Summer means baseball!
Here it is the last day of June, and summer is definitely in full swing in Wisconsin. We have heat warnings again today into tomorrow, and the humidity is finally noticeable, as the locals assured us it would be. For our family, summer always means baseball! We spend the most time at the little league field, with some minor and major league baseball filling out our time spent enjoying America's pastime.
As part of our settling into Wisconsin and finding new friends, we signed John up for little league baseball with the Neenah Baseball league. It was confusing as a new resident to figure out what was what - there are two leagues in Neenah, the other being Suburban, so I sent a couple of emails, asked a few questions at work, and figured making a decision was better than not. Neenah Baseball it was!
Unlike in Arkansas, this league had tryouts, and it had been a while since John had hit a ball. To help give him a little bit of confidence, we hit a batting cage one cold Sunday morning so he could get a feel for the bat in his hand again.
It got pretty crowded pretty quick, and we started thinking about other alternatives. The gym we joined for tennis happened to have an area that could be converted into a batting cage, so we headed over to Valley Athletics to take advantage of their space. You know you're a baseball mom when you find yourself pitching b.p. for your 10 year old son...
Before there was even a whiff of summer in the air, we joined the other boys in John's age group at the Neenah High School gym to go through the paces of the different baseball skills. He fielded, ran, pitched and hit for the coaches. I felt like he did pretty well, and we found out later that he had one of the top scores in the group, which was nice to see.
After an unusually late snow and cold weather delayed the start of the season, it was finally time to get going! I had managed to talk Justin into coaching John's team, as the league was short on coaches and they couldn't hold the draft until they had enough volunteers. My two guys are baseball best buds ever this season.
The first few games were actually a little bit rough; the quality of play is a step change from last year in Fayetteville, as John decided to play up an age group to be with the other kids in his grade. On top of that, Neenah has both rec and tournament team kids in the summer league, so there are a few boys on each team who play at a higher level and much more frequently than John has. The pitching is faster; the fielding is better; there are very few infield hits at this level. It's more fun to watch, but until John got into his groove, he struggled with no longer being the best player on the team.
Now that we're over halfway through the season, I can see a big improvement in John's play. He's worked on the fundamentals at the plate and in the field, and while he doesn't quite have enough velocity on the ball to be on the mound every game, his mechanics there have improved, too. I'm excited to see what the rest of the season holds, and then to see how tryouts for tournament ball go at the end of the season!
With little league ball being our twice a week time at the field, we also made it down to Milwaukee for our first Brewers game! Miller Park is a beautiful stadium, and we had a terrific time taking in a major league game only 90 minutes from home.
This is the closest we've lived to a major league park since we were in Cincinnati, and we definitely plan to go back! Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll schedule the Astros to come up for interleague play in the 2019 season. Until then, we'll just wear our Astros gear (and Yankees, he can't help himself LOL) while we yell for the Brew Crew and sing "Roll Out the Barrel" during th e7th inning stretch!
We rounded out the local stadium tour last night with our first minor league game in Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Timber Rattlers are the Single A affiliate for the Brewers, and are right up the road in Appleton. We loved going to Naturals games in Arkansas, so this was right up our alley! It was a warm but very pleasant summer night, and it was a great time for the whole family. Justin and I hung out in our bleacher seats most of the time while the kids ran over to the grass seating area and threw a baseball together and with some of the other kids at the game.
We had chosen last night to go because of the giveaway - it was Harry Potter night and there were 1,000 pair of HP socks up for grabs! Unfortunately we didn't make it in time, but it was fun to see lots of fans there with their wizarding shirts on, just like me. Minor league baseball never disappoints when it comes to crowd entertainment and gimmicks. They had silly contests between the innings with plenty of crowd involvement and enthusiasm. The absolute best, though, was the World Famous BRATZOOKA!! This one takes the cake - they were shooting real bratwursts out of the air cannon!
Totally hilarious, and only in Wisconsin!!
While the live baseball has been a ton of fun so far this season, I have kept my eye and my ear on my beloved Astros, too. My SiriusXM subscription is worth every penny to follow their incredible play this season. I just bought plane tickets for us to visit Houston in August, and they're home the weekend we'll be there! Fingers crossed, we'll be able to catch another game at Minute Maid Park this year where instead of the polka, we can all clap our hands during the 7th inning stretch as we sing my an ode to my home state, "Deep in the Heart of Texas"!
As part of our settling into Wisconsin and finding new friends, we signed John up for little league baseball with the Neenah Baseball league. It was confusing as a new resident to figure out what was what - there are two leagues in Neenah, the other being Suburban, so I sent a couple of emails, asked a few questions at work, and figured making a decision was better than not. Neenah Baseball it was!
Unlike in Arkansas, this league had tryouts, and it had been a while since John had hit a ball. To help give him a little bit of confidence, we hit a batting cage one cold Sunday morning so he could get a feel for the bat in his hand again.
After an unusually late snow and cold weather delayed the start of the season, it was finally time to get going! I had managed to talk Justin into coaching John's team, as the league was short on coaches and they couldn't hold the draft until they had enough volunteers. My two guys are baseball best buds ever this season.
The first few games were actually a little bit rough; the quality of play is a step change from last year in Fayetteville, as John decided to play up an age group to be with the other kids in his grade. On top of that, Neenah has both rec and tournament team kids in the summer league, so there are a few boys on each team who play at a higher level and much more frequently than John has. The pitching is faster; the fielding is better; there are very few infield hits at this level. It's more fun to watch, but until John got into his groove, he struggled with no longer being the best player on the team.
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| eye on the ball |
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| behind the plate |
Now that we're over halfway through the season, I can see a big improvement in John's play. He's worked on the fundamentals at the plate and in the field, and while he doesn't quite have enough velocity on the ball to be on the mound every game, his mechanics there have improved, too. I'm excited to see what the rest of the season holds, and then to see how tryouts for tournament ball go at the end of the season!
With little league ball being our twice a week time at the field, we also made it down to Milwaukee for our first Brewers game! Miller Park is a beautiful stadium, and we had a terrific time taking in a major league game only 90 minutes from home.
We rounded out the local stadium tour last night with our first minor league game in Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Timber Rattlers are the Single A affiliate for the Brewers, and are right up the road in Appleton. We loved going to Naturals games in Arkansas, so this was right up our alley! It was a warm but very pleasant summer night, and it was a great time for the whole family. Justin and I hung out in our bleacher seats most of the time while the kids ran over to the grass seating area and threw a baseball together and with some of the other kids at the game.
We had chosen last night to go because of the giveaway - it was Harry Potter night and there were 1,000 pair of HP socks up for grabs! Unfortunately we didn't make it in time, but it was fun to see lots of fans there with their wizarding shirts on, just like me. Minor league baseball never disappoints when it comes to crowd entertainment and gimmicks. They had silly contests between the innings with plenty of crowd involvement and enthusiasm. The absolute best, though, was the World Famous BRATZOOKA!! This one takes the cake - they were shooting real bratwursts out of the air cannon!
While the live baseball has been a ton of fun so far this season, I have kept my eye and my ear on my beloved Astros, too. My SiriusXM subscription is worth every penny to follow their incredible play this season. I just bought plane tickets for us to visit Houston in August, and they're home the weekend we'll be there! Fingers crossed, we'll be able to catch another game at Minute Maid Park this year where instead of the polka, we can all clap our hands during the 7th inning stretch as we sing my an ode to my home state, "Deep in the Heart of Texas"!
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