Special Olympics Basketball Season and Album

Our son, Isaac, loves to be active - running, soccer, basketball . . . you name it, he likes it. Thank goodness our city has an amazing Special Olympics program. Right now, he's playing basketball. His team practices once a week for an hour. They've had four practices so far and just played their first game.

It was awesome! Isaac kept his hands to himself (he loves to grab jerseys so he can keep up with the faster kids). In fact, the kid he was guarding was a sixth grader. Isaac's head came up to about the middle of her chest. With his arms up to guard her, his hands reached to about her shoulders. What can I say? Isaac's in third grade and he's a small third grader, too. I actually find it quite humorous to watch my little guy, who has no fear, guard such huge kids! Anyway, Isaac dribbled, made a basket, and was awesome at defense. When his team fell behind on the score board half-way through the game, Isaac got very frustrated. He was running up and down the court going back and forth from defense to leading his team - the whole time with tears coursing down his face while he said, "We have to make a basket! We need to get ahead!"

Now, some of you may be thinking "Oh that poor boy!" but parents with kids with special needs would be saying, "That's cool!" Why? Because he understood how his team was doing and even though he was frustrated, instead of tantruming and having a melt down, he kept playing the game and obeying the rules. This was a MAJOR accomplishment for our son. Hurray!

Even though the final score on the board showed that his team lost, it was a huge win for Isaac. All of his coaches gave him big hugs and high fives - they were so proud of him. Even the coach from the opposing team came up to my hubby to say how impressed he was with how well Isaac played.

Now, I know you're just waiting for the album. I have a little disclaimer. I had our three year old AND our one year old with me in the stands. Our three year old desperately wanted to be out there on the court with his big brother. To keep him in his seat, I let him take all the pictures of the game. So be prepared for not the best quality - we had to do A LOT of editing which really diminished the crispness of the pics. But hey, you'll still have an idea of what the game was like. Enjoy!