Oh Take Me Out to My First Ball Game...

please Tom, before we leave NY. Now this wasn't my first baseball game, I mean I did watch the Salt Lake Trappers a few times, and my little brothers t-ball games, but it was my first major league game, not to mention my first NY Yankees game.

I woke up yesterday morning to the heavy sound of thunder and rain. The last thing I wanted to do was sit through a rainy game or have it rained out after I made the effort to get up there, arrange a babysitter, and take care of everything else that goes into leaving your child for the night. My day wasn't exactly spent looking forward to the evening that I had dreamed of....eating cracker jacks, hot dogs, sitting with crazy fans. I spent most of it running from here to there with a higher than normal amount of anxiety, even including my subway ride up to 161st street stop, Yankee Stadium, fearing I would be the reason we were too late to receive a free hat. But, there is something to be said about the energy of Yankees fans, as I  stepped off the train surrounded by a sea of navy blue and white baseball hats and t shirts, the excitement began to set in. We walked through the turnstile and handed the men our tickets, I could already hear the crowd cheering as the stadium blasted the Imperial March from Star Wars, I knew this night would fulfill my expectations, and we did get our hats!

Yankee stadium filled up quickly with its die hard crazed fans. I at some points felt a little out of place, not screaming my lungs out every time we struck out or missed a fly ball. We did have our share of ball park dogs and cracker jacks, and by the end of the 7th inning, when we came back 4 to 1, we fit right in.

I admit, I had heard of A-Rod and Derek Jeter before, mainly in overhearing my old employees conversations or looking over subway riders shoulders at their newspapers, but watching them play gave me a love for them that I didn't think was possible, at least for me. I am now a Yankees fan,I might even join in on a Yankees conversation, or buy my son a Yankees t-shirt, heck I might even follow them for the rest of the season

Fun With Photo Booth

Ahhh....the beauty of the Mac

Luke and his antics

I recently thought about how happy I am that I have been documenting our lives as of lately. I admit I blog partly for other peoples enjoyment, but mostly to help me remember. I plan on printing all of my posts so I have some sort of journal at the end of the year. So I admit, this post is for me, to help me remember, because the really do grow so fast. If you do choose to read however, you just might get a laugh out of it.

A few weeks ago some friends had some renovation work done on their bathroom so they came over every day to use our shower. One morning, Tom and I were getting ready in the bathroom and Luke was playing in the tub, as he usually does, with no water in it. We looked down and saw that he was chewing something and holding a big bar of soap in his right hand with a good size bite taken out of one of the corners. I immediately said to Tom " I guess I won't be using soap as punishment", I asked Luke to spit out the soap into my hand, and he reluctantly did. Not even 20 seconds later he crinkled his nose and eyes and yelled "blaaaaaaah". He did not appreciate us laughing at him and began getting upset. But over the course of the next minute he continued with the "blah's" until I guess he got the taste out of his mouth.It might just work after all.

Luke also got a hold of their razor that we didn't realize fell into the tub. Again while Luke was sitting in the tub, Tom looked down and he had the razor to his head imitating what he had seen Tom do. He shaved a big chunk of hair right on the side of the new haircut I gave him. Tom was reluctant to tell me worrying I might be mad that he ruined his new "do" but all I could do was laugh. I secretly love it when kids give themselves haircuts, its too cute.

Lately Luke has been great about taking his naps. I usually say "Luke time for your nap", and he goes and finds his binky, finds his silky, and tries to climb in bed. The other night, I said, "Luke time for bed", & I guess he wasn't ready and took off running down our hall. He stopped at the garbage can, lifted the lid,  stuck his head inside, and closed it on top of his head.

This weekend we went with a bunch of friends to the Red Hook pool and after ate Mexican food at the soccer fields. Luke as always tries to keep up with the big kids, usually doing something funny to make them laugh. Tom gave Luke his hat and as you can see in the picture, Luke put it right over his face and ran around the kids until he fell. They laughed and laughed so of course Luke put it right back on his face and ran around and around again. Luke entertained the kids until they lost interest, then moved onto the spectators, making them laugh equally as hard.

Luke has also really enjoyed playing with my ipod. He usually dances and sings when he puts it on. It is hard to tell sometimes though what he is listening too even when he hums the tune.

I heart NY parks

Some say nothing is free anymore, but if you look hard enough, you will find....

NY parks are fortunately, all over the city, and all offer free activities or facilities to be taken advantage of during the summer. Here are some of Brooklyn's finest that I often take advantage of.

Park # 1: Red Hook Pool

The Red Hook pool has helped ease the pain of the scorching sun coupled with the thick heavy air that I happily breathe and soak up all summer long. Some of the beauties of the Red Hook pool include but are not limited to; the strict rules (only flip flops, water bottles, towels, and sunscreen allowed on the deck, obviously keeping it very clean), the big pool and kiddie pool are both Olympic sized, free lunches are given to every child after they swim, and every Saturday, food stands line the sidewalks  offering what I have found to be the "best Mexican food" in the city. My only gripe with the pool is with those strict rules, comes the no camera rule, hence no current pictures.

I was however able to find this picture of the pool during the 30's. This pic might give you a better idea of the actual size of the pool, although the occupants  differ in their size and diversity.

Park # 2: Brooklyn Bridge Park

For a year now I have been hearing talk of the "floating pool". The Brooklyn Bridge Park, also home to "movies in the park", (side note, every Thursday this park shows free movies on the water front, next week "Muppets Take Manhattan"), just opened a free pool on a floating barge. Sounds too good to be true right?  well unfortunately it was.

Katie, her girls, Luke and I, all gave it a shot last Monday. We were supposed to meet some friends there but just barely missed the cut off time for the first session. We luckily were able to pass the hour and a half time frame by playing in the hot sand and baking under the heat of the sun. For Katie's account click here. It pretty much sums up my feelings as well. But on a positive note, I will post some pictures that give you the an idea of how much fun it could have been if you minus the hour and a half wait, the over priced umbrellas and water, the 30 minutes we were able to swim because someone puked in the water, and that fact I couldn't pry Luke away from the pool ladder without him throwing a tantrum.

:Perception:

:Reality:

:Boarding:

:Luke enjoying the few minutes of pool time he got in:

:After they evacuated everyone, so sad:

Park # 3: Prospect Park

My favorite of the free parks is Prospect Park. I take advantage of this park approximately 4-5 times a week. As I have mentioned before it has a great running loop that sometimes makes you forget that just outside it lies thick smog, loud horns, and lots of people. Every year the New York Philharmonic travels each of the major NY parks and puts on a concert. This year, I organized an Enrichment group to meet there for food and music. I was especially delighted to find that the second number on the program was the Mendelssohn Concerto. The Mendelssohn is my favorite concerto, I learned it in high school and then in college perfected it. The solo artist played it beautifully, much more so than I would have, especially being that I have the worst case of nervous bow arm ( actually,I just made that  term up, but really, I can't control my arm and bow when I am nervous, luckily I take a magic pill right before I play that does the trick).  After the show, they put on a great fireworks show which Luke especially enjoyed, he missed the 4th of July show. I have to say, this is probably one of my favorite NY activities so far, and it was free.

:A clip of one of my favorite phrases of the Mendelssohn Concerto. You can't actually see the person playing unless you look very closely, but you can listen, which is the best part. I clearly don't play it as well:

He's all growns up

Only 17 months and he looks like a shrunken teenager.

One more month til nursery....hooray!