Professional Baseball Player

Hello everyone, this is Morry.

Today was a pretty standard day.  It had started to lightly rain when I got up.  Rachel came downstairs not too long after me because she was tutoring this morning.

The boys had school all day while Rachel went into teach at ATA in the morning.

I interviewed a person today for a job with us.  The 30 minute interview went for more than an hour so it was pretty good.

After I finished work, Rachel was tutoring some more.  I made a marinade for boneless chicken thighs and put it in the fridge.  Then Evan and I went to Marucci Clubhouse to get some hitting work in.  Evan's tryouts for high school baseball are Friday and Saturday.

When we got there, we look at the schedule on the monitor.  A guy who was drafted in the first round by the Mets from Lake Travis was going to be there at the same time as us.  Evan got very excited.  While Evan was practicing, we both took a peek to see how he hit and things like that.  It was pretty cool.  Evan said that the video game, MLB the Show, did a good job of making the video game version of the guy look like the real player.

When we got home, I grilled the chicken thighs.

Now, Evan and Noah are upstairs playing on the Playstation.

Until next time...

Last Day of School and Perfect Noah

Hello everyone, this is Morry.

Today was the last day of school.  The boys were both up when I got up this morning and dressed.  They were excited to get to school for the last day.  It was especially important to Noah because it meant he had gone to school every single day of the school year.  That's right, Noah had perfect attendance for his first year of elementary school.  We are very proud of him for making it perfect through the whole year.

Rachel cleaned a bunch today and started preparing for the trip.

In the afternoon, when Rachel got back from tutoring, we drove to pick up the boys.  Noah gave Mr. Valdes a really big hug.  When he came over to us, he told us he wasn't happy.  I think for Noah it was bittersweet.  He's excited for summer, but he really enjoys school.

The boys got their report cards.  In Austin, for Kindergarten through 2nd grade, they grade the kids on a variety of things on a scale of 1 to 4 with 4 being excellent.  Noah continued the perfection theme by getting all 4's.  His second time in a row.  Evan also got all 4's, his second time this year.

When Evan came over, he seemed excited for the end of the year.  I think he likes being with his friends at school, but the school part of school he could take it or leave it.

Later in the afternoon, Evan and Noah went over to Jack's house to swim.  They both had a good time.

We picked the boys up and then went to the Galleria.  We went to Zingers for dinner.  It's a family sports bar.  It's near Dick's which is why we went there.  We thought the kids would like watching the sports.  We asked them to put on the MLB draft on the tv nearest us.  The service was really poor and everything took awhile.  The food was good though.

We walked to Dick's and I got some shoes.  Rachel talked to someone there who had great suggestions for Rachel's feet.  We got a few other things as well.

We are home and the boys are ready for bed.

Until next time...

Still Going

Hello everyone, this is Morry.

This morning, Evan finished his breakfast early.  Now that the MLB is in full swing, Evan really likes watching the highlights in the morning again.  Then he imitates both the good and the funny plays he sees.  For example, if he kicks the ball when he's trying to field it, he says he's Rickie Weeks.  This afternoon, he imitated Bryce Harper running into the wall to show Noah.

Rachel took Noah to his gymnastics class today.  He enjoys going there.

In the afternoon, I came home and took Noah to his playoff game.  Evan stayed home with Rachel because he had his end-of-season party for his baseball team.  Rachel dropped him off at one of his teammate's house and he rode over with them and then Rachel came to the field.

Noah's game was very tense.  Twice the other coach questioned stuff that Noah's coach was doing and had to be shown in the rule book that it was legal.  The other team was pretty good. But Noah's team was better.  The way tee ball works here is that each half inning ends in one of two ways - either the team batting scores 5 runs or the defense records 3 outs.  In the top of the third, Noah came up with two outs and a man on first and second.  They had scored three runs with the boy on first representing the 5th run.  They needed Noah to get a hit there and not hit into a force.  Noah came through hitting a ball between short and third that was fielded in the infield but there was no play.  He ran fast to first.  It was a very critical hit.  The next batter was able to hit it into the outfield scoring the fourth and fifth runs.

When the game was over, we drove over to Rudy's where Evan was having his team party.  The coach gave out trophies to all the kids and said some nice stuff.  He talked about how much Evan loves baseball and how determined he is.  He talked about how he would see it in Evan's eyes when Evan got to the plate and how he moved Evan to third at the end of the season and he knew that Evan just wanted that ball.  It was nice. And Evan seemed to having a great time with the other kids on the team.

We came home and the boys are about to get ready for bed.

Until next time...

Noah's Turn

Hello everyone, this is Morry.

Last night, Evan was kind of cranky.  I think he was still tired from the long night of baseball the night before.  He went to sleep fairly easily.  When I got him up this morning, he was actually kind of hyper. We watched the MLB channel like normal and then we were getting on our bikes to go to school.  It seemed like it was misting.  I'm not actually sure if it was raining, but there was 95% humidity.  Either way, we decided not to ride the bikes so we drove.

Rachel went for a run this morning and then took Noah to school.  After dropping Noah off, Rachel had a massage that I had scheduled for her.  This week is "Spa Week" and a bunch of salons were having big deals.

Rachel came home, did a bit of work, laid down, and then got Noah.

Rachel's first tutoring session was cancelled so she was able to pick Evan up.

After I finished work, I got Noah ready.  One of the games that had been cancelled was made up tonight.  Noah was very excited about his game.  I was excited to get to see him play.  Noah started the game at third base.  Unfortunately no balls were hit to him.  He then played right field, left field and finished up at second base.  He dove for a ball hit to him when he was playing second.  He was very excited to talk to me about diving for the ball.  At the plate he hit the ball hard twice for singles and he scored two runs.  His team won and is currently undefeated.  He has his next game on Sunday.

After the game, there was a pinata since it was the birthday of one of the boys.  Noah didn't participate but Evan did.

We had corned beef that we'd cooked in the crock pot when we got home.  Right now Rachel is reading to the boys.

Until next time...

Evan Knows

Hello everyone, this is Morry.

In the late 80s and early 90s, there was that set of Nike commercials with Bo Jackson that said "Bo Knows" as he played all the different sports since Bo excelled in both the MLB and NFL.  Well maybe they should be making commercials with Evan.  He had both a football and baseball game today, back-to-back.

This morning before the crazy day really started, Evan and Noah played downstairs.  Rachel went for an 8-mile run as she prepares for the San Antonio half marathon.

For lunch, I made pasta for us.  I figured Evan needed the carbs and energy.

At about 1:40 we left the house.  Evan's football team had pictures schedule for 2.  His game didn't start until 3pm.  After pictures they practiced some.  Noah and I had a catch.  Rachel came for the start of the game.

Evan started at wide receiver.  On their first possession, they attempted 4 wide receiver screens to Evan but the quarterback hopped the ball to Evan 3 of the times.  However, on one, Evan caught it and turned up field and ran all the way for an apparent touchdown.  The referee, however, said that Evan had stepped out about half way down and brought the ball back.  Evan seemed to handle it well.  They also handed the ball off to him on end-arounds twice.  Both times the other team tackled Evan as they tried to grab the flag.  That's a penalty and an automatic first down.  So Evan was responsible for 3 first downs in the first half.  Unfortunately, Evan's team lost.

We got Evan changed into his baseball uniform in Rachel's car and then Evan, Noah and I drove over to the fields for batting practice before his game.  Rachel went home for a bit.  Evan did well in batting practice.

As the game was about to start, it started to rain hard.  It did this on and off for most of the game.  In the bottom of the first, Evan came up to bat with two kids on.  At this point it was really pouring.  Each kid gets 6 pitches.  If you don't get a hit in 6 pitches, it's a technical strikeout.  Evan fouled the first 5 pitches off.  On the sixth pitch, he turned on it and put it into left field for double scoring the two kids.  Later in the game, Evan was playing third with a kid on first.  The batter rocketed a ball at Evan on the ground.  Evan scooped it so quickly and threw to second, I was slightly worried that there was no one covering second, but there was and the boy running from first was out.  It was such a nice play that the coach of the other team came on the field to high five Evan.  A few batters later there was a short pop up that Evan ran in and dove for.  Unfortunately, the ball hit before him and came up and hit him in the mouth.  He was crying.  He didn't want to come out of the game.  His coach high fived him and Evan crushed his coach's hand.  They knew that Evan was ok.  Evan's team ended up winning in the bottom of the fifth (the last inning).  The kids were really excited.  They've got a good bunch of kids on his team.  Evan likes his teammates.

Rachel had left a bit early to pick up Blue Bamboo for us on the way home.  When we got home, she had gotten food ready for Evan and Noah.  We had dinner and the put the boys to bed.  Amazingly, they had energy.  We didn't leave the baseball field until 7:20, almost 6 hours after we had left the house. Noah was with me the whole time and was amazingly well behaved.

Until next time...
 

Baseball Brothers

Hello everyone, this is Morry.

This morning, as normal, Evan ate breakfast while watching "Quick Hits" on the MLB channel.  Think SportsCenter but completely about baseball.  As we were leaving, Noah got up. He wanted to come with us but we were running a bit late - Evan was moving slowly.  We didn't have time to get Noah dressed and ready to get on the back of the bike.  He was very upset.

When I got home, he was still upset.  I ended up clearing a space for him at my desk and he ate his breakfast while I did some work sitting next to me.  That made him happy.

Noah had gymnastics yesterday.  His buddy Cole wouldn't go into the class until Noah got there.  They really are good for each other.

We stopped at Target on the way home to get a few things.

When we got home, Rachel made Noah lunch.  Then she picked Evan up from school.  Rachel called the hair cut place, Cool Cuts 4 Kids, and they said they could get them in right away.  She drove the boys over there.  Basically they lied.  It took so long that Rachel wasn't going to make it home in time with the boys for their respective baseball practices.  I thew their bat bags and waters in the car and met Rachel at Noah's practice.  I gave Evan's stuff to Rachel, as well as a chair to sit in.  Then Rachel took Evan to his practice.

The coach came over to tell me how well Noah did at his first practice.  He said he only had to tell Noah things one time and he would do them.  He liked how focused Noah was and how he hustled.  I was really excited to see him out there playing.  At this practice he did really well.  He seems to understand baseball and he tried to do the right thing.  He played second base quite a bit and I only had to tell him about covering the base one time and he did it every time after that.  At one point the shortstop got him the ball and Noah spun and threw to first as if he were trying for a double play.  It was great.

After practice, we drove over to Evan's practice.  As we walked up, we saw Evan playing second base.  A ball was hit into the outfield and Evan covered the bag.  A coach in the outfield threw the ball to Evan who made a nice catch.  I heard that coach turn the other coach and say "That Evan is a monster."

Both boys were super hyper after practice.  I think they both really enjoy playing baseball.  Both boys are excited to watch each other in their games this weekend.

We came home, had a late dinner.  While we got dinner ready, Evan did his homework.

The baseball brothers are in bed.  I think they are going to sleep pretty quickly tonight.

Until next time...

Gymnastics

Hello everyone, this is Morry.

This morning, Evan and I rode bikes to school.  On the way leaving the house, the two 5-year-old twins across the street, Christian and Connor, were getting into their mom's car to be driven to school.  When the saw Evan riding, they jumped out of the car and were yelling "Hi, Evan!" and waving to him.  Once we got to school and walked into the cafeteria, Mr. Valdes was there.  He told Evan that he had been trying to say hi to Evan all week.  Evan was very shy.

Noah woke up when I got home and he was in a very good mood.  He could not wait for gymnastics today.  They have two classes at The Little Gym for kids Noah's age - the sports class and gymnastics.  It's not true gymnastics.  It's not like they are training on the uneven bars or anything.  Noah chose gymnastics, in part because his friend Cole was in that class.  It seemed like Noah asked every hour when we'd be leaving.

We got to gymnastics a minute or two late.  As soon as Noah got there, I heard Cole yell "Hi, Noah!".  Later, the teacher, Mr. Jose, told us that every 2 seconds, Cole told him that Noah was going to be coming.  It just seemed like they were having so much fun in the class.

On the way home, we stopped at Wholly Bagel to get lunch for Rachel and me and then stopped at the bank to deposit some money and get ones, fives and quarters for the garage sale on Saturday.

Rachel picked Evan up from school.  He said he had a good day today.

For dinner, Rachel went to a dinner party for the Pink Ribbon Cowgirls.  I made the boys food while we watched the Cardinals/Nationals game.  If it were up to Evan and Noah, baseball would be on 24/7 in the house.  Last year, in the mornings before school we'd have on cartoons as Evan ate.  So far, we've had the MLB channel on watching highlights of the previous nights games.

I gave the boys showers and now they are in bed.  I like when the school year starts as both boys tend to go to sleep much more quickly.

Until next time...