Take Me Out to the Ballgame

I waited 22 months and almost a week for this day.

There was a lot of preparation that went into such a glorious event, with plenty of practice (we’ve been practicing nearly every day the last week or two). He’d been wearing his hat a whole lot the last month or so and was primed for the event. Saturday night we watched the end of the Twins/Brewers game while we ate dinner and Isaac got very, VERY excited when Trevor Plouffe hit a home run to give the Twins their winning run.

Then Sunday morning came and it was time. Isaac’s first baseball game was upon us!!!

Isaac woke up a little before 7 and we knew it was going to be a long day so we skipped Sunday School and just went to church at 11:15. Unfortunately we had to leave church early to get to the game in time, but we got there in time to see the 2nd batter. Let me tell you, with the price of parking near the stadium, I was really, really happy that I babywear and Isaac loves it.

We got to our seats and Isaac was mesmerized as he looked out at a real baseball field and the players. It was like a fantasy coming to life, it was really cute to watch.

But we didn’t go to the game alone. Isaac was thrilled when we got there and he got to see Uncle Roger and his cousins waiting for us. The amount that this kid looks up to them and adores them is really cute. He asks for Barrett nearly every day and grins ear to ear when he sees him.

The excitement of seeing his first base was too much for Isaac to handle quietly, which led to this FANTASTIC display of talking to the players. I’m not sure if the guy who yelled at the end of the video is making fun of Isaac or anything, but if he was it was a pretty pathetic move.

At the end of the first inning Roger went to get food and grabbed Isaac a footlong hotdog (the kid loves them). While that might seem excessive, it was not. He packed away a good portion of it (80%-ish), a ton of puffs, several french fries, a full sheet of a graham cracker, two handfuls of yogurt melts and several bites of the bun.

Now comes the absolute awesome part. Isaac sat and watched the first 3 innings, ran around the concourse for the 4th inning and then came back and watched the 5th-9th. We watched 8 innings of baseball together! He even got to see two home runs, which he loved. He preferred when David Murphy of the Rangers hit his home run because when the Astros hit their homer in the 9th inning they shot off the cannon which eventually led to him crying for 15-20 seconds. David Murphy’s homer, however, caused him to grin ear to ear and yell when I told him “HOME RUN!!!” The one thing he did like about the Astros homer was the train that they run after that is loaded down with fake oranges (Minute Maid, get it?). He talked about it all the way back to the car.

The Astros lost (no big surprise), but it really didn’t matter since Isaac can’t really follow the game. And I didn’t get to keep score on a scorecard since I had to make sure Isaac didn’t do anything crazy, but it was a FANTASTIC first baseball game. It was a good start to our baseball watching experience, which will number many, many games in my life. A perfect bonding experience. What special things do you do with your kid(s)?