Ready for Tomorrow

Sunday started off with church and the library. Shane bonded with another little boy over Sonic the Hedgehog. They were deep in conversation and wandering all over.

After his new friend left (Shane followed him to the door to wave goodbye), Shane picked out some books and hopped on the computer. That left me free to check out adult books.

At 3:00 PM, there was baseball.

We almost did not go. Baseball was at the bottom of my activity list. The coach's wife emailed while we were on vacation and said that practice was going to be on Tuesadys. That conflicted with swimming. 

There was too much going on. One night each for soccer, TKD, swimming, and then baseball wanted to have TWO weeknights. And the weeknights wouldn't even remain constant. There'd be one for practice and one for games, but the games could be anywhere?

I seriously thought about cutting baseball from our schedule.

However, the coach's wife emailed again to offer a Sunday practice before the first game on Tuesday. The weather was perfect. Shane was full of energy (as always). Why not?

So we tried it.

It went well. Shane remembered some of it from tee ball and when we've worked in the yard. He looked to be having a lot of fun.

He was paired up with the kid of a dad I was talking to. It turned out the kid's dad, Aaron, and I went to the same high school! He'd graduated the year before me, but we'd never met (I went to a big school).

I would have offered to help coach, but there were already four adults helping. They seemed like a really good crew, too

Which had been in doubt. There was an email a week before Spring Break saying "We need a fourth coach to start. Anyone want to volunteer?" I don't mind assistant coaching, but I couldn't commit to being a head coach. There was a second email before spring break saying, "Anyone? Please?" I felt like the season was in doubtful circumstances.

And yet here we were on a Sunday. The coaches were technical and kid friendly. They seemed to know each other and I wasn't needed.

So I sat on the sidelines, talked, and rethought dropping out of baseball.

Practice went on for an hour and a half. Shane was getting frustrated with the fielding practice when he was called over to practice batting. He wasn't an instant rock star. He didn't get a single hit.

Waiting is hard, too. He accidentally whapped the coach's daughter's hand as she was putting a ball on the tee.

The coach's wife was giving tips to the kids at the tee, as well. It was clearly a baseball family. She said her husband, Coach Chris, had batted .508 in high school! He'd gone off to WV to play for a small school in college.

We got our team shirts after practice.

It was go time for bo time! I love these sponsor named teams!

Shane said he had a lot of fun as we drove home. He was eager to show Henry his team shirt.

I was newly enthused about baseball, as well. I figured we'd try the game on Tuesday and rethink swimming for April (Which made economic sense, too. Baseball was $35 for the whole season and gave a shirt and hat. Swim lessons were $85 for 4 lessons).

It was great to stand back and rest over spring break. After a weekend full of activity, I felt ready to start the final quarter of the school year. Shane, Carrie, and I would have all liked to have had two weeks of spring break, but summer will come quicker if we get back to it.