Baseball, Easter, and Other Overdue Stuff

I realized I was a little overdue on sharing the couple things worth sharing in that tail-end of the winter slog.  First, Carter had his annual String Festival concert back in mid-March.  It was enjoyable as always, and they played my same favorite song from a couple years ago--Seven Nation Army.  It always sounds so cool with such a massive orchestra.

The following week, Craig and Jacob went to the first round of March Madness in Buffalo with Craig's mom, so Carter and I took the opportunity to finally do something we've been talking about doing since probably last summer--eating dinner at Chili's.  I think we had talked about it around when Carter was in the thick of his ulcerative colitis flare, and obviously at the time, gorging himself on fatty foods didn't sound like a great idea.  Chili's used to be a favorite of Craig's and mine way back when, but then they took my two favorite things off the menu and Jacob got diagnosed with Celiac Disease, so we stopped going there.  I think I ordered something to go once when we were doing weekly takeout during the peak of COVID, but otherwise, we just hadn't been there despite some intriguing food choices.  Between their burger deals and the viral mozzarella sticks, we had it in the back of our minds to get there someday.  This was our night.

We ended up having a ridiculous amount of food, but it was SO good.  We first got the Triple Dipper, the choose-any-three appetizer.  We got Honey Chipotle Chicken Crispers, Buffalo boneless wings, and the super famous Nashville Hot Mozzarella Sticks.  I knew I had a lot more food coming, so I tried to take it easy, but I had to try at least a part of each.  The mozzarella lived up to the hype, for sure.  Their $10.99 burger deal was unreal, as well--a starter, drink, burger and fries for one low price.  Carter got bottomless chips and salsa, and I got a side salad.  Then came our amazing burgers--the smashburger for me and the quarter pounder for Carter--complete with fries.  It was so much food, but it was all so good!

Carter ate some of the apps, his whole burger and fries, and a lot of chips.  In addition to small bits of the apps, I ate a few chips, my salad, burger, a small portion of my fries.  I was pretty stuffed!  We took home the apps and fries, and then the waiter brought over a giant bag of chips to take home with us.  It was such a massive but fun meal!

Spring break was the week before Easter, and as usual we didn't really make any plans.  I did decide to take off both Thursday and Friday, rather than just Friday like other years.  I figured I just needed a mental health day and it was one less day to either leave the boys on their own or distractedly work from home.  Well, on Monday Craig messaged me that tickets for Wednesday's Blue Jays game were only $30 in the 100 Level, which is obviously an insane deal (and laughably cheap compared to the last game we went to...ha).  I looked at my work schedule and oddly didn't have anything.  Wednesdays are usually busy because everyone is in the office, but I'm guessing enough people were out because of break that nothing really got scheduled.  I figured it would be a fun day trip, although given that I had already taken Thursday off I would have loved to make an overnight of it.  But Craig had a lot to plan for his upcoming weekend trip to Halifax (meaning he was going back up to Toronto on Friday), so we just did the day.  

We decided to leave Tuesday night and stay at my parents' to get us a little closer and not have to leave as early, since it was a 1pm game.  Well, it ended up being a super rainy day and the storms that came through around dinnertime were CRAZY.  Like, I'm not sure I have ever seen it rain that hard for that long.  There was ponding in our front yard, which I don't think I have ever seen.  I was a little concerned by all of the gutter overflow into our front flower bed and went to check the basement.  It was good that I did because the sump pump pin got a little trapped by some of the tubing so it wasn't running quite like it was supposed to.  It might have worked eventually, but it was good that I caught it when I did and ensured that it was running properly (since it rarely has to run).  We reluctantly left just as it was starting to slow down, but promptly got rerouted twice due to flooding down the road.  I was watching the 911 calls and there were so many "dangerous conditions" calls, including two in our neighborhood.  I presume it was either for road flooding or water in basements.  Anyway, the rest of the trip wasn't bad, but the beginning was very unnerving.

We got a bit of a later start in the morning than we wanted, but the trip was pretty smooth until we got to construction outside the city, slow traffic around the CNE grounds, and a long backup at the Rogers Centre exit.  But we found a spot to park (accidentally ended up at our usual surface lot) and got in with plenty of time to spare.  We were greeted right away by this Ernie Clement sign!

It's the Blue Jays' 50th season, so they have a ton of display cases all along the concourse with artifacts, including the famous home run jacket.

We settled into our seats, which were only a couple sections over from where we sat a couple years ago when we went with Craig's parents.  I should have had Craig look when I took this shot, but the boys look good!

It was fun to be back after the craziness of the World Series, but it was definitely a different vibe--but as it was a school day game, it was still pretty fun.  The game, however, wasn't as fun.  Jacob and I actually missed the only Jays' run score while we were getting food, and Colorado came back late in the game and won it in extra innings.  Booo.  Rough start to the season for the Jays--sporadic wins and a lot of injuries.  

It looked really cool when everyone had their phones lit up.

I smiled when I saw this sign in the concourse, as that one shortstop was near and dear to my heart--John McDonald played for the Bisons when I interned there, and he was my co-intern's favorite!

The 50th season stuff was fun, and it was nice to have some cool new things to see and take pictures of.

Wish there was a third one of these!

All the uniforms

This was a bittersweet sight--nice that there's something recent, but it would have been cool if it was the BIG one.

It was extra cool to see Ernie out there after Carter got to meet him a couple months ago.  He played really well, too.

We also got to see the exciting new Japanese player, Kazuma Okomoto.

One of the fun things about the milestone season is that they brought back mascots of old--BJ Birdie, the original; Diamond, a girl blue jay; and Domer, a turtle that was the original SkyDome mascot.

We wandered around the stadium for a bit after the loss, mostly to avoid traffic, but unfortunately it ran right into rush hour, so it was busy anyway.  As we approached the border, we had to figure out dinner, and I had the thought to get Jacob to his favorite, Kith and Kin in Lockport.  We were right up north anyway, so I figured it might not be bad, and then we could take 104 home instead of the Thruway.  But it was getting close to closing time, so we ended up ordering it online, picking it up, then going down the road to Mighty Taco for the rest of us.  It worked out reasonably well aside from Mighty taking forever and getting detoured once, likely again due to residual flooding.  We got home pretty late, but overall it was a pretty good day for a last-minute trip.

It was a good thing I took Thursday off, because it turned out I had a ton of stuff to prep before Easter.  The boys and I were leaving Friday afternoon (and Craig was leaving Friday morning), and I had a bunch of food I had to prepare, lots of unpacking and repacking, and squeezing in a little work both days since I had projects that needed to be moved forward, and I wasn't able to do it Wednesday.  I was pretty much non-stop for two straight days.

Friday was a really nice day, too--to the point I probably walked a little too long and didn't get back earlier to push the boys along to pack up.  We got a bit of a late start, which made the stop at my parents' house to prep my Good Friday food contributions a little hectic, but we still ended up having a nice (though quieter than usual) Prunes and Noodles dinner.  Then we were off to church, and home to play some SkyJo with my parents.  Jacob loves that game and it's a highlight of staying there.  With all of the food prep and other things heading into the weekend, I was pretty tempted to go Friday, drive home, and come back Sunday, but staying allowed us to spend more time with my parents and do things like SkyJo.  We also made a stop at the new Dick's House of Sport and went back to Kith and Kin for lunch and Easter goodies for Jacob.  The food was fantastic as always, and Jacob enjoyed trying arancini for the first time and mozzarella sticks for maybe the first time since he went gluten-free?  Since we were staying for the weekend and Jacob was finally starting to feel a little better from his post-viral fatigue, he wanted to get some shots up.  Thankfully my cousin's wife got us into the gym where her volleyball team trains and Jacob was able to shoot for over an hour.

We had a nice weekend, but I will say I was a little sad to leave my mantel at home with so much Easter happiness--all of my Polish eggs (most of which are in a years-ago IKEA clearance find, which actually lights up), my Target Dollar Spot egg cups (from two different years), two Aldi vases (and one set of Aldi tulips), one Aldi candleholder, two Target glass eggs, and this year's Aldi glass bunny (who goes so well with the eggs!).  Oh, and I have LED lights inside the eggs and bunny that light up at night.  Add in my homemade garland made many years ago, and it's just so colorful and fun!  Easter decor does make me happy! 

The group before us left Jesus lounging on the couch, so we had to replace him like that, but the boys added the tiny detail of the hands behind the head!  How perfect, no?

A well-deserved rest after a couple tough days, I guess!

We hung out at my parents' with the plan to pick Craig up from Niagara Falls on his way back from Halifax via Toronto around 1pm, but I ended up having a little food malfunction (half of my hardboiled eggs didn't cook right) so my dad went to grab Craig while I finished up the deviled eggs, which Jacob promptly, accidentally tipped as we got in the car, making a bit of a mess of them inside their containers.  Ugh.  We made a stop at Craig's brother's house, ate and socialized for a bit, and then headed over to his parents' house.  We were still pretty full but ate a bit more there, got a super cute Snoopy-on-an-egg candy dish and a peace lily, and spent some nice time with them.  But by that point in the day we were all pretty tired and eager to get home.  The only hiccup was that Craig was so tired that he slept most of the way home and as we pulled into our neighborhood, I had the jarring realization that Craig's vehicle was all the way back in Leroy at the park-and-ride.  We had literally driven right past that exit and forgot he had left it there back on Friday.  So we unloaded all of the food and luggage (which barely fit in my car by the time we had Craig's stuff in there), and he and I hopped back in my car to drive 25 minutes back there, and 25 minutes home again.  Darn it.  So much for a little decompression time.

That was not the best way to start the week, as I was exhausted the next day, but I had to buckle down for a busy week.  Lots of work projects and deadlines, plus a quick medical procedure bright and early Thursday to check out some lady parts, but that ended up being all good.  Apparently my body's just confused and a bit stubborn, but thankfully not diseased.  Nice to cross one thing off the list of worries, even if I have plenty of other annoying perimenopause-induced body weirdness to contend with.  That morning Craig and Jacob left for Boston for Jacob's first tournament.  We knew he wouldn't play much because his fatigue prevented him from practicing, but he did end up getting in a couple games for a bit.  Not the best weekend, but it's a start.  Meanwhile at home, Carter had his first modified scrimmage.  Again, nothing super exciting, but a start.  I predict this spring is going to FLY now that I see his schedule with 2-3 games per week until just before Memorial Day.  Jacob has some really interesting trips coming up, but I'm not sure how many we'll be able to go on because of Carter's schedule.  Hmmmm.  I also got in some early yard cleanup, finally, although multiple parts of my body are protesting that today.  I won't be able to do it when Jacob and I are in Pittsburgh (!) next weekend, so it felt important to bust through that this weekend.  No word yet on whether Jacob's schedule will allow us to cram in a Pirates game.

So, I guess we're officially into full-speed-ahead spring.  All the things are up and running (although, mercifully, lacrosse is almost over--not a good season for the Knighthawks, sadly), so it's going to be a lot to manage in the coming weeks.  But maybe there will be more to talk about and I won't go weeks between posts for a change...