Rain, rain go away

The rain has just kept on coming since Friday night. Both boys had a baseball tournament this past weekend at Baseball USA. We were very excited about it. I was happy because Tanner's two pool games were Friday night and Mason's two pool games were Saturday afternoon. This would work out great because I could see both boys games. Sunday might have been tricky, but at least the games were in the same park.

I got home from school on Friday, loaded Tanner up in the car and we went to the ball park. It looked a little cloudy, but the weatherman said only a 20% chance of rain all weekend. During the game it started lightening. The moms in the stands were all getting a little nervous sending our babies into a big field with a metal bat. We wanted the lightening to go away because our boys were playing great. I don't think they could do anything wrong and were winning 7-0 in the top of the fourth. The umpire finally cleared the field and we waited around for the rain to stop. They finally had to call the games for the evening and told us to check the website to see when our games would be rescheduled. Lucky us, they scheduled us for our make up game at 8:30 in the morning. So much for sleeping in on Saturday. Tanner and I got up and got there at 7:30 to find out they had cancelled all the games for the day. Bummer!!

The changed the tournament to single elimination games played on Sunday. Mason's game was at 9:00. Mason was the first batter and hit the ball just inches from going over for a homerun. After that he got thrown out stealing from 2nd to third. They were playing on a softball field and running was like running in quicksand. The rest of the game was not pretty. The boys just looked flat. We ended up losing 13-4. The umpires were a little different. They called in field fly, which hasn't been called in a tournament we have played in yet. The pitcher hit one of our boys with a pitch and he didn't let him take his base because he said he didn't try to move out of the way. I hadn't heard that rule either. We probably still would have lost, but it is discouraging.

Tanner's game was at 10:50 and they ended up losing by 1. The boys did not play terrible, but did not look like they had on Friday night. Tanner did make a great catch at home and tagged the runner out.

It rained again on Sunday night. Then yesterday it started raining in the afternoon and I don't think it stopped until this morning. School was cancelled due to the flooding. It had to be bad for the schools to cancel, because today was one fo the big state TAKS test. The picture is the bayou behind our house. It usually just has a little stream of water in it. It was full this morning. I hope this rain stops soon.

Snakes

Tonight Mason was walking into the house from the front door he yelled, "Oh my God, a snake skin is in the house." Brad ran over there and looked and confirmed what Mason saw. They kept asking me to come and see, but I was too scared to get off the couch. Brad kept saying how big it was and asking where the snake that shed it was. He kept saying it must be in the house. I kept telling them I didn't believe them, but Mason really looked freaked out. I slowly made my way to the entry way and sure enough it was a snake skin about 2 feet long. I was thinking we were going to have to move, because I can not be in the same house as a huge snake. To be honest I can't be in a house with a baby snake either. I hate snakes!! Finally, Brad started laughing and said he found it by the bayou on his bike ride and brought it home to scare us. He is so nice. Then because we are so nice too, we decided to play a joke on Tanner. We put it by the front door and waited for him to see it. He didn't freak out like we did.

Determination

There are times when you can see the wheels turning in your children's brains when they are learning new things. Last weekend after Tanner had played his two baseball games we went to watch Mason's two games. One of the kids at the park had brought a rip stick. Tanner decided he wanted to learn how to ride it. He spent most of the first game trying over and over to ride it. He kept falling off. I kept seeing broken bones, but luckily he wasn't hurt. He spent the second game riding that thing like a pro. He kept asking and asking for his own rip stick. I decided to get him one for Easter. We got it yesterday while we were in San Antonio.

Mason decided he wanted to learn how to ride it. We went to our hotel and Mason spent about an hour trying to learn to ride. He got very frustrated and even started crying, because he couldn't do it. Today at Nana's house he kept trying and could finally stay for a few seconds at a time. When we got home tonight he spent about three hours riding it around the block. He has mastered the rip stick. I hope they put that much effort and determination into everything they want to learn to do.

Baseball, baseball, and more baseball......

We had a total of 9 baseball games this weekend. Tanner played in LaPorte both Saturday and Sunday. Tanner's team played really well. We got 6th out of 15 in the tournament. The most amazing play happened. The 6th inning came around. We were down 5 runs. We ended up tied. The other team was home, so they got to bat last. We had 2 outs and they had runners on 1st and 2nd. The batter hit the ball into the outfield. The runner was rounding third towards home and the ball was thrown to Tanner, who was playing catcher. He caught the ball right when the kid was at home. Tanner blocked the plate and tagged the guy. Tanner was bent down and the kid flipped over Tanner's back. They both fell down in a jumbled up mess of legs and arms. When the dust settled, Tanner still had the ball in his glove. He got the last out to keep them from winning the game. This made us go into extra innings. We ended up losing in the end, but Tanner got the game ball, for being so tough.





Mason played in Katy all weekend. Tanner played at 9:30 and 12:30 on Saturday. Mason played at 4 and 6. Mason's team killed the two teams they played. Winning by 10 or more points. Sunday I had to miss the first two games, because I was in LaPorte with Tanner. I heard they didn't play really well. But they ended up winning. This put them in the championship game. We were winning the majority of the game. In the end we lost by one. The kid made some really stupid mistakes in the last inning. I think they thought they had already won. We still came in 2nd place. We get a little break for the next two weeks. And then it begins again.