Take Me Out To The Ball Game

BAD Blogger. I wrote and "published" this post on Friday morning and then went out of town. For whatever reason, it never posted... nor did the one I had scheduled for yesterday. Boo! But, my husband and I smartly chose not to take the wee ones to the Cardinals game yesterday when it was so hot that the city was asking the team to move it to a night game in an effort to reduce heat illnesses.

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Yesterday, we took the wee ones to their first professional baseball game. Technically, Mister Man has been before, but not since he was an infant and we were rained on while at an indoor stadium. Don't ask.

My husband decided it would be a good idea to go to see a Brewers Twins game during the day with my parents and the wee ones -- and me, if I could get the time off work. I agreed, although I'm mildly regretting it now.

Our seats were in the sun. It was 94 degrees and incredibly high humidity throughout the game. They ran out of iced lemonades during the game, it was so hot. The wee ones were tired, and they didn't like sitting stil that long. And ohh, don't get me started on the traffic.

I unfortunately wasn't able to get the day off work, but I was able to take a half day. While on a conference call, I drove to my parents just in time to see my dad pulling out of their driveway. Oops, I knew I was late, but I didn't think they'd leave without even telling me!

They didn't. My dad was going to get gas for his car. By the time he returned, we discovered he also took the time to wash his car. My dad isn't exactly a sports fan. Sadly, that ate into (no pun intended, I swear!) our time budgeted to stop for lunch on the way to the park, so we drove straight there.

Straight there involved driving past the gas station where my dad filled up his tank. It also unfortunately involved being stopped in a traffic jam for twenty-five minutes on a two lane highway that had one lane closed. Fortunately, we arrived slightly before the end of the second inning.

I'm quite impressed at all the food Mister Man consumed. My dad got him a hot dog. Unfortunately, he was only four bites into it before he dropped it on the ground under the seats in front of us and I refused to let him pick it back up and eat it. Instead, he ate an entire iced lemonade. And half a gigantic pretzel covered in cinnamon sugar that my dad got. And half another hot dog that my husband got him to replace the first one. And half of a strawberry iced lemonade. And then half of a strawberry ice cream container.

On the plus side, when he was full, he didn't keep eating. He didn't finish the hot dog or the ice cream. Instead my husband had that honor.

Given that we were in the sun, the dark green seats were hot. Really hot. As in so hot that neither of the wee ones could sit on them. I finally got the brilliant idea of burning myself, using my body to absorb the heat and cool off the seat, then moving so a wee one could sit in the vacated seat, and I could repeat the process for the other wee one. They were content with this theory.

Mister Man did enjoy watching much of the game. He followed the action fairly well, and we had fun conversations about what it meant to hit a single, double and triple. We talked about intentional walks and sac flies. His baseball knowledge is coming along nicely.



Little Miss was more interested in playing with the spray bottle my mom brought along than watching the game, but this didn't surprise me in the least. She sprayed herself, my mom, the people around us (who fortunately were thrilled to be cooled by the mist of water). She was busy.



She also spent a good deal of time eating the iced lemonade trying to keep cool. And wanting to play with my mom's camera. Smart girl knows better than to try to mess with my camera!



As the game wore on, the wee ones cared more about when the Brewers would hit the next home run than anything else. And yes, we are Twins fans! Unfortunately, they were drawn in by the pageantry of Bernie sliding down the slide and the fireworks set off after each home run.



By the end of the game though, the wee ones were wiped out. All Mister Man wanted to do was curl up in someone's lap and take a nap. It was too hot for a sweaty little boy to cuddle with us though, so mean parents that we are, we made him rest in his own chair. He was happy to do so.



Luckily, the Twins pulled it out 6-4, and everyone left happy. Except Little Miss who was still demanding more homeruns. And we get to do this all over again at Busch Stadium on Saturday. Oh yeah, except that the heat index is expected to be 109. Wish us luck!

And Go Twins!