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We are currently driving through the smokey mountains as the sun sets. Breath taking! Headed back home from South Carolina,Myrtle Beach for the last baseball tournament of the season. We are sad the season is over but at the same time, pumped up about how well JT (and team) did. I will post all the full details soon.
It was a GREAT experience and THE best tournament we have been a part of EVER.
The growth in the boys skills is unbelievable! Their talent was recognized by other coaches and tournament directors from all over the United States.

We had a little time on the beach. Walked along the boardwalk at night. We had fun times in the rain. Autumn and Alec had a blast with their friends.

We are making one more stop tomrrow on the way home and will sleep in our own beds.
It always feels good to be home but it also stinks to jump back into “reality”. Giving back the nice rental van is going to bite. It’s been nice.

I have been talking about going back to school since JT was born. About 4 years ago, Joe finished his Masters and it was to be my turn. I made up excuses for a while. Some were legit and some were not. I would talk myself into going back and then let any little thing (money, time, etc) get me talked out of going back.
The big *issue* that was holding me back.
A learning disability.
There I said it. It is out in the open.

When I was young, it became quite obvious that I struggled with math. I was terrified of numbers. I remember breaking out into a sweat any time we had to do math on the board in front of the class. I had a terrible second grade teacher who doubled my fear of math by calling me a “silly foolish girl” because I could not figure out a “simple” math problem on the board without using my fingers to help add. I was so embarrassed.

I believe around forth or fifth grade I was tested for a learning disability. I scored high in everything but math.

I was then pulled out of my class everyday and went to the *special* math class that every child dreads going to. I hated it. I was taunted about going to the class and my anxiety about being teased made me even more terrified of math.
I was tested once in grammar school, earned my label as *math stupid* and continued to be in the low math classes through junior high and high school. To be honest, the program was a joke and I did not learn one thing. I would sit in a classroom with about 25-30 other kids and we would be given our math book and would work on a page a day.

A teacher and aide would be in the room if we needed help. That was it. Once we finished one book we would move on to another. We moved at our own pace. I don’t remember any *teaching* ever really being involved unless we asked a question.
I never did anything past (pre)pre- algebra. At the time, I was okay with the lackadaisical approach to math. I was a teenager and wanted to do the least amount of homework as possible.
Especially, in a subject I dreaded.

Now, I feel as though I were cheated.
I have an honest to goodness learning disability AND a mental block with math. I do not know if anyone has ever officially labeled certain math disabilities like they have with reading or not but I know I have one.

I look at a math equation and at first my mind races around all the numbers. Trying to make sense of them all and then just like that it shuts off and it is like I am looking at a completely foreign language. I just don’t get it. The concept just does not connect. I then get frustrated and angry. I WANT to understand but I CAN’T! Simple things like fractions can throw me for a loop.
So, I skated through high school going to my *special* math classes and honors English/writing classes. I know you are thinking “Honors English and writing!? How is that possible?” I can write, I have just gotten lazy over the years about proof reading. *wink*
Anyway, I coasted through and let my absolute fear of math and low self esteem get in the way of me going further with my schooling.
It was always the *THING* in my way. It was always the secret holding me back from going to college. It was always easy to blame it on babies, or my husband working on his degrees but now that my babies are all in school and my husband is done I do not have an *excuse* anymore.

Well, on Thursday I stomped on that fear and marched my little (okay , maybe medium) butt to a Junior college and filled out the new student registration forms. I received my student number and then went to take the placement testing.
Oh. my. goodness was I nervous.
I was testing in math, writing and reading comprehension.
Of course, the first test was math. I tried very hard to not just check out. I tried. I blanked and let’s just say I was not in the math portion of the testing very long.
I moved on to reading and writing and was testing for over an hour and a half. I felt confident and enjoyed the testing.
When I was done with the testing and turned in my calculator (which I never used) and scratch paper I was given my results. I was not surprised by the results at all and actually felt a huge pressure off of my shoulders.
I scored 95 on the writing portion and 98 on the reading comp. portion.
I will keep the score of my math test a secret, but will tell you that I have to take 2 math classes that do not even count as credits before I can start taking *real* college math classes. Am I surprised by that? No, not at all. I will take the classes and I will do everything I can to understand what I am being taught and I will consider that a great accomplishment.

So… the question everyone has been asking. What are you going to school for?
Well, I have decided I do NOT want to pursue nursing anymore. I just do not feel the pull in that direction anymore.
I am toying around with the idea of elementary education. I would love to be a 2nd or 3rd grade teacher someday. Or who knows, maybe I will work in special education and help children with learning disabilities?
For now, I am going to work on getting my basic classes out of the way.
I can only go part-time. :( For the fall semester I will only be taking two classes to see how I manage working and school. A math class and an English class.
I have filled out all my financial aide forms and hope that will quickly go through.
One. step. at. a time.

There once was a two year old blue eye’d ,active,happy boy who loved three things:
His baseballs.
His Blankie.
And his *Buddy* aka Woody.
Buddy went everywhere with his little boy. He went for rides in the boys little red car. He went on vacations to Disney, camping trips, pumpkin patches, the zoo and even in time outs with his owner. Wherever that little boy went, Buddy was close by.

When the little boy was a little older he proudly “loaned” *Buddy* to his younger brother. Sadly, his brother liked Buzz a little more. Poor Buddy.

Buddy missed his little boy and sat by, watching his boy.Waiting for him to play with him again.

He watched his boy work for hours out back on his baseball skills.
He sat patiently.

After a while, he tried to grab his boys attention the only way he knew how.

Pitch back, baseball tee, batting cage.

….hoping.

The boys mother knew how poor Buddy felt. Their sweet little boy was growing up and needed them less and less.
It is sad but they understand.
They know the boy loves them.

***Come back tonight for a special blog post!***

***This is my second time typing this post out on my phone. First time, the post was gobbled up by the internet gobblin. Grrr.. No time to edit! Sorry for spelling grammar mistakes.

* Autumn has been in a Drama camp with a Christian Youth Theater Company this week. She loves it and is excited that she got two parts and a singing part in the production they put on at the end of the week. :)
She has expressed intrest in continuing with this theater company after the summer camps end. They offer several diffrent programs. Joe and I are thrilled she seems to finding something she is really *into*.

* JT had an interesting weekend of baseball last week. On Saturday he had a rough time pitching.He was throwing strikes but the other team was just hitting really well. He felt pretty down after the game. Then, on Sunday at the Semi finals he pitched and incredible game! He went the six innings he was allowed to pitch and did not let up any earned runs! It was hot and windy. The dust was flying hard. The umpire was terrible but JT didn’t let any of that get to him and “Pitched his butt off.” As his coach said after the game.

*Alec has been having fun playing with hia friends from the neighborhood. Catching frogs and playing with Nerf guns seem to be current activities of choice. He is officially all signed up for *real* football. First day is in August. Joe will be a coach and Alec is very excited about that. I have mixed feelings about my baby being out there playing tackle football. He is a big kid so I am sure he is going to be out there tackling and playing defense.

* The van is still broken. We were told to not invest the money to fix it. Its a problem with one of the cylanders (sp). Sigh. So for now we. (Joe) will be replacing the spark plugs often because they get caked with oil quickly causing the misfires. Along with replacing the plugs and praying (a lot) we hope to make it work for at least 6 more months or more. We have been blessed with great neighbors who have an extra truck that is available to us.

* Joe has been using his Cpap machine for a couple of weeks now. It has been an adjustment and some kinks need to be worked out. Joe has been unable to keep the mask on for a full night. He wakes up in a panic and feels as if he is suffocating and takes the mask off.
The The first week, even with taking the mask off he was feeling well rested and noticed having more energy.
The last several days though, has been a diffrent story and he feels wiped out. Needing naps again. It is really frustrating for Joe. I have noticed that he does seem to be more peaceful when he is sleeping with the mask on. He does not startle awakw and the snoring is gone. I have been sleeping much better. Now we just need to get him sleeping all night with the mask and we will be set.

* I have done a couple photo shoots for some friends over the past several weeks. It has been so much fun getting back *into* my hobby. Last night I was going over ideas in my head for a picture for our Christmas Card. Yes, I said it… Christmas!? It is only 5 months away and I am determined to be done before December this year! I say that every year hoping one year it will happen.

That is all for now. Don’t forget to come back tonight for a fun new post.

I haven’t updated in a while. We are still alive and kicking. Getting nice tans and eating a ton of BBQ goodies.
Living life.

When Joe and I were talking about JT’s upcoming tournament being several towns over we started exploring the option of going to a cheap rate hotel website to see if we could find a room for Friday night. Normally, I would not be for that idea. Penny pincher that I am. However a couple factors played into me being okay with getting a room. #1. ) We would probably spend close to the same amount of money going back and forth in gas. #2.) Our van is in BAD shape. The less city driving we have to do with it, the better. #3.) Saturday mornings game was schedule very early in the morning. Meaning a 5 a.m. wake up time if we drove from home.
Joe ended up finding a cheap Motel 6 room for $35.00 and booked it.
We left our house at 1:30 Friday afternoon. We quickly faced the dreaded reality of TRAFFIC. Joe was working (phone calls) the van was shaking and sputtering along. The express way was a nightmare. Then.. the van died. It does that often, but we can usually put it in neutral and start it back up. Not this time. Smack dab in the middle of a traffic jam. My stomach in knots. Time pressures on us to get to the game on time and Joe trying to work. Finally, it started. We chugged along, waiting for the van to die again. The clock was ticking and after TWO HOURS we were trying very hard to stay positive. About 8 miles from the fields (and 30 minutes late to pregame practice -THREE HOURS from when we left) the van dashboard started flipping out. Speedometer didn’t work. Gas indicator didn’t work. We FINALLY arrived at the field and in the parking lot the van died. Joe tried to click it over. Nothing. He told Autumn and I to go to the fields and watch JT, the game was starting soon. Joe joined us a couple minutes later saying he would worry about it later, he wanted to watch JT start.
The game started. JT pitched well. He didn’t give up any runs. It was time for us to be up to bat. I think we had two players hit and then the rain started in. It started to pour. Of course. That has been a regular occurrence for every tournament we are in. We all ran back to the van to sit and wait it out. Joe put the key and … Woohooo. Van worked,along with all the dash board gages. We sat for about a half hour before they called the game off.
We drove in a thunderstorm and MORE traffic to our hotel room. Van sputtered. Joe worked. We all laughed and made the best of our situation. What else could we do right?
We pulled up to Motel 6 and Autumn and JT made a face. We just smiled and said ” This is better then driving 4 hours home.”. No argument to that.
We checked in and I pulled off the comforters of the beds so we could all relax for a little bit. After a while we decided to head to CiCi’s Pizza for dinner. That place is THE cheapest place to go to eat. $4.99 all you can eat pizza. When we pulled up to the trip mall I saw a fire truck and joked ” I bet that truck is there for CiCi’s.” I was KIDDING and not really thinking that was the case. We parked and quickly saw that everyone was standing outside of the restaurant. We had a good chuckle and then decided to go see what happened. Turns out someone pulled the fire alarm and they could not get it to turn off.
After a short wait, we were let in and ate a LOT of pizza. Then it was back to the room so Joe could work. I was asleep in about an hours time. Joe was up ALL night preparing for his upgrade at work.
Poor guy.
We were expecting the games for the following day to get pushed back. They did but only by an hour. So, we were all at the fields by 8:30 a.m. for a 9:30 start time. When we got to the fields it was obvious right away that we would not be playing on time or any time soon. The game before us was not even started. They were still working on the fields and continued to do so for another two hours.
We sat around a lot. That is the life of baseball tournaments. lol
At 12:40 we started our first game, which was a continuation of the game we had started Friday night. We won and then moved on to our second game. We won that one too.
As much as I would have loved to spend another night out there, we headed home Saturday night. Joe had to work and I had to wash JT’s uniform. I stayed awake just long enough to pull JT’s clothes out of the dryer and then crashed. On the couch. Poor Joe worked again ALL night. Getting an hour and half of sleep. Happy Fathers Day huh?…
Sunday ,we took a different route to the fields and actually went through downtown Chicago. Along Lake Shore drive. It was a beautiful drive and much more relaxing then the Friday nightmare. The van still had/has its issues but less stop and go traffic seemed to make the ride less stressful.
It was a beautiful day for baseball games.We won our first game. There was a four hour time gap before our next game, so we did more sitting while Joe worked.
JT was the starting pitcher for the Semi-final game. He ended up pitching a complete shut out! He did an awesome job in the most important game! It got us to the Championship.
Unfortunately, we lost the Championship game. It was brutal and hard to watch. One of our players got really hurt and had to go to the hospital. The other team was “bush-league” and so obnoxious.
The boys kept it together though and should be proud of how they did.
We didn’t get home until late last night. It was a CRAZY weekend but we had a good time. Even though we were dealing with broken car we managed to make the best of it and have fun.

When you are watching a sporting event you don’t (usually) think about the hours and and years of training and practicing that go into that ONE event you are watching.
The money spent on training and equipment. The time families spent sitting at events to support their child/brother/ sister. Etc.

I used to think that athletes were overpaid for *playing* a sport.

I was wrong.

Let me expand on that statement. I still think *they* (some) are overpaid. However, I do have some understanding of WHY they are paid what they are. It is NOT about *playing* a game. Well, it is but the pay is not just for the game you view. It is for the hours and years I mentioned before.

It goes so much further then hitting a homerun, scoring a winning goal or setting the fastest record.

As most of you know, baseball is a HUGE part of life in the Baksha household.

Our once 6 year old little boy in T-ball who had big dreams for playing in High-school one day, has grown up and will be playing High-School ball next year.

New goals are being made. New opportunities are opening up.

It isn’t just about a “town travel team” anymore.

It is about college ball.

That means getting MORE serious then we have been.

How on earth is that possible? How far are we willing to go? It is a tough balance. We have THREE children. How do we make sure all three of them are being given the opportunities for their future without sacrificing the others time?

So far we have been blessed with great kids. Autumn and Alec have been amazing about being dragged to tournaments and spending summers at ball fields. Joe and I always try to make it fun for them at games and if they express a desire to participate in a sporting club (soccer, football etccc) we encourage them and make sure they can do it along with getting our support. There also usually a handful of other siblings at games and they have fun with each other.

Sorry, I got off track for a bit there.

Baseball has been a way of life for JT since he was a toddler. It has always been something he can push himself in and challenge his athleticism with. He has continually set goals for himself and pushed himself to succeed.

When he was playing In house baseball it was about making the All- Star Team.

When he was on the All-Star team it was about making a travel team.

When he was on a travel team it was about being one of the best pitchers.

When it was being a top pitcher it was about being a top hitter.

When it was being a top hitter it was about making the Elite White Sox team.

When it was being on the Elite White sox team it was about being the starting pitcher on the Elite team.

When it was being a starting pitcher it was about high-school
And strike outs
And speed
And hitting again.

It never stops.
Suffering from AdHd has made it challenging for him at times. Concentrating and focusing does not come easily. He sometimes struggles and has to work even harder then some other players.He never stops pushing or believing in what he can accomplish.

There are hours (upon hours) spent working out at camps. Extra pitching and hitting instructions. Tee work. Batting cages. Physical Therapy. Reading and studying mechanics and work outs.
Eating certain foods on game days.

Thousands and thousands of boys have the same dream my boy has. They are all working every day to achieve that dream. They all WANT it. All their families are encouraging them.

Only a handful of them will one day play on that big field for a major league baseball /football/basketball team.

As a parent, we know that the possibilities are slim. Even our boys know that. We would be foolish to not make them aware of that.

However, that does not dull the passion they have for the sport. That does not take away the DREAM or lessen the importance of the GOALS they have set for themselves.

If our son does not play past college, that is okay. I will never regret supporting him and encouraging him on his path to chasing a dream. I know that along this road he has learned great lessons that will be valuable in LIFE.
Setting Goals.
Working as a TEAM gets the win.
Not letting one game (loss) get you down. Moving forward and thinking about that next big win.
Patience.
Hard work PAYS off.
Respect.

The list goes on.

BBQ chicken
Corn
Banana cream pie
Cheeseburgers
Potatoes
Wine
Hotdogs and brats
Side salads
Grilled veggies.

Nights on the patio with neighbors and mesquitos(sp).

Music and fresh air.

Thoughts distracted by the ping of a bat hitting a ball.

The sound of crickets.

Fireflies!

Baseball games.

Thunderstorms.

Rainbows.

Conversations about your son falling in LOVE!

Letting the chores fall aside just to grab a couple extra minutes outside before it is time for bed.

Enjoying every.single.minute.

Thanking God for every blessing given to me.

* On Sunday we swapped kids with Oma and Papa. Autumn came with us and Alec went with Oma and Papa. Alec has his mind set on staying with them for two weeks! We will see if that happens.

* Sunday is Fathers Day. We will be spending the day at the ballfield.

* Yesterday, we had the most beautiful vibrant rainbow I have ever laid eyes on over our neighborhood. Everyone was outside taking in the beauty of it.

* Joe did a wonderful job at the memorial for his grandpap. I was/am very proud of him.

* Autumn has started babysitting in the neighborhood. :)

* I am so thankful for 3 healthy children and a loving husband.

When you are at your brothers baseball games all weekend you find ways to have fun.

By putting a huge Nerf gun up to your forehead and pulling it back so it sucks up your entire forehead and leaves a huge circle on your forehead. FOR DAYS!