Ball Game!

As some of you may know, Auntie got a new job just after Easter that she will have until the end of September.  Auntie was invited to try out for, and made, the Seattle Mariners Ball Girl squad!  So she is now a ball girl!  On the field, catching foul grounders and handing them out to kids in the stands!  Or working in the stadium, handing out the giveaways or baseball cards to kids!

And being a team employee also means… FREE TICKETS.

So we went to the game last Friday.  And when I say “we” I mean myself, the Webmaster, Ane and Tad.  Rerun could have come with us, since he’s still young enough to not need his own ticket, but Grandma offered to watch him and we figured he’d have more fun with her.

Ane and Tad haven’t been to a Mariners game in two years, but we have been to minor league games in the meantime.  Still, the kids were pumped.

Especially Ane.

 

Of course, the seats that a ball girl gets for free are in the 300 level – meaning nosebleed section.  Still, they were quite good for nosebleed seats.  And did I mention that they were free???

Tad got a little overwhelmed by the game.  By the time the kids had eaten their picnic dinners that we’d brought to the game, Tad was asking to go home.  It was the second inning.  But I had earplugs in my purse, and I managed to keep him from getting too overstimulated and from kicking the seat of the person in front of him.  There was a lot of heavy pressure and back scratching going on to keep him even-keeled.

It also helped that Auntie’s duties were light and not on the field that night, so she was able to stop by and visit the kids a couple of times.  Ane went walking with her at one point, too, for fun.

Tad did eventually take the earplugs out, Ane got really into the game, and I finally broke out the iPod Touch for Tad in the 5th inning.  Since we’d brought dinner, the Webmaster sprung for a special treat for the kids – Dippin’ Dots ice cream.

Now, Ane LOVES mint chocolate chip, and Tad is a chocoholic.  So she managed to sweet-talk her father into buying each of them their own cup of Dippin’ Dots.  Tad was a little wary of the appearance of the ice cream – because it doesn’t look like how chocolate ice cream should look – but since the flavor was right, the texture didn’t seem to throw him that much.

I was actually really proud of him for trying it, because that can be so hard for him.

Well, the kids were real troopers and we stuck the game out until the bitter end, when there was a blown save and we lost 6 to 4 to the Angels.  Ane enjoyed the game much more than I thought she would (especially since she was complaining in the third inning about HOW BORED she was), and Tad behaved himself pretty well with several coping techniques to keep him from melting down.  Still, I’m not sure how soon I would want to take him to a game again.  Auntie wants us to get really good seats when she actually is on the field, so she can maybe give the kids some foul balls, but if we take her up on free seats again, I might see if Tad wants to stay with Rerun and Grandma.

So, when can we get free seats again, Auntie?  🙂

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 29th, 2012 at 12:34 am and is filed under Autism Adventures, Children, Family, Life in the Pacific Northwest, Sports.
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