A few quick baseball pics

Shannon took my camera to Josh's baseball game on Saturday. I can't take pictures very well while I'm trying to coach so she was nice enough to take them for me. She even used my camera instead of her own (which she likes much better) because I don't like waiting for her to get her film developed (she's still boycotting the digital age).

Here are a few of the pics that I liked best:













Note: There will be a super colossal gigantic enormous stupidly big picture post here as soon as Shannon's film actually gets developed. Be ye warned.

I'm Dreaming of a White Easter

Josh and Maggie just got back from going to the beach with their grandparents to quite a surprise. Although we didn't get snow for Christmas, it appears a "White Easter" isn't out of the question. It's colder right now in April than it was all December, and as you can see in the photos below, we got some snow yesterday for Good Friday.

Also, I realized something this week while I only had Caleb to care for. While it seemed like life got a little more complicated with each birth, I think that was just because we had a new baby to deal with. When they get bigger, having only one is a whole lot more difficult. Shannon and I were all that Caleb had, so I became his new best friend. That was cool for a while, but there was no let up. Whenever he was bored, hungry, or needed anything, he came to me. No matter what I was doing I had to deal with his request or the consequences of not dealing with it. There was none of that "go ask your brother to help you" stuff that I'm used to being able to do. There was no sub-letting of my parental responsibilities to a sibling all week. I'm exhausted! Well, without further ado, I present you with our wonderful Easter(ish) snow:

Requiem for a season

I would apologize for the amount of time that has passed since I last posted, but that has become something of a distressing habit. These last two weeks have been especially busy, as we have been at the crossroads of basketball and baseball seasons. As I mentioned earlier, I was asked to help coach Josh's basketball team. Much to my surprise, however, I have also been enlisted to help coach Josh's baseball team. It is becoming very clear to me that if you want to be involved in youth sports, as well as anything involving youth, you pretty much just need to be willing to show up. Anyway, basketball season officially ended yesterday, and I would say that it was a very successful season, as measured by two things.

First, our team, while not particularly good, made as much improvement from the first game of the season to the last one as any team in any sport I have ever seen. Not only did we become competitive, but we actually dominated a couple of teams the same way that we were dominated in our first game. We rebounded well, we defended enthusiastically, and we had a couple of players turn into fairly reliable scoring options, especially in the lane. We worked on getting the ball inside, and like most teams that do this, when the ball did go inside consistently, good things happened.

The second, and far more important reason that the season was a success is that the kids had a lot of fun. This was most evident at the party after our last game. The seemed to really enjoy each other's company, and were all excited about coming back and playing basketball at some level next season (not all of them will be at the same age level next year).

My overall evaluation of my experience helping to coach this team is that I never knew coaching could be so much fun or so rewarding. I enjoyed playing sports when I was younger. The baseball and basketball teams that I played on were the cornerstones of my daily life when I played, occupying a majority of my energy and attention, even if I was never a particularly good athlete. This was only rivaled, and then ultimately overtaken by my devotion to guitar. Coaching has provided for me the same kind of joy that playing did, but without as much insecurity and anxiety.

Basketball season is over, but baseball has begun. I am typing now using an arm that is as sore as it has been since I gave up baseball twelve years ago, because I spent most of this week throwing batting practice. I think this is going to be a lot of fun.

Brief update - More to come

I know it's been a while. I'm sorry. I have been shirking my duties as purveyor of Baker Monkey knowledge. I'm sorry. I've been very busy and just haven't made the time to update in a while. If it makes you feel better I've been neglecting my music site as well.

Maggie went to UK's last home gymnastics meet yesterday. Princess Pinky wrote all about it in this post, complete with a picture of my girl with two of her favorite gymnasts. From what I hear Maggie is really coming out of her shell and actually talked with these girls at length about gymnastics without the usual fidgeting and hiding. I wish I could have been there to see it.

Josh turns seven today. We're having a family party today and then a friends party tomorrow at Kids' Place. I'll do a whole new post on that soon, complete with pictures and everything. Josh's basketball team (which I have been helping coach) is doing very well. They're learning a lot and improving with each practice and game. It's been a lot of fun for me to watch these kids develop.

Caleb has been helping me coach. I think it's mostly because he's been very needy lately, particularly wanting to be around whoever is least available at the time. If his mother is cooking dinner or cleaning the kitchen, or even updating her blog with way more regularity than I have been, then he wants her. If I'm across the gym trying to teach nine other kids how to rebound, then he wants me. That said, he's having fun being around the bigger kids. Plus he got to dunk on Wednesday (with some help), so he's having a lot of fun.

Like I said, I'm sorry I've been neglecting you. I'd make some sort of empty promise to do better in the future, but I'm not sure that either of us would believe it.

Well, I will promise something. I'll post about Josh's birthday parties soon.

Tom

So, what's new in the land of the Baker Monkeys?

I know it's been a little while since I've provided any updates here. That should not in any way indicate a lack of activity here at Baker Monkey central. Quite the opposite, actually. We have been extremely busy.

Josh is a basketball player now. If it seems to you like early February is a little late to be starting basketball, you are absolutely correct. While I have always striven to be a very loving and involved parent, I have never been considered to be an organized and "together" one. A few months ago I totally flaked out on getting Josh signed up on time for the basketball league he was going to be playing in. Fortunately the local Y has a second basketball session for the children of parents like me.

While that is a very good thing, they also appear to have coached that are even flakier than me. You don't believe that's possible? Josh's entire coaching staff quit just before the first practice! We went to the gym where the practice was supposed to be. We arrived early (in our sporting experience thus far "on time" is "late") and waited. And waited...

Fifteen minutes and about five phone calls later (to make sure we were in the right place at the right time) a coach for Josh's team arrived. He explained that he had just found out that he was needed to coach the team because the other coaches had decided not to coach this season after all. He is a soccer coach with the Y and has never coached basketball before, and could therefor really use some help.

To make a long story short, I am now a basketball coach.

This could be very interesting.

In other Baker Monkey news:

There's actual snow on the ground. The Monkeys got to go skiing today, and will also be doing a fair amount of snow playing over the weekend. Last weekend we went to Adam's (the Baker Monkeys' cousin) and had a marvelous time. Caleb received an awe-inspiring black eye to go along with his scar and missing tooth. Pictures of all of these events and more will be posted as soon as I have both the time and the inclination.

Morning conversation about MLK

The other day, as he was getting ready for school and I was getting ready for work, Josh stopped for a second and said, "I don't have to go to school on Monday because it's Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Birthday."

I told him that I don't have to go to work, either. He was very excited about this initially, however a look of concern quickly fell over him. Josh explained that Dr. King would not be getting older on his birthday. "Do you know why?" he asked. "It's because somebody shot him."

I asked Josh if he knew why Martin Luther King, Jr. had been shot. He said that he did. He explained to me that Dr. King had been shot "because somebody did not like what he was doing." Josh even explained to me the details of the shooting, including that the gun was "a big one, a rifle" and that there were three people with Dr. King as he was shot who then pointed out to the police where the shot had come from.

Getting away from the gory details and back to the part that I felt was important, I asked Josh what it was that Martin Luther King, Jr. had been doing that someone would dislike so much that they would shot him. Josh replied, "I don't know that part."

I could get off on some kind of a rant here about the emphasis in our society on the details of violence or some kind of failure in school to teach the subject matter such that children like my son could understand, but important matters such as social justice and racial equality should probably be dealt with by parents at home. So ant rant that I might go off on would probably be self-incriminating, so I'll avoid that. Let's just say that Josh and I had a good conversation after that, and I do not believe that he will answer with "I don't know that part", again.

The OJ Mayo Traveling Circus

My dad, Josh's "Pops", took us to see OJ Mayo (widely regarded as the best high school basketball player in the US), potential UK recruit Patrick Patterson, and their team from Huntington play Lexington Catholic in Memorial Collisium this afternoon.

Josh gets out of the rain as we buy tickets.

The scoreboard. Doesn't it look familiar?

Josh and Pops find their seats.

Lexington Catholic warms up.

OJ Mayo dunking in warmups.

The officials get their photo op with the star.

Tip off.

Potential UK recruit Patrick Patterson shooting free throws.

Look familiar? This is where we were yesterday for gymnastics.