Baby and Baseball

Friday we went to the youngest child’s first baseball game, always a big deal for us, or at least it has become so. We didn’t take Allyson to a game until she was nearly two, when we went to Salt Lake for a Stingers game. Ryan’s first game was in Provo, when he was a week or two. Isaac went to a Stingers game in Salt Lake at about 6 weeks of age. So it seemed logical to take Evan to an Isotopes game as soon as possible, which turned out being Friday.

We got to the stadium early, giving the crew a chance to pose by the field.
Our seats were just to the third base side of home, about 12 rows back, right at the edge of the net behind home plate. This seemed a good spot to catch a foul ball. Almost was.

I also had the chance to take Isaac down to the field to see Orbit, the ‘Topes mascot. In the mess of children and parents down there, this was the best shot I got:

There are of course some challenges to going to a baseball game with a baby. For example, this increases the number of trips to the restroom, as diaper changes have to happen every few hours. I made two trips Friday. Another challenge is feeding. This is Summer’s gig, which leads to some cute post-nosh pictures:

During the seventh inning stretch, Isotopes personnel began tossing from the press box dozens of small foam baseballs. Our seats were too far down the line to catch anything, but the sight was great, like large, soft hail flying down.

Toward the end of the storm, I turned my attention to the field as something entered my peripheral vision. I raised my left hand just in time to snag a foam ball tossed from the dugout. It makes a nice souvenir of Evan’s first game.

This episode reminded me of the game last July 4. We were on the first base side on a crowded night. In between innings, some team staff were firing tee shirts into the crowd. One of the last shirts was shot more or less directly up, giving it a long arcing path down. The slight breeze from the east carried the shirt closer toward home plate—and closer toward us.

I stood up to see where the shirt would wind up, and as it dropped, I realized that it was going to land perhaps four seats to my right. But as the shirt got closer, it curved my way. I reached over Allyson, who was sitting to my right, and made a solid one-handed grab, pulling in the shirt. It was a great moment, one of the 5 or 6 best moments of my life.