Soccer...an update

Saturday was our first regular soccer game day.  Jared's game was first.

 He went on the field with a little anxiety, but tried to join in.  (He wasn't the only one feeling worried.  The coach's face in the above photo is due to the fact that she was trying to find out if several players were going to make it off the sidelines...some didn't.)

 Pretty soon he got discouraged and decided he was done.

We talked him into staying on the field the whole game which, looking back, feels like a major victory.

 He spent the rest of the game watching things pass by him.

 The coach tried to help, but he was pretty convinced that he didn't like the game.

Hopefully we can help him be more ready for the next one.

Ethan's game was next. His team had many more players and so he didn't play the whole game, but he did really well when he did play.  He isn't a star athlete, but being my son he didn't have much of a chance.  :)  He did try and stay with the ball and had some good kicks.

 Look at this cutie!

 A close-up of the above picture makes me extra happy.

For my own recollection:  I left the camera in auto mode during Jared's game because I was worried I would just mess things up.  I also was using my zoom lens that I haven't used much.  Since I didn't spend much of the game convincing Ethan to get on the field, I decided to try manual mode.  I really should never use auto.  I did edit these pictures a little bit (I really want to get photoshop!) and so Jared's are much lighter than they were directly off camera, but I was disappointed.  On the flip side, there were several of pictures from Ethan's game that were out of focus or over- or under-exposed.  Photography is something I want to do so well, but it is such an expensive hobby and it requires practice that I am not doing much lately.