Living in Putin's Backyard ~ Our Adventures in Mother Russia: July 2016

Saturday, July 30, 2016

Texas Rush Soccer Camp

Since we are going to be for some time while I have the baby, start the Visa process and medical clearance for Connor to move to Russia, we wanted the kids to be as "normal" as possible to make this easier on them. So we have put them in Fall sports. Ash is in gymnastics and working on getting her into Equestrian lessons while Mike is playing soccer for Texas Rush. We enrolled him into a week soccer camp before the season starts since he has had very little exposure to soccer.

It was evident that Mike was among the few in his age bracket that have never played before. Most of the other yr olds look like they have played since they learned to walk. It was impressive actually. All the fancy footwork on these small little kids!! He had two boys from South America in the camp and they were unbelievable.

First day and ALL smiles!! Coach was giving Mike a pep talk on his dribbling

Must have water Mom! It is HOT!!!

5yr old group with their coach

The sessions are an hour long with the first 25 minutes being technique based and focus on proper dribbles and ball control. The the rest of the time is scrimmage games of 4 on 4.

Mike does really well on defense and is not afraid to be aggressive and competitive, however, when he is on offense running down field with the ball be is not. He give it up without a fight. We need to work on that :-)

This little girl in the blue tank just ran circles around him. Hehe maybe he was afraid of her and that why he gave up so easily.

Mike had a ton of fight when going against this boy.

He was able to gain control of the ball for a short minute before losing it again.

Another little girl who gave Mike a run for his money :-)

He had control for a while on this run but she came in quick and took it from him

He had so much fun this past week. Can't wait for the season to start in September!

My Water Babies!

As challenging as this is with us being separated from Will while I finish out the rest of my pregnancy in the United States (5 more weeks), we have been keeping busy and trying to find normalcy in a temporary place. Good thing is even though, we do not have Will, we have my fabulous in-laws and it really makes things easier. We have not seen them in so long and the kids are thrilled that Cici and Papa are so close!!!

So what do you do on these super hot days??? POOL TIME!!!!! These little ones are serious water babies now. Ash and Mike are swimming by themselves with no floats and doing so well. CJ FINALLY decided to get in the pool and he likes it!!

Mike loves that his brother is swimming, however, Mike finds it convenient to grab CJ every now and if he needs a break :-)

Then there is this one.... She can hold her breath for so long, dives down to the bottom, collects all her rings and rods. She is loving this so so much!

So many smiles!

CJ LOVES wearing his goggles and going under water to watch Mike and Ash. My other kids really never did this. Ash would go under water at 3 but was not using goggles or looking for things and Mike had a serious distaste for getting his face wet. They have come such a long way.

"Just Keep Swimming, Just Keep Swimming"

Ah yes.... The ENDLESS competition!!!! Everything is a race with these guys. If your not first, SO MANY TEARS!!! Race to the kickboard.... and go!

Got water in your nose kid?

Kids also had a 2 week swim camp in July. It was very beneficial for CJ when he would participate :-)

The first two days he did very well. He did have a set of negotiations that needed to be met before he got into the pool but he and the instructor came to a compromise and CJ got in. He was loving this!!