Book, Line, & Sinker: Take Me Out to the Ball Game

Gavin loves ball. Any kind of ball. We took him to see the Rangers two times last year, and we have two sets of tickets for this season. Sunday afternoon, we headed to Arlington to watch the Rangers play the Royals.

We learned a lot. Primarily, don't sell it too much. Several times that morning we mentioned the schedule for the day: church, early lunch, early nap, baseball game. Poor Gavin was so excited, there wasn't much of a nap. He slept about 30 minutes the first put down. Then he started crying. When I went up to check on him, he was talking about baseball. As I rocked him to try to get him to go back to sleep, he was singing, "Take me out to the ballgame." Hmmmm. He was down for 10-15 minutes the second time. Same thing. Ball game. By the 3rd time, Dave brought him down stairs. We tried laying with him on our bed, knowing that a nap would make the game more fun. But, the boy couldn't wait for the fun to start.

We made it to our seats just after the first pitch was thrown. If we'd listened to Gavin, we would have seen the National Anthem and the first pitch. Oh well.

Even though, we got him his own seat, he spent much of the game in my lap. The plastic seats were really hot in the mid-90 degree temps.

For the first part of the game, he actually kept his sunglasses on.

We hadn't been in our seats long when Gavin announced, "I need popcorn." Who are we to deny the boy some popcorn? He put a hurtin' on the popcorn (with some help from Mama and Daddy). Seriously, he was mesmerized as he ate the popcorn and watched the game.

Dave bought some tickets down close so Gavin could really see the game. We were on row 19.

Gavin did sit in his seat for a while, but I don't think he could see.

About the 5th inning, he was getting antsy, so he and I went out for a fresh diaper and ice cream. By then the shade was covering our seats. So, he sat in his seat eating his $1 Blue Bell ice cream cone--that was the deal of the day. People around us were very complimentary of his behavior during the game.

After the ice cream, he discovered the bottom of our Diet Coke. (Or maybe it was before the ice cream from the looks of the shadows in the pictures.)

But more importantly, the ice.

We had to wait for our little singer to hear "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" during the 7th inning.

The Daddy-recliner was utilized, as well as the Mama-recliner.

We watched a little more, then left after the 7th inning because the boy was getting violent (aka tired).

I guess Gavin had had enough, when we started packing up and telling him that it was time to go, he started waving to the field saying, "Bye bye baseball game." And, he didn't pout when we left as he has been doing lately when he doesn't like something.