first contact

Ada has been showing some very strong indications that she wants to play soccer next year.

**Note - she actually wants to play now but Elliot and I have a belief that no kid under the age of 5 should play organized sports so next year it is. **

In an effort to show us how much she wants to play, Ada has started to dribble my soccer ball around the house, practices kicking the ball against wall, and finds mini goals all over the house to 'score' goals in.

Given these flashing indicators, Ada and I ventured off to the park today where I snuck in some illegal SLOW jogging, and Ada dusted off her cleats and had a little soccer practice. She mostly just ran around dribbling her ball (she is getting pretty good at this). We did set up some mini-goals using some of my old cones and she started to understand that the ball goes through the cones (not on top of them) to score.

Once she tired of running around we did a few headers, and then lined up for some partner work (the former coach in me started to seep out a little bit). And it was in the middle of this partner work that we had a major break through. I was tossing the ball at Ada, while simultaneously counting down 1, 2, 3 go for Ada to strike her leg out in an attempt to get the perfect storm of a good throw and solid footwork from Ada. She made contact most of the time, sometimes off her knee, sometimes on a floppy foot, but contact none-the-less. Then she did it. She hit the ball with solid contact and you could hear the pop and see the ball come shooting back at me with more power than she had ever mustered.

The feeling behind a solid touch is amazing. And in one instant I realized what she had done and she realized that different feeling and the look on her face was priceless. It was amazing watching that one moment of discovery. One that I have seen so many times over the years in my players, it was about a million times cooler seeing it in my own Ada. That tiny moment of success was enough to fuel her to keep trying again and again.

And again. I have a feeling that summer is not going to come soon enough for one little superstar.