Happy Birthday and Opening Day! (week 271)

What a week! Two of my favorite things happened within just days of one another: my 5th Birthday and Opening Day for East Long Beach Shetland Division Baseball! We had a small party with just our immediate family on Wednesday. Grandma Dubby was still in town, so she got to join us in the festivities: homemade macaroni and cheese, and vanilla cake with vanilla frosting. Mommy made a bowling lane on top of the cake out of cinnamon cereal and real bowling-pin candles. My two favorite presents were a new Razor scooter (silver and blue) from Grandma Dubby and Tiger Woods Golf for my Wii. I also got a new helicopter from my friend Anna in Virginia...all-in-all a great haul.

In Christopher news, he has been spending a lot of time with Mommy learning his flash cards. Just two months ago, he couldn't really say much of anything exception "hot" and "gilk". Now, at at 27 months, he is ripping-off all the flash card favorites: corn, baby, toast, tractor, mirror, and the rest. He can even pick-up the cards when you ask him to identify them. A lot of progress in a very short time, and lot's of combinations and sentences beginning to emerge. It cracks me up when he makes a statement out of the blue about the nature of things.

This weekend also marked the beginning of a new baseball season--the second of which Nate and I will play on the same team just up the street at Heartwell Park. This year, we are on the Rays 6-year-old division and have dark blue socks, dark blue jerseys, and dark blue belts on top of white pants. I haven't been playing much baseball over the past few months so I Daddy and I are starting to catch and throw a lot in the backyard. With two practices a weeknight and two games a week (including weeknights) next week...it is going to be an awesome season playing under the lights at Heartwell Park.

At Opening Day, we joined about 800 other players up to the 12 year old divisions and paraded around the field. Mostly, it was a lot of standing around so we chased each other and got our new white pants dirty on the wet grass. It was hardest on Christopher and Maddie because they had to stand around for about two hours and wait. This is a stretch for two active two years olds, but luckily they love each other and have much to talk about. After Opening Day, we went over to El Dorado Regional Park and posed in pictures at the picnic table, on scooters and bikes, and playing catch in our uniforms for the Parks, Recreation and Marine activity guide. They said that they needed some stock photos of kids and parents enjoying the park.

Our big Angels and Dodgers baseball birthday party is all set for Sunday afternoon in Wardlow Park. Daddy made sure to get all the appropriate permits from the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department to have a full baseball and bouncehouse party at Wardlow Park. Nathan has invited all the Dodgers fans and I invited all the Angels fans. Mommy and Cheryl bought lots of hotdogs, and Nathan's grandparents are bringing the popcorn and hotdog cooking machines. It should be a big fun mess with the Opening Day for the real Dodgers and Angels coming-up in just a week (Monday, March 5tth). Daddy says that with the additions of Albert Pujols and C.J. Wilson, the Angels are finally a real contender to win the World Series. Likely, he is just setting himself for more heartache...but it is the best shot that we have had in years.