Mini Golf 2013 Part 1: Father's Day!

Happy New Year's Eve, folks! I'm celebrating the New Year with Golf! Well...not really, but I'm celebrating it with two blog posts about Mini-Golf! They will be my final posts of 2013, and that should officially catch me up! (We'll see if I need to do any more catching up if I look through my photo archives, but if this is it, then that would be the first year that I am not playing catch-up deep into the new year! How cool is THAT!?)

First, I will show you some stuff from Father's Day. Dad got it into his head that he wanted to go miniature golfing for Father's Day, and we found a nice little mini-golf course out in Maryland.

I was doing pretty well (depending on the hole...some of those things are tough!)

Dad seemed to be having a great time.

I was having fun, too....except that there was a brother/sister team that kept insisting on jumping onto our hole and messing with my ball. A couple times, they even went ahead and took my ball out of the hole (or put it in, depending on their moods at the moment)

I did my best to be patient, and walk away from the situation, but it really was tough to keep my cool. Grrrr... :-( Where were the parents!?

Ugh.

We rallied after our little invasion by the other kids, and ended up having a pretty good time.

Dad did his best to show me the best way to hit the ball successfully, but I really just like hitting it how I like to hit it, ya know? We all have our own style!

Mom also showed me a little bit of her mini-golf skillz (That's right....skillz with a 'z', everyone.) and it definitely helped, too....

....but not enough for me to not face tragedy once again, as yet another one of my balls insisted on staying away from the hole I had tried to hit it into.

The roller coaster of emotion continued as I started picking up and doing well again, and Mom was just cleaning up. She did great! Try as they might to keep score, my erratic (yet endearing) style of play made it near-impossible to keep score for too long, and they gave up.

The final hole was a frog where you had to hit your ball through the base, and then up a slight incline, until it landed in a hole that gobbled your ball up for someone else to play with.

We timed it all just right, since a big picnic let out nearby, which meant that a bunch of people got in line to play, just as we were wrapping up. Score!

I tried a couple times to get the ball in, to no avail....then, I got serious....set my stance up just like Mom and Dad showed me, and I hit the ball through the base!

While it took me a few more swings to finish the hole off, I finally got my ball in, with Mom and Dad following soon after. Some snacks, and a ride on an old, squeaky, yet totally endearing train  finished off Father's Day 2013 in a lovely way...

Washington Nationals Baseball Game 2013 GAME 2

As we had hoped, we managed to get to a second game at Nationals Park this year!

Dad went straight from work, while Mom and I took the Metro over to meet him at the stadium.

Outside of the stadium, there was a rogue President just wandering around....who is this guy? Harding? Is that Harding?! I dunno! Why are you asking me!? I'm five, AND he's creeping me out! I gave him a WIDE berth while walking to the stadium...that person standing next to him is supposed to protect him from US....whereas I think she should be doing the opposite... Give me the spooky shivers just recalling this moment for the blog...

On our way in, we saw some really cool garbage cans that had giant baseball helmets on them. Cool, right? 
Green Dinosaur, who joined us for this go-around, certainly approved.

Dad was kind enough to carry it in the car with him, and that meant that once again, the foam finger made a grand re-appearance!

It was helpful, both as a tool for showing my enormously fingered support of our team, AND for having a soft place for Green Dinosaur to nuzzle into when he was tired.

At one point in the game, a pigeon ended up on the field...we're not sure if he was injured or what, but he certainly had no intention of getting out of the way of the game, that's for sure! They tried to scoot him off the field, but he wouldn't budge, so they played for awhile with him just standing off to rear of first base. He left after awhile, but only when he was good and ready, I'm sure!

The best news of all this time? THE NATIONALS WON! They CREAMED the Phillies 11-2. There were so many runs, and so many good plays, the Nats were REALLY doing a great job.

This time around, I felt a little braver, and decided that I wanted to give running the bases a try...All three of us were SO excited to be right down there on the field where the players played the game. It was such a rush, and I think it's awesome that they let the kids do this. I was very worried about the fact that I would have to run without Mom or Dad, but I was trying to be brave about that, and also enjoy the fact that we were RIGHT THERE ON THE FIELD!

At the last minute, I decided that I couldn't do the run around the bases...the Presidents were too scary, and I didn't like the idea of running without Mom or Dad....I was pretty disappointed, but both Mom and Dad did their best to make sure that I was positive that I didn't want to run, and that my decision was final, because they wouldn't let us walk back in after we left...Like I said, I was bummed out, but still happy that we got to go on the field.

Mom and I took a quick picture on the field, but I was still feeling a little upset about how the whole thing went down, so it was not my happiest moment. :-(

Luckily, after I talked it over with Mom and Dad, (who both assured me that they understood how difficult it was, not only to make the decision not to run, but to also make the decision to try going down to the field even though I was feeling anxious about it) I felt a lot better, and was perfectly content with how things went down, and I was excited about running along the corridor back to our car.

I showed off some of my fancy dance moves while I jumped from bench to bench, and also showed off my red outfit that I wore to support my hometown team!

Go Nationals! We'll see you next year!!

Washington Nationals Baseball Game 2013 GAME 1

Continuing our end of the year wrap-up as I arrive back in Maryland after my lovely holiday week in Connecticut:

After talking about it for some time, we FINALLY made it out to a couple baseball games to see the Washington Nationals play!

Now, this wasn't my first baseball game (My first game was chronicled HERE when we were in Louisville...man, I was a cute baby!)

Dad and I both bought hats (Mom already had one from several years ago) and I finally realized my dream of getting a giant foam finger. It was the one thing I asked about as soon as we got our tickets...it took Mom a second to figure out exactly what I was asking for, but as soon as she did, they were nice enough to buy me one...I LOVED IT!

We had great seats, and could see everything that was happening on the field perfectly. It was a little hot that day, but other than that, the weather was clear and pretty.

Mom and I had some time to ourselves to enjoy the game because Dad went to get us snacks, and through a comedy of errors including all the credit card machines being down, it took him forever!

Things got pretty serious as the sun beat down on us, and I was not happy about being so sweaty...but we managed to fight through so we could see our team play the whole game.

Our team did great! I was happy to cheer on the red guys (as I came to call them)

Later on, the Presidents (who are people in costumes with giant heads dressed as Presidents Washington, Lincoln, Taft, Roosevelt and Jefferson) did their race around the bases....

...and then they got set up after the game so that kids could go down to the field and run the bases. I decided against this little event, and just watched some of the other kids run around the bases and give high fives to the Presidents and the other girls on the field. Who are those girls, anyway? Ballgirls? Helper girls? I'm confused...

I thought it was fun to watch the other kids, which was enough for me and we got to watch for awhile while people cleared out, so there wasn't as much of a crush of people as we were headed out.

The Colorado Rockies ended up beating The Nationals 7-1, but it was still a wonderful game to watch. I cheered as much as I could, and was bummed that we lost, but it was still fun!

On the walk back to the car, I got to enjoy some of the scenery around the ballpark. There was a really nice water sculpture along the route which was REALLY calling for me to jump in and cool off....Mom and I waited in the shade while Dad went on ahead to get the car for us....what a great ballgame!

Soccer!!

While I am in Connecticut celebrating the holidays with my family up North, I figured I'd wrap up this year with a few catch-up posts detailing some of the other things that 2013 brought us.

Easily one of the most fun things of the year was my Fall foray into soccer. Mom and Dad signed me up for a soccer league that was organized by a friend's Mom, and the league included many of my current and former classmates at my pre-school.

We played a lot of fun games (that sometimes only loosely looked like soccer) that helped develop teamwork and our ability to follow rules. Some of the games seemed silly at first (and they were!) but it was a good way for us kids to burn off some energy, have fun, and learn the importance of rules.

We each had our own ball, shin guards, and t-shirt (which I wear all the time because it is my favorite shirt ever.) and got to play a lot! Our Coaches were great. They had the right balance of encouragement, while also being no-nonsense about having us follow the rules and play the game. (Well, as much as a bunch of 4 and 5 year old could focus on the rules and play the game)

I did pretty well during the various games that we played! I did a good job listening, and had pretty good control of the ball.

I even managed to score a couple goals, and make a few assists during the games where we actually played soccer. I think my favorite part had to be whenever we figured out a loophole in a game....for example, for one game, any time the ball went out of bounds, the coach would throw a new one in...so, we caught on to this pretty quickly, and had a pretty good idea when the ball would go out of bounds, so we would turn and run back to the coaches, knowing that a ball was about to be thrown in, gaining the advantage by getting there first. 

I had a very good time throughout the season, and only had a few injuries that qualified as the worst injuries that I had ever had. I kept up a pretty good attitude (most of the time) and really missed the games, my coaches, and my teammates once it was over. Hopefully we can do something similar in 2014!

My Last Christmas At The Shoe.

This past week before heading up to Connecticut for Christmas, was my last end of the year holiday party at my pre-school. I have had five holiday parties there, and it has always been such a great time. The parents and teachers are great, and always throw a good party, and my friends are always great fun.

As we have for our last few parties, we performed a little song and dance number that we worked very hard to learn. It was a lot of fun for the parents to watch, and certainly fun for us to have worked on the last few weeks. The performance was a success and we all really enjoyed ourselves.

The show was followed by a gift exchange, and I gave a gift to one of my friends, while another different friend gave ME a gift.

When I opened it, I discovered that it was actually a bunch of small gifts: A large bouncy ball, a funny shaped ball that lights up when you bounced it, a cookie, and a game called Cheese Chase. SOLID gift...

The gifts were followed by our (as usual) crazy party full of controlled (and sometimes not so controlled) chaos. There was lots of great food to eat, and I made Dad very proud by eating all my pizza (Which I shared with him...) and all my snacks and desserts (Which I ALSO shared with him!) We were pretty full (and more than a little wound up) by the end of the party!

As things slowly came to a close, I took a few moments in the quiet corner to do a little bit of drawing...

I ended up with a very cool picture of a robot riding around, while Dad watches.

I think this was a nice way to close out my winter holidays at The Shoe. I will miss it a lot!

The NSO Pops Holiday Concert 2013

The weekend before we went away to Connecticut, we went out to see a lovely concert by the National Symphony Orchestra. They play a holiday show every year, and it had been some time since Mom and Dad had seen it. They finally figured I was old enough to see the show, so we all went down to The Kennedy Center, an enormous building devoted to the arts (With numerous theaters and performance spaces) It was  a very cool building, and I enjoyed running around in it.  

Mom got our tickets from Will Call (who sounds like a really nice guy for holding our tickets. Thanks, Will!) and handed them out to us.

Oh...did I tell you that I was going to be making the above face (or similar) for the next two years in every picture I take? Sorry about not informing you sooner...

The place has a lot of really cool stuff to look at while you are waiting to go in, and even stuff to see as you walk up to your seats!

We had a great spot up in the balcony where I could see and hear everything PERFECTLY.

The orchestra sounded lovely, and they played some of my favorite Christmas songs, in addition to some I had never heard before. I loved the new ones, too!.

The choir that they had up there singing with them was pretty good too, and they had a guy named Brian Stokes Mitchell join in as a guest vocalist for the show, too. He was AMAZING. He had a great sense of humor, and such a wonderful voice. He sang the heck out of The Grinch. SO good.

As a nice capper to the evening, Santa Clause stopped by for a visit at the end of the show and handed out candy canes while it snowed indoors!! How did they do that?!

Generally I was very excited to be up in the balcony because of how great everything looked and sounded, but when I couldn't get a candy cane from Santa, I was devastated.

Later, on our way out, I learned that Santa had kindly given little sacks of candy canes to the ushers, and we got some after all! It was a Christmas Miracle!!!

For all your theater nerds out there, don't worry...Dad took all these pics before the show started. :-)