Friday night FroYo (Alex's true sports calling)

About 2 weeks ago, I accidentally stumbled across One Direction's Story of my Life music video.  I am being completely serious when I say it was accidental, but I would like not to explain how it happened.  Anyway, at that time, it seemed to catch me off guard and I found myself kind of blurry eyed at the end.  It seems like a concept I could have come up with. (Freezing memories in time (photography)...it's beautiful.  *Vivek just threatened to punch me out...)

Then, last last Friday night, Alex and I had a mom (yes, we are pronouncing mom in full now...no more ba (ma))/son date night.  We ran some errands, ate at Chick-fil-a, and ended the night at frozen yogurt store (No idea what it's actually called).  It's our favorite place in the world and Alex rushes through the doors like he's storming though the paper signs held up for football players to run through on Friday night games.  Like a presidential candidate, he waves and smiles to all the patrons on his way back to grab a bowl.  As we were eating, the Olympics were being played on the TV and there was a commercial for P&G, marketing through their mom campaign.  This was a commercial for moms of children with disabilities and how they went on, despite missing arms and legs, to play sports in the paraolympics.  The line at the end was "the world's toughest moms raise the world's toughest kids" and had Alex not dismounted out of his spinning bar stool chair while trying to drink the rest of his ice cream bowl and losing his balance when his elbow, on the spinning table, spun the opposite way of his chair and fallen to the floor, I would have straight up cried at FroYo. (YOLO)

When little things like the above threaten to send me off into emotional episodes, I have to step back and examine my current life situation.
I concluded that I was exhausted.
It is only March, which on a teacher's timeline, is waaaay to early to feel this tired.  I am talking about feeling like mid-May tired at a time when there are still well over 12 weeks left that will build in stress the closer to 12 we get.

I needed to start thinking of positive things fast which is always my go to when I feel overwhelmed and helpless...in this case, unbalanced.
One of those good things, is that baseball season is about to begin...like super soon...March 31.  All will be right in one sector of the world, again.

Since I am "helping" with testing at my school and we lost both of our snow days on the calendar, I will not be taking a personal day until summer vacation.  I decided to take a long weekend so we could take Alex to spring training in AZ not during spring break when it's crazy crowded and more expensive.

Even if you're not into baseball, Arizona in the spring is where to be.  Every day is sunny and 70 degrees.  You can feel the strength of the sun as it is still sending cancer rays down on you, but the breezes are natural air conditioning and even me, who starts sweating 2 minutes into a work out, is sweat free at noon in the sun.

Alex loved it.  I think he loved concentrated attention from both mom and dad for 5 days in a row and probably would have done anything we wanted to do, but I like to think that he will still be my buddy at games even when he's a teenager and obviously cooler than me.


There were snow cones eaten.  Actually just one because I was thinking as I was eating the snow cone, "This is just sugar syrup over ice."  When it melted, I was drinking cold syrup.  I had to throw it away and was sad because this was the first time I thought of a snow cone this way.  Is this what getting older is about?
<insert sad emoji>

Alex is all about sitting at a game, but the trick is to keep him constantly fed and properly (un-properly with sugary lemonade) hydrated. 

Cub fan snow birds in front of us.  "Already in mid-season form," is something I overheard and have overheard by many old, Cub fans in multiple spring training games.

Since the games are at 1:00 PM every day, I was wondering how Alex would get naps or how horrible our lives would be if he didn't get naps.  We started out in the seats the first day and moved to the grass around 2:30 PM.  I thought I would just try to see if I could put Alex to sleep on the blanket, expecting zero success since it was loud and blindingly sunny.  Just like I used to pat his back when he first got here to put him to sleep (that's what they do in Korea...a firm patting on the back.  I guess it creates a lulling rhythm?), I tried it on the hill.  At first he was like, hell to the no...I know exactly what you're trying to do, woman.  But I got lucky.  He was so exhausted, he only put up a small fight and was out.  He slept almost 2 hours under the loud speaker in the sun with children running and screaming around him.  This seems like terrible foreshadowing for mornings before school. 

 

After that first day, he was asking to go to the grass ("gass...blanket...")  after the third inning.  I took that as, "I am tired, Mom, I need to sleep."  And that's how we got to stay every day for the whole game.

A slightly colder day.

I didn't really pimp out my son for autographs.  Trust me, I thought about it, but I think the sweet age for that is 4 or 5 when they can yell for themselves and still look cute.  He got a few baseballs from assistant coaches and field techs, but couldn't stand his ground among the other kids lined up to sign.  He also wrote on the baseballs himself.

We toured Chase Field where the Diamondbacks play.  They grow new grass every single year from sod!  Like most baseball tours we've been on, the old man giving the tour shuddered with contempt when he saw a child was going to be on the tour.  buddha did well though. 

I mostly like this picture because Alex has light coming out of his ears and top of his head.

It wasn't all baseball.  We thought of our kid some, too.  If you are a member of the Perot Museum or Dallas Zoo, that gets you major discounts at other states' museums and zoos.
We got half off admission at the Phoenix Zoo and got in for free at the Children's science museum!

This is the only reason V wanted to go to the zoo...so see the Fennec Fox.  He wants one real bad. 

Sums up the zoo trip.

The museum.  A cool motion detecting screen.

It was a great, relaxing trip and we didn't want to come back to reality...which in this case was 23 degrees and ice. 

"No, seriously pick any hat you want.  Just any of the many hats on this wall...ok, you want this one?  Are you sure?  Are you really sure?...not this one instead?...okay still this one."  Duck Dynasty for the win.