Scenes From the Game

Steve's entire family was born in Cincinnati, so even though he moved to Atlanta around the age of five, he's always been a Cincinnati sports fan. When we lived in Cincinnati? We had season tickets to the Bengals, the Reds, and Xavier basketball, and while I never gave up my Indianapolis Colts fandom, no matter how many Bengals games he dragged me to, I did end up embracing the Reds as my own.

(Mostly because I had a crush on the 3rd baseman at the time, but that's neither here nor there...)

Now that we live in Atlanta, we don't attend nearly the same number of live sporting events, because one, it's too expensive, and two, Atlanta is the most poorly planned out city in the history of cities, and to get to any sports stadium in the area is a test of every ounce of patience Steve and I possess, and also, quite frankly, the strength of our marriage. Traffic...is not good for us.

But we do make exceptions when our teams come to town, because we're determined to raise the girls the right way. They will be Notre Dame fans, obviously. They will be Reds fans. I WILL WIN THE BATTLE OF NFL TEAMS, and they will be Colts fans. Indiana basketball is a must. The brainwashing has begun at an early age.

This weekend, the Reds are in town, and Steve decided it was time to introduce the girls to baseball. So we did. And last night at Turner Field, Brigid ate a hot dog, cotton candy, frozen yogurt and french fries, while washing it all down with an extremely watered-down Coke Zero* (and then she actually went home and went straight to bed, which surprised me to no end, because I figured she'd be riding that sugar/caffeine high until next Tuesday...). And on top of all of that? It was bobblehead night, so Brigid left with a new toy.

I'd say she's probably a pretty big fan of baseball right now.

Caitlin, on the other hand, got none of the good stuff. The poor, mistreated child had to settle for a bottle and an exhaustion so deep that she was able to sleep through the last two innings of the game we stayed for.

Then she woke up as we left the stadium, stayed awake through the drive home, a bath, and another half bottle, before immediately crashing once again, as soon as I put her in her crib. One thing that kid has going for her...when it's time to go to bed, she generally goes to bed (*knocks frantically on every single piece of wood within a fourteen mile radius of current location*). It almost (ALMOST) makes up for those times where she's up in the morning at 5am and still only manages about an hour of naptime, total, throughout the day.

And then Cincinnati lost. But, you know, other than that, I'd say the evening was a success...