Life, Family, Trying to Be Happy
It’s that time of year…back to school time! It’s time for parents to breathe a sign of relief or cry. Whatever suits you best!
Of course, the day would NOT be complete without a little friendly teasing from your older brothers…which caused this…
Which I was able to turn into this…
They didn’t even look back…
I’m amazed how quickly this summer is passing us by. Most of the spring and summer was consumed with what sometimes seemed to be endless evenings of baseball. While fun, it did make the time fly by.
Since we obviously didn’t get enough Pee Wee or Travel Baseball this season, we took the boys to a Indianapolis Indians game with FREE tickets Bryan won at a golf tourney.
It was hot. I mean hot. Did I say hot?
Like feels like 104 hot.
We did have a slight breeze.
The team gave us a good show. The game was tied 4-4 at the end of the ninth inning. It was fun but not so much fun that we were going to stay all night.
I’m not even sure how the game ended up. It doesn’t matter. What matters is we had fun family time with the boys!
But I must conclude with this funny story.
As we were walking back to our car, we passed the White River Gardens concert. OAR, whoever they are, had performed for the evening. We witnessed a very overly intoxicated woman being pushed in a wheel chair to her car while her husband had a talk with the police. Apparently, it was the talk of the concert.
How embarrassing for her.
I’m so lame with my personal blog. This has been in my “saved” drafts since October 2009. This is not a spot for up to the date information!
Laser tag was not originally on my 40×40 list. However, I’m adding it in. It is something everyone should on their “list” of things they want to do.
It was my oldest son, Peyton, ninth birthday over the past weekend. I really don’t know what I was thinking but we let him invite 4 friends to go play laser tag in lieu of a “traditional” family party. Since my little brother’s birthday is just the next week, we combined groups and he invited 3 friends too.
For those of you just joining in, my little brother is 21 years younger than me. I have a daughter that is older than her “uncle.” Peyton and Braden are exactly 51 weeks apart and routinely share a birthday party for convenience. They are more like brothers or cousins than uncle/nephew.
Our vehicle consisted of Bryan, Peyton + 4 friends, Sofia, and me. Uh, yeah, I heard my lifetime quota of balls and stinky farts in that 45 minute drive. Apparently, my son is very normal because all of his peers talk about the same two topics.
Because I had Buy 1 Get 1 Free Coupons, (imagine that, right?) and only nine eligible kids to play Laser Tag, we had a spot each game for an adult to play. Bryan reluctantly took the duty first round. I knew he would love it, though. He was the sniper and you could see him hopping around as much as the kids.
Same with dad/grandpa. He was overheard from the observation deck hollering, “So this is where all the weenies are!” They pretended like they didn’t really want to play but the little kid came out in all of us.
Finally, it was my turn. Somehow I ended up on a team with all adults and the NINE boys in our group were on the opposite team. Needless to say, once one of them hit me, they surrounded me and wouldn’t go away!
I will say it was one of the best nights in a long time. I should have played more than one game but it was hot, I’m aging, and hopelessly out of shape. It is a fun way to get your adrendaline up and spend quality time with the kids. Somehow Laser Tag did not end up on my 40×40 list but it should have been.
Oh, and the little boys had fun too! (wink)
Eli was almost old enough to play but it was probably better he didn’t. I don’t think it would have been a safety issue for him but here’s the scene that played out in my head. Eli gets shot in laser tag. He can’t shoot anyone else for those 10 seconds so he gets upset. Ridiculously upset, which is the only way he works upset. Threatens to throw his gun out at the kid who got him and then gets us all kicked out.
Or maybe he would have been perfectly fine and oblivious to the fact that he got shot. He will have to wait until he is six to find out!
Sofia played some arcade games and kept turning in her points for candy. Candy is her number one priority in life so she had a great night.
Of course, any kind of event involving my little brother, Braden, is not complete until he throws up, which he did right before we were headed into eat pizza!
I have to admit something in this post. I left my 10 year old and 8 year old in the van while I dropped the younger two children off at daycare. I know lock me up now! Mind you, the daycare is attached to a church in a very safe neighbor with no drive through traffic. It is a secure spot behind the church with only one entrance/exit.
While I was walking out of daycare, this older gentleman, who I have never seen before, stops me and asks if I am the owner of the silver mini-van. Uh, yeah, I am. What did my kids do? In my mind, I’m thinking he was mooned, someone stuck his tongue out at him, the two kids were fighting to the death in the back seat….
The story went in a direction that I did not expect. He claims my son was in the front seat trying to move the gears. He went on and on about how dangerous it was, blah, blah… I thanks him for the information but I knew it didn’t sound right. While Peyton may be ornery, he would not try to drive off in my car, right?
As soon as I got into the car, the both kids started telling me about how this weird man tried to get in the car and told them not to mess with the shifter. Come to find out my son was turning on the window wipers which are to the right side of the steering wheel where a gear shift is sometimes located. In my Honda van, however, the gear shift is closer to the radio panel than to the steering wheel. Since it was raining and both kid’s stories matched up, it made complete sense.
So in fact, in an effort to be “safety” conscious, this man freaked my kids out by trying to get in the car and talk to them when he was a stranger to them. I know he was probably harmless but they didn’t know that.
I don’t really know what the point of this story is besides the old man probably went around telling everyone he knew about an untrue story about a kid trying to move the gear shifter while the mom wasn’t in the car….the things that irritate me…
Last night, my mom had both of my youngest kids over to spend the night. Somehow Sofia maneuvered her way into going. I think it was the “I’m going to your house” in a sweet voice combined with her you can’t say no to me smile. Who can say no to that?
While we were doing the kid exchange in town, Eli kept asking me to go home and get his bike. Uh, no, we live across the county from my parents and I would be 35 minute round trip not including all the chit chat time! I suggested he offered my brother $1 to come to our house and get it. He doesn’t have anything better to do, ha!
After arriving at the house, Eli was bugging my dad and brother to drive to our house and get his bike. My dad, not knowing Eli had never rode a bike without training wheels, suggested Eli ride my youngest brother’s orange bike. My youngest brother (9) gives Eli a little push and he is off! Seriously, it was that easy. He wasn’t even wobbly or anything.
I was told he did have a few close moments but it doesn’t sound like anything we had with our two older children.
I feel a little guilty because Eli had been asking us to take his training wheels off his bike since he turned 5. According to Eli, once you turn 5 you can just magically ride your bike with no training wheels and he was right!
Here’s the video my mom sent me of Eli taking off on his bike (note he is wearing a safety helmet!):
While this was all going on, the two older kids and I decided to make it movie night at our local theater, which is really cheap $2 for kids and $4 for adults. Plus, the concessions is just as reasonable. We watched Night at the Museum 2 and while it was funny and enjoyable and it was a little over the top!
It was odd to be a movie and not have to really chase anyone around. Hannah and Peyton sat in the third row with friends who were also at the movie. I sat completely by myself and was actually able to enjoy the movie. Minus the two times the kids wanted money from me for popcorn & cokes! It was really weird.
Peyty Pie, as I call him, hit his first over the fence home run at last night’s Pee Wee game.
It came at a critical time when we were only up by 2 runs in a close game against a hard hitting team.
We had two runners on base with 2 outs. First pitch, he swung and it was so out of there!
After that beautiful hit, everyone could breathe a sigh of relief in this close game. We want to keep our undefeated season ya know. Cuz, Pee Wee is LIFE.
We couldn’t find his real home run ball so we think it may have fell into the creek but he was given a new ball which one of the coaches scuffed up a bit to make it look like the home run ball.
Now the home run race is on between two of the 8 year olds on our team.
After the game, we celebrated with dinner at the Dairy Queen with no coupons. Our life is consisting of lots of dinners out right now with our hectic schedule!
So will my 8 year old son have nightmares after this past weekend’s baseball game?
He says no.
But when you look up at the game and your child is being chased by the ENTIRE opposing team, you wonder what your child is going to dream about.
It was a game that was really just a comedy of errors. Mostly due to an pimpled faced umpire. I will give it to the ump, he has given us a story we will never forget.
Long after we forget who we played, the outcome of the game, or the date, we will never forget the comedic relief in an tense game.
Here’s the scenario. Peyton, my eight year old son, was on second base. Next batter strikes out. The opposing team all starts to head to the dug out. Peyton heads back to our dug out.
The moms in the stands are trying to figure out how there is 3 outs. Who got out? We are all kind of shaking our heads and looking around. There is only two outs, right?
All of the sudden I look up and I see Peyton racing back out to second base and being chased by the entire opposing team. Really, only one kid could get him out but the whole team was chasing after him.
Lucky for Peyton, he gets his speed from his dad and made it back to second base quickly. Plus, the catcher who was running with the ball tripped. Though, I really doubt they could have outrun a kid who looked like he was running for his life.
Pretty hilarious and it is too bad youtube wasn’t there to film it. Anyone else catch that Michael Scottism?
So that wasn’t even all. There are more unforgettable moments in that game.
It is the top of the 5th inning. The opposing team has a runner on third base. The runner attempts to steal home. Mind you, it is not a passed ball. So our catcher looking perplexed, stands there with the ball to tag the runner and gets plowed over. (Runners are suppose to slide in any situation like that so he is out regardless.)
Still there is more.
The last involved the very last moment of the game. The scene: 2 outs. 2 strikes. Our team down by a mere 4 runs. Umpire calls a strike on our batter as the ball is leaving the pitcher’s hands and quickly exits the field. The ball was in the dirt. Hardly, a strike.
Game over. We lost. But we really improved.
{We faced the same team again the next day. We had an adult umpire, which gave me much confidence in how fair the game would be judged. We won by several runs. Amazing how decent umpiring can change the outcome of a game.}
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