & Caiden were on the same team AND Tyler and I coached!), as well as some pictures from his summer soccer camp!

The last game of the season was so scorching hot, we had to pull Caiden out of the game during the last quarter, as we thought he was getting a bit of heat exhaustion.

This is Caiden with his coach for the week, Coach Bazz. At the end of the camp, all campers get a little evaluation from their coach. This is what Coach Bazz had to say about Caiden: Caiden is a very gifted soccer player. He has the ability to beat defenders and finishes well. Keep your head up and look for teammates when dribbling.


Minus the ladies legs in the way, I thought this was a pretty cool picture!




On the first day of camp the kids are put into teams, and get to partake in a World Cup tournament. They get to choose which team they want to be and then get points throughout the week based on games won, good sportsmanship, making a team flag, wearing team colors, etc. Caiden and his team were Argentina.


Argentina won the World Cup! They went undefeated in tournament play, demonstrated good sportsmanship, and racked up all kinds of points! Here they are getting their "trophy".