Astros vs. Braves

Saturday marked the beginning of an era in the life of our Fairhope Family, an era that will last quite a while and could at some point even turn into a career. It was Jayden's first baseball game. He is a natural in every sense of the word. He's on his toes and ready for each hit, he's the best thrower/catcher on his team, he can crush the ball off the tee...he's just great!

There's a 4 run-rule for each batting team in each inning. The Braves led off and scored their 4 runs. We had two outs, but they scored their 4th run right when Jayden got the second out. Then we went out and got 3 runs before getting 3 outs. However, the second inning we held them scoreless!! Jayden played pitcher the whole game and after his first throw to first base wasn't caught, he took matters into his own hands and ran to tag first base after he fielded the ball. He got people out -- sometimes just barely -- but he needs to be sure to throw it over to first base when he's too far away. We worked on that yesterday afternoon and now he knows to call the first baseman's name if he's not looking.

One funny thing. The coaches told Jayden to run touch home plate if someone was on third base. So the ball comes to Jayden, he sees the kid on first base running home, so he runs up there to touch the base. He gets there practically at the same time as the other player, whose coach yells for him to stop and go back to third. Jayden touches home plate and starts to run back to the mound, so the other coach tells his player to keep going. Everyone's going nuts yelling at Jayden to touch the player, but he never hears us and just trots himself back to the pitching circle so the ball will be dead. Everyone's still yelling, "Touch HIM!! Touch the RUNNER!!" but it was too late. After all that our coach went over real quick and reminded Jayden to touch the runners too, just in case. Even though it was funny, hopefully it won't happen again!!

We ended up losing 13 - 10 (unlike when I was younger, they not only keep score in t-ball but they also have t-ball all-stars!), but Jayden played his absolute best. We have our second game tomorrow night and our third on Wednesday, the we're off until the 25th. The league didn't schedule any games next week since schools are out for Spring Break.

Here are some pictures from the day and the game!

Pictures!!

Go Astros!!

...t-ball Astros that is.

Jayden's t-ball team has been practicing for about 3 weeks now. This past Wednesday they had their first scrimmage against the Pirates. That was their first time to practice on the field due to rain outs on the other practice days. Jayden got to play short stop and got to bat twice. I don't think any balls came his way, but he was ready every time anyway and he hit really well, scoring both times. Jayden is definitely the best thrower on his team and is the second best catcher. His coach always uses him for examples because he's always there listening and already knows how to throw with proper form (thanks to Jeff and G'pa Mike) so he's the perfect modeler.

This is the first season that our coach has coached a team, but the team we scrimmaged against looked like seasoned professionals. I heard one of the moms saying that the coach has 8 kids and his two oldest were out there helping him coach. They both had HS letter jackets on, and I'm sure this dad had been through the t-ball thing a time or two and coached a time or two. Our coach must have taken a few pointers from that team because he made some moves for some of the positions. Jayden and another boy named Victor traded out being pitcher and first base, because that's where all the action happens. The pitcher's job is to stand at the front of the pitching circle and wait for the ball to be hit to them. Then they get it and chase down the runner to tag them out. Since Jayden's so fast, he's perfect for this. If the ball is to the third base side, he gets it and throws it to Victor at first base and get them out that way.

They're all cute when they're playing. There's one little girl on the team and all the helmets are wayyyy too big for her, so she holds on to the front face part so it won't falls backwards on her head! All her stuff has pink on it, and it's sooo adorable.

The only piece of our uniform we're missing is the hat and those will be ready on Monday. We have a "real" scrimmage on Wednesday. We have pictures on Thursday. We have Opening Day on Saturday with our first game that afternoon. We're so excited to get the season underway!!