Catcher Remy

2-hour baseball scrimmage today...

and I managed to burn.

Yes, I'm that pale.

Time to break out the sunscreen!

On the other hand, my Remy played catcher!

 

Signs of Spring

The trees at my apartment complex.

The flowers outside the office at work.

My boy, starting baseball season.

What are the signs of Spring around you right now?

Texas Storm

Yesterday was the beginning of baseball season for my 8 yr old, Remy.

Their team played awesomely.

But the game got called a little early due to a large Texas Thunderstorm rolling in with lightning and hail.

It was impressive.

I love Texas storms.

And I have a feeling this spring is going to be full of them.

And oh, yeah, my son's baseball team name?

The Storm!!

Little League Sports and The Flu have partnered up to take us out!

My 7 yr old had three baseball games over the weekend.

And at the end of each game, all the boys line up...

and proceed to slap each others hands.

And if that's not bad enough...

the kids all then run to get their end-of-game team snack!!

Why, oh, why didn't I think to bring hand sanitizer to the games?!

We're going to get our kids sick with good sportsmanship!!

The Complexity of a Seven-Year-Old

Before you read this post, you need to know:
These photo were taken LAST YEAR.





Remy is a natural at sports.
He loves playing all sports.
He's played soccer, baseball & basketball for several years now.

Well, this winter, it came time to sign up for baseball.
So, I signed him up, like always.





Then, a couple of weeks ago, it was time for the first practice.
And Remy informed me he did NOT want to play baseball.
He told me he hated baseball.
He said I forced him to sign up.

I was confused.
Is this not the same child who loved baseball last year?
And the year before?
And the year before?

The same child who has played baseball for three years and excels at it?






Apparently.

Well, I talked him into going to the first practice...but I couldn't take him because I had to work.
His dad took him.
And it did not go well.

He spent the entire practice under a park bench crying.
My husband had gotten him there a few minutes late, which if you know Remy at all, you know he HATES being late. And this was a new team, he didn't know anyone. So, he was uncomfortable. All those things combined made for an unhappy Remy unwilling to try.

And after that, he said NO MORE BASEBALL.






But, with a mother's intuition, I knew I had to keep trying.

I bribed him.
I said, "Remy, if you try one practice and one game, I'll buy you that Indiana Jones Lego kit you want."

After some hedging...and perhaps me pulling up said lego kit on Amazon to temp him...he agreed.

And yesterday was another practice.
He went.
He played.
He played REALLY well.
He got his uniform.
He liked it.

"Mama, I love baseball."





Why does parenting have to be so complicated?!

The longest post in the day of my life.

Or did I mean the longest day in my life post? Or both? You be the judge. My day started off like this...


Yep, the big green monster (my ten year old Land Rover) has fallen apart on me again. If you want to read a much more entertaining story of my car troubles, read my previous post "I don't speak car." Anyway, yesterday's trouble began when I was in the car taking my boys to school. We only made it one block from our house.

Then I spent all day at my part time nanny job, where I spent eight hours taking care of these little adorable hooligans.

I get off work the same time the boys are finished with school for the day, so we had a brief hour to hurry home (or, have someone give us a ride home) where my mom had left HER car for me to drive temporarily. We then had to gather all the baseball gear in the bat bags and head out to baseball games.

Both boys had games last night. Remy's was first. Here he is in the outfield...I don't think this position is called "baseball ready." hehe I think his eyes need to be open and his glove out in front of his body...and in a ready crouched position...

Then he was up to bat. Here he is "on deck", practice swinging while he waits his turn. Good batter form. His right elbow is up, he's looking where he swinging and he has a good stance.

Now he's up at the plate..and this is NOT a good batter's stance. Elbow's down...and he's not looking at the pitcher!!
Despite that, he made it to first base. Whew. I can now breathe again and unbite my lips. Unbite, I'm not sure that's a real word...you get the point.
He makes it to second base...wait a minute, this is not good "baseball ready" form again!
Ok, there we go, much better. Good stance, he's alert and ready to run home.
The next batter hits the ball, CRACK, and Remy's off....running to home base. He'd kill me if he knew I shared this photo. His facial expression is priceless...

And, yes, he made it home!! SCORE, Remy!! My picture of this was too blurry, so can't share. Then, we all piled back in the car and headed to a different baseball field for my older son's game. Remy's games are a quick affair...less than an hour long. Donny's on the other hand are an hour and forty-five minutes long! So, while I'm really into them, and really enjoying them...I sometimes get distracted by the sky...and it was just about sunset and I saw some really amazing clouds. Lots of whispy things going on...
Then the sun started going down (ok, wrong terminology, I know, the Earth rotates, so the sun doesn't really go down...we're moving away from the sun, but you know what I mean)...and the clouds look darker. Very moody looking.
See, there's the sun going down...moving away...shoot, we're the ones moving away, it doesn't move at all.
Then, wowser, some pretty soft colors show up! I don't know how that happens...well, ok, scientifically I learned how, but it's still amazingly pretty...

and then bam...the magic really happens. Look at that dramitic lighting! As you can see from the power lines or telephone lines, I'm kind of far away...

So, here's a close up....wow, huh?! AMAZING lighting. I'm loving it (and watching Donny's baseball game, of course, how could you imagine otherwise?!)
It was a close game, but our team won! It was super exciting. They're getting really good at this age, lots of double and triple plays, amazing team work. Really fun games, despite all my cloud pictures, I promise!! And, here's Donny right after the game for the team pow-wow. He's flushed, he tired, he's exhilerated, ,all at the same time.
And, then we make it home and the little munchkin, who played nonstop on a playscape with other kids during his older brother's game, crashed in my bed...with sweet Annie!


Adorable, aren't they?

And, please, voting is still going on through the end of today (Saturday), so if you have time (and more than one computer to vote from!) stop by Darcy's blog Graphically Designing and vote for me!! It's super easy, takes less than 30 seconds! And, you should check out her work. She has designed some awesome websites, and I'd love for her to do mine!

Dragon skin, chore charts & baseball, oh my.

This morning, my 11 year old came to me and told me he had learned about the coolest thing. He has started watching Future Weapons, a Discovery Channel show about new technology. Dragon skin, a new type of body armor, has him awed and amazed. Here is a clip of a test dummy wearing the dragon skin and surviving a direct grenade explosion. Lovely, huh? Surely this isn't as bad as a violent video game, right? It's educational...





Meanwhile, I have been a bad parent. Last week, in my 6 year old's second baseball game, he was awarded a "golden baseball." At the end of each game, the coaches give out one gold baseball and two gold bats. The bats go to kids who made great hits in the game and the ball to a kid who made a great play. Remy was over the moon and so happy to receive this ball. I was so proud of him!

He was on the pitchers mound (although they don't pitch at this age, it's coach pitch) and a player hit the ball towards him. Remy fielded the ball quickly and threw it to first base. The first baseman caught it and they tagged the runner out! This is a rare occurance at this age, let me tell you! We were so proud of him. This kid's a natural athlete, that's for sure.



The boys have been dragging their feet lately about helping out around the house, and I've decided we needed a new approach to chores. So, we made chore charts last night. I didn't put a lot of creative craftiness into, just enough to make it ok to look at. We put up a week's worth of chores on a poster board with marker. And, if they mark off a certain amount of chores within the one week period (allowing for a few chores to be skipped in case of problems) then I'll take them to Target (one of our favorite places to go).

Well, apparently this works. In the last 24 hours the boys have made beds, taken dishes to the kitchen, fed and watered the dog, taken out trash and recycling, etc. I'm amazed! Why didn't I do this sooner? Such a simple concept. lol




I see a trip to Target in our near future.

Hit and Run

Here he is warming up on deck....

Then poses for Mom with the camera...

Then he's up to bat...
He hits the pitch...
and runs!

Yay, Remy! His first baseball game of the season and his first game minus the tee.

A new take on the 7th Inning Stretch

Baseball Joke:

A young lady arrived at her first ballgame during the 5th inning. "The score is 0 to 0," she heard a nearby fan say. "Oh, good," she cooed to her boyfriend, "then we haven't missed a thing."

Here's my little wild one having fun on the field while nothing's going on and he forgets his mom is watching closely with a camera:

All-American Afternoon Antics

See, I am doing something with that English Major...I used alliteration in my subject title for today's post!

Baseball season has begun in our home. Donny's first game was yesterday, and unfortunately, they lost 1-9. I see a lot of potential in their team's talent though, so all is not hopeless! Remy's first TBall game is Friday, and he can't wait!

Of course, I couldn't resist bringing my camera along to be that obnoxious photo parent, taking pictures of anything and everything that moved. Here's the team getting their pre-game pep talk:


Here's Donny. He was nervous about the game. He played second base and third base and did ok at bat. He has a powerful hit, when the bat makes contact with the ball, which is good, because he isn't the fastest runner.

He got popped in the face with a grounder during warm-up and now has a dark bruise under his left eye. I'll get a picture of that after school today.

Most everyone knows the basics of baseball, but just in case you don't, here's a refresher. You try to hit the ball and run towards these things:

They're called bases. It's very important you touch these, before the other team touches it with the ball, or you're out. There are four of these bases...home, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. When you stuck on a base, waiting for another chance to run, it's a good idea not to try and figure out what shapes you can find in the clouds...or watch an airplane fly overhead. Just saying...

These are common tooks used in the game. The bat is good for hitting balls...and your brother. It's not good to hit rocks, despite the attraction every boy has to doing so.

The helmets are surely something pesky mothers invented or those guys in suits who worry about liability.

Gloves are not for scooping up dirt or putting over your head, despite seeing many do otherwise.

Remy isn't very good at sitting still and watching his older brother's game. So, he spends his time moving...I managed to catch him as he hopped up on this cement baseball...

Then I caught him again as he quickly scaled the backdrop fence...

And, finally, I redirected his energy to the baseball complex playscape, that surely a mother invented to keep all her kids busy so she could watch her child play baseball!! Of course, I had to keep checking to make sure he hadn't been kidnapped or was hurt...can you believe the size of this playscape?

The Tball game Friday will have even better photo opportunities, because little kids are hilarious playing sports. So, stayed tuned for more fun baseball season commentary as we get deeper into the month.