The Spark Has Gone Out

Today George Lee Anderson passed away due to complications with dementia. Better known as "Sparky," he led the '70s Big Red Machine to many pennants and World Series victories and is a legend for those of us who grew up in Cincinnati.

By the time I was born Sparky was on his way out of Cincinnati, headed to Detroit where he would manage the Tigers for 17 years. I feel fortunate that I was able to see him at Tiger Stadium, see him go to the mound to yank a pitcher, his hands stuffed in the pockets of his jacket. I feel even more fortunate that I was able to see him inducted into the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY, in the summer of 2000.

Why do I have such an undying love for a man that I've never met? It's not that I hold all the members of the Big Red Machine with the same affection. I just think that he's one of those people whose genuine goodness shines through, someone who can be famous without being pretentious. He smiled because he was happy to being paid to be in the game of baseball as much as he was happy to be walking down the street.

But when it comes down to it, Sparky was one of those people who regardless of the fact that he was a celebrity, he was a good person and he was down to earth. Today I read that a motto he followed was one his dad taught him: It doesn't cost anything to be nice to people. What a great lesson to learn. Chances are my kids aren't going to grow up to famous people, but they sure can learn how to be nice.

Sweet Baby

Sometimes I bubble up and gush over all the love I have for my baby girl. She does some of the sweetest, funniest, cutest things and I have to share that feeling with whomever is around.

The other day it was Louie.

I said, "Louie, isn't Meredith just the sweetest baby in the whole world?"

Without a pause he tells me, "No, Mom. The sweetest baby in the world would be Jesus. He was a baby one time, too." And before walking out of the room says, "But she is pretty cute."

I didn't have anything to say after that, my head filled with Ricky Bobby quotes.

"My 'Merica"

Charlie has a dream.

And that dream is to one day sing "God Bless America" at Great American Ball Park. The one snag is that he has to be allowed to sing it his way.

His way consists of something like this:

My 'Merica
My home SWEET hooooooooome

My 'Merica oh my 'Merica!
My hooooooooome sweet home!

There are other unintelligible words mixed in, but he keeps repeating this part, really getting into it like he's seen singers do during the 7th inning stretch of baseball games. Like, how they close their eyes, squeeze their fists and bellow the "home sweet home" part.

I'm going to do my best to get it on video. It's really good.

October 31st

The day started off with church school for Lou and Ben, then mass, then the Bengals game and then...waiting. Waiting for the clock to get to the time when the kids could put on their costumes.

Five o'clock arrived and we started getting dressed...and found out that Benny had grown quite a bit since this summer when Grandpa gave him a lion costume. Poor guy was stuffed into the lion and you could tell he was uncomfortable. It's too bad because it looked like it just came off the stage of The Lion King, it was that good. We couldn't find the Batman costume that he was wearing the night before, so he settled on the "bad" Spiderman costume. Thank goodness for friends' hand-me-downs for emergency backups!

Most of the gang

Sweet Mere, sans antennae

As soon as Charlie got his costume on he conked out on the couch. He slept for an hour before getting up, grumpily to take this picture. Benny's not grumpy, he's showing his "fierce" face.

We finally figured out that for Meredith to wear her antennae she had to have a hat on her head. The headband was too rough for hairless scalp.

Charlie and Louie with their friend, in their fighting poses

The dads took the kids around the neighborhood, which was different than the last time they did trick-or-treating, three years ago.* Kevin said they were sprinting from house to house, whereas in years past he had to coax Lou and Ben up to the door. Meredith insisted on walking herself to each door (which left her in the dust of her brothers and their friends) and then taking what she wanted out of the people's basket. This is the same thing that Benny used to do!

I stayed back at the house with chili and a bonfire, handing out candy with the friends' mom. There was a funny moment early in the candy dispensing. A group of middle school-aged kids came up in a herd. They are getting to the point where they may be a bit too old to go trick-or-treating and so they travel in packs. Many of them do not even wear costumes.

This particular group did pretty well in dressing up, although it seems to be the cool thing for boys of this age to wear wigs and dresses. Anyway, the first one got his candy and as he turned to walk away I realized what he was and said, "You're a piece of pizza!" He responds, "You're bright!" And I say, "Well, I did go to college." "No," he says, "I was talking about your shirt."

Man. I felt like a jerk. I'm not sure if you can tell from the pictures but the orange shirt I was wearing last night was practically glowing. So many of the older trick-or-treaters tend to be somewhat smart alec-y and so I unfortunately assumed that this was what was going on. But we both got a good laugh out of it!

The biggest treat of the night was when Uncle Joe, Aunt Erin and Gracie showed up at the end of the night. Gracie was the cutest garden gnome you ever saw!

*Last year, Aunt Joanie and Uncle Josh were married on October 31st. The year before that, Daddy played in a baseball tournament in Florida during the week that Halloween fell.

On Saturday, Part Two

Later that day we headed to a friend's birthday party. The whole family was invited and we were all excited.

The birthday boy wanted a "spooky" party and so Louie wore a black hooded cape with black pants and a black shirt and a scary mask that Benny wore last year with his skeleton costume. Benny was Batman, scarier in his mind than the lion costume he was going to wear for trick-or-treating. Charlie wore Spiderman, a costume that I'm afraid is going to be his daily uniform from now on. Meredith wore a puppy costume with a bow in its ear to make it a little more girly, but much cuter than spooky.

They had great Halloween games that included lots of gross body parts, which is absolutely perfect for these party guests. The birthday boy's mom is a great storyteller and she had the kids on edge listening to every word.

Everyone had such a great time and I wish that I had pictures of all the fun (and gore), but I was the party photographer, not for my astounding picture-taking abilities but I was just at the right place at the right time. As for the awesome-ness of the costumes and the party itself, you'll just have to take my word for it :)

On Saturday

Saturday morning, bright and early (9am--hard for this family to get out the door!), Louie had his first tournament game for soccer. It was pretty chilly, lots of frost covering everything, but the boys were fired up to take on the Wildcats.

Between chasing kids around, chatting with the other parents and screaming for the team until my throat was sore, I didn't take any pictures of the game. Awful, I know. Good news though, the boys won their first game and the second took place three hours later. We went home, ate lunch and then headed back to the field, this time to take on Mustangs.

The outcome wasn't as great this time. It was obvious that the boys were worn out from the first game. The other team was running circles around them. It probably helped that they had a bye in the first round. The guys had a great season, definitely something to build on next year. Louie didn't want to hear any of that, though. The poor guys was in tears after the whistle was blown. The tears didn't stop during the ride home and when we got out of the van.

I took him aside to talk, because this is something all too familiar to me. After every season I would tear up. Embarrassing, I know. I don't know if I was like that when I was as young as Lou, but as I got older, and definitely in high school. You don't want it to end, especially if it ends on a losing note. You put so much of yourself into the sport, it almost feels like you're losing a part of yourself when its over.

I don't remember what I said, other than sharing with him that I've been there, too talk. It's not a bad thing, although it's hard to see your kid upset. But it means that he was really into it, he cared about his team and the sport. He's got passion already in his short six years, and I think that's something that we are in short supply of these days--in both kids and adults.

He dried his eyes and I gave him a hug and he went inside to change out of his uniform. Basketball starts next Saturday, and after that is baseball. Soccer will be back next fall, but it's not about one sport or another. Or even just sports. Louie puts his heart and soul into almost everything he does and for that, I am proud of him. He's a good kid.

Busy Weekend!

We had such a great weekend! I'll start by telling you about Friday and then move from there.

After much consideration, I deleted the paragraph I wrote on the "importance of school" and decided just to let you know that on Friday night we decided to celebrate the end of the first quarter by going out to eat as a family to Blue Ash Chili. We let the boys decide where we were going. Two wanted chili the third wanted burgers and we chose the place that had both. No one had a burger and only one had chili. Those crazy kids.

It was such a nice evening. We rarely get to go out to eat as a family so really this was a treat for us all. The kids got to color on place mats and check out the servers in their wacky costumes, and Kevin and I could relax without worrying about cooking or cleaning up afterward!

We left to go home, got in our jammies and hung out for a bit before going to bed. This was a very much needed evening!