Weekend in Kansas City

This weekend Grant’s baseball team played in a tournament in Kansas City.   Jeff was already in northeastern Kansas for work so Grant and I caught a ride up with the Becker family and he met us in KC on Friday afternoon. 

We made Grant pose for a quick shot with both of us before his first game. 

Luckily there was a covered upper level deck area where we could watch the games.  It seemed like a great spot when we arrived but by mid-evening when the sun started to go down we were wishing that we had an east facing field. 

The boys played hard and won their first game (14-7) against the KC Padres.  We celebrated the win with several families for dinner at Cheeseburger in Paradise at the Legends.

This cute little orange/lime frog came in my fruity drink.  I didn’t intend for Grant to suck on it all evening . . . I guess he liked the flavor of my drink cleverly named Euphoria.

Saturday morning we headed back to the ballpark and played at 10:00.  The boys beat the Arkansas Ghost 11-1.  It was the best I have ever seen them play.  Jeff took the good camera so we got tons of great shots of all the kids.    Grant had his own cheering section.  My mom and dad came and brought my grandma.  They had been in KC visiting family so they stopped by the ballpark on the way home to catch a game.

After the game we headed back to the Legends and had lunch at T-Rex.  It felt so good to be inside someplace with air-conditioning and limitless amounts of cold drinks.   We left Jeff in charge of a few of the boys while we ran into the Nike Outlet store after lunch.  They found the fountains and got completely soaked.  It’s a good thing it was a hot day because they dried off really fast.After a few hours of shopping we went back to the hotel to swim and get cleaned up.  They we met up with a  few families and went to a  T-Bones game.  They are a semi-professional team that plays in KC.  It was a beautiful night and we had a great time!!!

The Bumgardner boys both had to have a snow cone.

Coach John had the best seat in the house.They had to of course get it a doofus shot.  This is coach John’s signature look anytime someone does something silly on the field or at bat.

Mid way through the game we found out we had the #2 seed in the tournament and had to play at 8:00 am so we packed up a little early and headed back to the hotel so everyone could get a good nights sleep.

Our winning streak continued a little longer.  The boys beat the Arkansas Rattler’s (8-1).  I ran down to get a picture of Grant playing 3rd base and right as I was about the snap the camera he snagged a ball on the infield and threw it to 1st base to get the final out of the game.  I think the ball is actually in his glove in this shot.

We had a few hours between games.  I thought this was a cute shot of the boys sitting with Carol on the bench sizing up their opponents who were still playing on the field below.

Unfortunately we lost in the semi-finals to the Topeka Renegades.  I think it was more of a case of us beating ourselves.  Our boys made a lot of silly mistakes that ended up costing them the game.  They played hard and probably finished in 3rd place.  We didn’t stick around to find out.  It was so hot and everyone was pretty worn out so we loaded up the car and headed home. 

Thanks for a fun weekend Cardinal’s (and Cardinal’s parents). . . I’m sure we will be doing it again soon.

OMG – How could I forget . . . on Saturday afternoon I got hit in the head by a foul ball from another field.  I have NO idea where it came from and nobody yelled ball.  All of a sudden I was just nailed by a ball from out of no where.  I felt like such a goof because it made me cry.  I think I was kind of in shock.  Luckily nobody caught in on camera (I hope).  I iced it down for a little bit and now just have a BIG lump to show for it.

A Room Full of Furniture & A Trip to the Pool

For the first few weeks of May our living room was completely empty.  Jeff’s grandmother decided she didn’t like her living room furniture anymore so told us we could have it.  With the help of my friend Diane and her husband Scott we got our old furniture moved downstairs and they took the basement couch off our hands for their daughter Karley who is getting an apartment at Emporia State next year.  The only time we had a weekend when we were both free was at the beginning of May and Jeff’s grandmother’s new furniture wasn’t  being delivered until May 15.  So we enjoyed a big open empty space for a few weeks and it proved to be a great place for my friend Jessica’s little girl to take some of her first steps.

It has taken us a while to get used to the new furniture.  It’s much more formal than what we had before.  Today the final piece of furniture was purchased to finish off the room.  Our old coffee table didn’t really go with the new furniture so I got the idea to buy a large leather ottoman.  I found the perfect one at a furniture store out east and it really looks great.  Hopefully we will start spending a little bit more time in the living room now.    

In other news we went to the pool today for the first time of the season.  Our neighborhood pool doesn’t open until tomorrow so we went over to grandpa’s house to swim.  Grant and his friend Hayden had a blast.

The Bumgardner’s are Back

Between baseball games, end of the year school activities, my masters classes and packing up my classroom at school for the big move , the month of May has flown by without very many posts.  There’s so much to catch up on so it may take a few posts to fit it all in.

A few weeks ago my good friend Jessica was in Winfield visiting family and made a special trip up to Wichita to have dinner with me.  It was so fun to catch up with her and meet her adorable little girl Sophia. 

Then we were off to Alva, OK for a baseball tournament May 14-16th.  It was a fun and very memorable weekend.  Here are a few action shots from our games on Saturday.  Luckily the bad weather held off and we were able to fit in all of our games on Saturday.  I wish I could say the same for Sunday.  We got one game in and then had several hours of rain delay.

While we were in Alva I ran into my good friend Amy.  Her son Hunter was there with his team playing as well.  Unfortunately we never got to play each other.

The best photos from the weekend actually came between games when the boys were hanging out.

We got coach John to give us his signature look.   It wouldn’t be a tournament without a $12 t-shirt.  There was a slight misspelling though.  I guess the tournament directors didn’t have spell check on their computer.

The “moms” showing off our new blingy Cardinal’s shirts. We also got a few fun photos on Saturday night at our motel.  There aren’t a lot of lodging choices in Alva so let’s just say that our accommodations were not exactly what we are all used to.  To make the experience a little more pleasurable Jeff and Chad hit up the local liquor store and got us a few treats to enjoy in the parking lot before turning in.  We also opted to sleep in our clothing on top of the sheets with our own blankets and pillows from home. 

This is the pose I got from Jeff and Chad when I asked them to smile.  Can you tell it had been a long day???

After a few drinks they thought it would be a good idea to take a picture holding Greg like the girls did earlier in the day.  The expression on Greg’s face makes me laugh every time I see it.  We woke up on Sunday morning to celebrate our 12th anniversary at the Western Motel.  We wanted to get our picture taken with the sign in the background so we would always remember our motel.  Luckily my friend Amy, who was staying at the same hotel, found the perfect spot.  Notice the empty beer can on the table behind us and Jeff eating a piece of cold pizza left over from the night before.  Classy huh???

I wasn’t lying when I said that baseball is keeping us busy.  This past weekend we played in a tournament in Derby.  Luckily we didn’t have to stay in another motel but we fit in 6 games between Friday evening and Sunday afternoon so our weekend seemed to just fly by.  

Between games the boys decided to do a little meditation to relax.

After meditating they thought it would be fun to put on a little runway show on the picnic tables.   The boys played hard and ended up with a 3rd place finish in the tournament.       

This weekend we are headed to KC for another tournament.  Even though baseball keep us busy we are so lucky to have so many wonderful families to hang out with.  Grant has also made some great friends over the years.  It’s fun watching all the boys grow up and develop into such great little players.