Are We There Yet?

Football Practice (or How the Guys Spent Two Hours in the Heat)...

Last Tuesday, I did manage to snag a few pics of football practice. I felt like a goober...all these hard-core football parents were grunting and pounding their chests (OK, not really...) and I'm taking pictures. Too bad...I have a blog to fill!

Carson is wearing the grey t-shirt and black shorts, in case you can't find him.
Who is that dude in the red shirt and grey shorts? He looks so familiar...
...why it's Coach Daddy! To tell you the truth, I think Daddy might be a bit more excited about this football season than Carson is. He has coached football before, but now he's coaching his son...big difference!

Here we have leg warm-ups...
...and side-shuffle running.
At the first water break...
...Carson finally turned to look for his Mommy. (Hi, Buddy!) I'm pretty sure Daddy squirted him with the water bottle to get his shirt that wet so early in practice. Had to secretly steal a picture...
...of Coach Daddy in action. He looks so official! This is my favorite picture of the evening...
...and I zoomed in on Carson to show you why in this next shot.
Look at my Little Man, running the football!! What a great action shot, if I do say so myself! Then they got to the fun stuff...tackle practice. Of course, one must always start in a three-point stance...
...before slamming into the tackling pad.
Good technique, Carson! I think that Coach was a bit surprised at my Little Man's determination. Carson's favorite part of practice was probably the big tackling pad. Here we have him approaching, getting his "game face" on......in preparation for...
...the big tackle! He got his first hand-off pass...
...from Daddy. Here you can see his determination...
...as he ran his required laps. That was about an hour and a half into practice and he was still going at full steam! I forget what they were doing here...
...but the next pic is very self-explanatory.
No, they weren't napping. It was the sit-up station. That was the only part of practice where Carson truly struggled. With his poor upper body muscle tone, sit-ups without a heavy football helmet are challenging...with the helmet, nearly impossible. After jumping jacks...
...practice was over! Carson was so happy to finally get to take off that heavy helmet!
Oops. He doesn't look happy in that picture, just exhausted and hot!

In all seriousness, watching him at football practice was a bit emotional for me -- and that's not typically my style. As I took pictures of him, I was so proud of how far our Little Man has come since he joined our family. From that skinny little boy we met in China in 2007 to the determined little guy in front of me now...it's been an amazing transformation.

It also humbles me to see how the other kids and Coaches just treat Carson...well, normally. He's not the handicapped kid or the kid with the "different" arms...he's just another sweaty kid in a football helmet doing his best.

After practice, I asked Carson, "Did you have fun at practice?"

His response, with a seriously straight face: "Football is not fun. Football is hard work. You listen to your Coaches and you don't talk back. That's football."

Brainwashed, anyone?

A few seconds later he added, "But when we get to tackle each other, THAT is going to be FUN!"
That's my boy!!