Play Ball!

I’ve learned quite a bit about t-ball in the past couple of days, and even my childless friend who was visiting this weekend and got stuck chasing the wee ones’ schedules today claims to have enjoyed it.



First, if there are opening day ceremonies, find out from experience parents whether or not this is truly a worthwhile event. Our opening ceremonies consisted of a parade, $1 burgers and custards from Culver’s, moon walks and more. Or so they claimed.

Really, we stood by the south entrance of the football stadium for a really long time trying with all our might to ensure that our children didn’t scale the locked fence. We made sure that no child disappeared. We searched for additional teammates. And twenty minutes after our parade was to have started – add in fifteen minutes planned prep time and you have squirrely five and six year olds confined in a small space for over a half hour, ha! – we began our parade.

The parade consisted of everyone, including parents and kids, walking about a half mile to the baseball fields. Then we stood with the other four members of our team amidst other teams while various officials gave twenty-three minutes of speeches. And yes, I kept track.



Fortunately, Mister Man wasn’t bored. He did sand angels with his legs – as did his teammates – until I caught him. He then picked up sand and poured it over his head and onto his shirt. Then he made roads in the sand. When I finally gave up and moved him four feet onto the grass so he could no longer reach the sand, he made like a billy goat and pulled up the grass.

I then had a conversation with him about how playing with sand and grass during a game was not going to be ok. And I mentally planned in some time for a shower later in the day.

The ceremonies finally ended, and the 400 kids were released to go have fun on the moon walks. Yep, both of them. One was a ten foot high slide and the other a moonwalk. And the bigger Little League kids of course came over after awhile and spent most of their time either sitting at the top of the slide blocking everyone from going down or kicking and shoving kids down. If they were knocked down, they bounced on kids at the bottom and them climbed back up the wrong way, stepping on kids on the way up. Yep, I've got a letter to write to the league about suggested either disuse of the moonwalks in the future or potentially some authority monitoring the moonwalks.

And the line for the Culver's food? Yeah, we didn't even try that one. Even after hanging out for over an hour, the lines were twenty people deep. We're just not that patient!

That was at 11am. At 5pm, we had our game. You can imagine how much wound up and exhausted all those five and six year olds were by yesterday evening. Our coach is also new to t-ball, so in our single practice on Thursday, we didn't exactly discuss how a game works or what is expected of t-ball.

Fortunately, parents are allowed on the field in t-ball, so my husband helped Mister Man out at "shortstop." He tried giving him all the hints, from the ready position to what to do if there is a man on first and second and the ball comes to him. Forget the fact that there are no outs in t-ball and the ball is supposed to always just be thrown to first. Mister Man appreciated the advice, however....



After the practice on Thursday, I realized Mister Man needed some remedial t-ball skills. I taught him how to stand and swing, and it really made a huge difference. He's a rules based kid, so drawing two lines on the driveway where his feet belonged made a huge difference -- compared to the "stand here, step forward, swing with your hips" that was being coached. Too amorphous for my boy!

It made a huge difference, and he actually was hitting the ball instead of the tee and hitting it well.



The last batter each inning hits a "home run," and Mister Man was that batter in the second inning. He was so thrilled as he rounded the bases!



Today, we were supposed to have another game. In fact, we should be there this second. Unfortunately, the rains have returned, so we were called off. I think one game this weekend was enough though. Both wee ones went up for naps before one, and I haven't heard a peep for either!



PS I promise the next post won't be about t-ball!