Yep, we went to another MLS Galaxy game last night. The Galaxy faced the Puerto Rico Islanders as a part of the CONCACAF Champions League. My girls won free tickets from a tournament (more on this another day…) and the Home Depot Center offered free parking for everyone, so off we went! (Yes, my kids are back in school, but we just pretended it was still summer!) It was a beautiful night with temps in the 80s- even at 8pm. That’s highly unusual around here.
As I’ve said before, the Home Depot Center is a beautiful place to watch a soccer match.
It was pretty empty that evening because of a crowd limiting agreement that the Home Depot Center has with Cal State Dominguez Hills, so half the stadium was blocked off. It looked a bit odd, but the small crowd was certainly loud! The game was exciting with lots of scoring (Galaxy won 4-0) and physical play. Beckham had been sick, but was dressed and on the bench. His walk across the field was greeted with enthusiastic cheers, but he never entered the game.
As always, the girls had a great time.
Things have been rather hectic here at the homestead with school starting and all the craziness associated with that! Sometimes you just have to enjoy the view (I was going to say “stop and enjoy the view,” but who has time to stop?) along the way. Driving home from practice isn’t all bad when you see this…
It feels like Hawaii…until you get home and have to do the dishes.
I haven’t written a Fashion Friday lately because it’s been so hot around here! (Well, hot for us beachy folk) Tank tops and shorts are not the stuff that fashion posts are made of. Now that school starts next week, I’m thinking about wearing some shoes besides flip flops. I went to check out the Toms site and found these lovelies… (All images are linked)
Toms Suede Desert Wedges- Love these new wedge boots! I’m definitely going to have to pick these up.
Toms Strappy Wedges- So maybe they’re not exactly meant for cold weather, but it’s California- we don’t really have any. Black means it’s a Fall/Winter shoe, right?
Vegan Women’s Wrap Boots- I’m not quite sure how these work, but they are certainly interesting. Not sure I’d have time for this in the morning!
I know…I think I’m too old for these, but I still want them. I wish I could get them for my girls, but at the moment they are very anti-sparkle. I may just have to sparkle for the whole family!
After I give the credit card a rest from all our summer expenses I’m ordering a few of these. Who knows, you might recognize me on the field with my sparkly shoes!
Yesterday my girls had the amazing opportunity to participate as flag bearers/ball girls with some of their teammates at the U17 Women’s National Team game vs the Chinese U17 National Team at the Home Depot Center. The funniest thing happened in the bathroom before the game even started. Our girls went into use the restroom and some of the Chinese team were already inside. When Big Soccer Girl came out she said, “The Chinese player left the seat up after leaving the stall…are you sure she’s a girl?” They did look a bit on the manly side with most of them having short haircuts, but I assured her both teams were female.
The game wasn’t on the main Home Depot Center Field, but on one of the beautiful outlying fields.
The girls got to carry the flags out for the National Anthems. My girls helped with the Chinese Flag…
National Anthem and then the action begins with the ball girl ready for duty…
She was a bit on edge because, “Mom, whenever the Chinese are threatened then just slam the ball out of bounds.” Fortunately she didn’t get hit and had a great time. It was amazing to see some of the skills the girls had. They definitely didn’t look (or play!) like they were still in High School. Check out this leap over the Chinese defender.
The US won 2-1 over the Chinese with a PK in the box helping their cause. It was a fun afternoon with many soccer girls coming out to watch and dream about being on that field one day. If you’re interested, here’s the article about the game…
You can now express all your soccer girl problems just like those girls over at SoccerGrlProbs! Their new t-shirts are really cute and I just ordered the “I can’t, I have soccer” one for my Big Soccer Girl. Go to their website at www.soccergrlprobs.com and order away. Don’t forget to follow them on twitter @SoccerGrlProbs and watch their You Tube videos. They make me laugh! Maybe they’ll make one for us soccer moms…”I can’t, I have carpool” lol.
Big soccer girl has had a tough two weeks. She’s gotten stung by a bee twice in two weeks in the same foot. The first time the bottom swelled a bit and was painful, but it went away after a few days. She was able to play in her weekend tournament (and score an amazing goal…hooray!!!).
The second time she wasn’t so fortunate. Her foot painfully swelled up. We tried everything…
Baking Soda…
Even acupuncture from an awesome mom of a teammate. That was the most successful!
It was still too painful to play much in her first game. After playing for 10 minutes she had to go sit on the bench with her foot elevated. Soon after this she took off her cleat and iced it. She tried playing in her second game for a while and had a really hard time running. She cried after the game, not because it hurt, but because she was so upset that she couldn’t keep up with her mark.
But after some more acupuncture treatment she was able to play a bit the next day. We’re going to have to do some investigating this week to figure out what made it swell so much. I think I should have given her Benadryl right away, but she had never taken any before and hasn’t had reactions previously. She has this weekend off, so she should be ready to go for her big Labor Day Tourney.
She’s begging to go back to the beach because she’s learning how to surf, but that’s where she was stung both times. I guess we’ll go get her some water shoes!
Who could say no? Especially when 10 “free back rub” coupons were attached 
Meet Bubbles the Betta Fish- the newest member of our family adopted by little soccer girl. Good luck little Bubbles!
Cutest label ever…
This is not our first foray into the world of the Betta fish. After vast experience I had decided never again. Yep, it’s another example of never say never. Oh well, at least he can survive a weekend soccer tournament without a babysitter.
Over the summer we spend most of our weekends traveling around Southern California attending soccer tournaments. As always, all opinions are my own and based on personal experience unless otherwise noted. If you have reviews of your own, please add in the comments!
Name: Dave Shelton Memorial(FC Heat)
Dates:August 11/12
Cost:$550 U9/U13 $625 U14/U19
Location: Ryan Park, Escondido
Application Process/Coaching Conflicts:The application process was easy, and the tournament director (Suzie Stephens- my new friend!!) bent over backwards to accommodate us. She was awesome and amazing.
Check In:At field before first game. Hooray! It was organized and easy.
Rules: 10 Point System; 20 minute halves for U9/U10 25 minute halves for U11/U14 30 minute halves for U15 and above. Championship game were 5 minutes longer per half resulting in PKs if tied.
Number of Teams at our Age Level:4 teams
Strength of Competition: Overall there was a mix of teams in our bracket with 2 higher level teams and 2 teams who are just starting out. The top two teams battled it out in pool play and then in the finals.
Fields:All the games were played at Ryan Park which is a beautiful multi field facility. There were concession stands galore as well as real bathrooms- hooray! It was a great tournament atmosphere. Parking was plentiful, but some of it was on dirt. I wish we had something like this close to home.
Referees:Some of the refs were very young, including one hilarious side ref who was about the same age as the girls. He was great though and had the quote of the day, “Don’t you think referees should have to pass a hearing and eyesight test?” after numerous incorrect offside calls. We had a great ref for the final who complimented our coach and our girls after the game.
Weather:HOT, HOT, HOT. This is the hottest I’ve ever been at a tourney. It was over 100 degrees and after sitting in the sun for hours, my car said this when I got back to it… Yep, it says 111 degrees.
I was concerned about the girls, but fortunately the refs gave water breaks in the middle of each half. It was definitely needed and I’m glad they took the health of the kids into consideration. My kid traditionally doesn’t do well in heat, but she’s done a lot of conditioning lately and I think it made a big difference.
Restaurants/Attractions:This was an away weekend for us and we had a great time!!!
We stayed at the Courtyard Marriott in Rancho Bernardowhich was very accommodating. The rooms were a nice size and the facility had a pool and a restaurant. The restaurant hired extra servers so that we could have our whole party (about 40 people) eat together on Saturday night. The girls played in the pool a bit and then came in the dining room to eat. It was perfect and so easy. (Good thing that people didn’t have to drive….lol)
On Friday night we ate at the Elephant Bar in Rancho Bernardowhich had great food, but the service was a bit slow. Most people drove down on Saturday so this was only a party of 12. The manager was very nice and booked a table for us in advance.
For lunch on Saturday we took a wrong turn going to the freeway, but found a little gem of a restaurant in Escondido called Rock n’ Jenny’s Italian Subs. The food was amazing, but it’s on the small side so it wouldn’t be a good place for a team lunch.
For lunch on Sunday we all went to Spires Restaurant which was fine, but very slow and had trouble fitting us all in. We squeezed together and most importantly, all the girls were able to sit together, eat and cool off in the air conditioning.
Overall Thoughts: This is the first time we’ve played in this tournament and although it was very well organized, I’m not sure if we’ll go back. The heat was crazy!!! We had such a fun weekend though and brought home another championship! Thanks again to FC Heat for a great tourney. Someone especially liked the medal ceremony…
Commitment in Youth Sports
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