Swinging Bats!

I grew up with a certain love for baseball.  It was something I loved to do when we would visit Grandpa Jim.  After showing me his outside garden and updating me on the latest and greatest strawberries we would go out to the street and throw the ball.  It was a highlight of the visits to their home.  There were also the series with the A's and the Yankees that we watched and the little Budweiser handkerchief that Grandpa gave me that said "Beat the Yankees!" and had the A's logo in the middle of it.  Baseball on the TV was a regular occurrence. I also grew up hearing stories about pops hitting a home run at a game that went forever and then Grandpa Al getting up and hitting one even further.  Grandpa Al played semi pro ball in Alameda.  That is pretty fantastic.  I never played organized baseball.  It conflicted with soccer.  I always enjoyed playing the game and watching the game though.  I have not done a very good job at teaching my children about the game.  We don't have TV so we don't watch it and we have never tried to join a team or play a season.  I do play church softball and the kids have come to watch that.  Anyway, we have done a few things.  Tonight I just got a wild hair and took the boys to the school to hit some balls.  I thought it could be disastrous.  It was not.  I took the bucket of tennis balls I have for tennis with Natty.  We went through the bucket a few times.  Jack was up first and hit a few great shots.  Andy was next and he was swinging like a champ.  Hit one right back at me.  I took the hit and fell down in dramatic fashion.  The boys were laughing.  Andy came up to check on me and I sprung up and tickled him a bit.  It was a good time.  We need to go out and swing the bats more often and we definitely need to start working on throwing the ball.  That part was a bit disastrous.