Baseball Dreams...

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...Cooperstown Dreams Park, New York...

The highlight of my son's life so far:  traveling to Cooperstown, New York with his baseball team this summer.

The anticipation of this trip reached its peak toward the middle of August.  Fund raising was over.  New equipment was bought.  His hard work was about to pay off!

There were fund raisers all year...you know, selling things, having raffles, and finding local companies for sponsorship.  But above and beyond all these efforts, Big C put in some old-fashioned blood and sweat.  He mowed lawns, watered plants and even gave up some of his weekly allowance, in order to go on this trip of a lifetime.  I really was so proud of him.

The only bit of disappointment was in the fact that this would not be a vacation for the entire family.  But it would be an extraordinary memory-maker for him and Dad.

We got him all packed up...baseball equipment and all.

We had really stressed to him that the trip was expensive.  And that he would have to do his part and work hard.  The money he had earned for the last many months was put away...for just that purpose.  So, you can imagine his surprise when we handed all his hard-earned dollars back to him on the week before the trip...to be his spending money.

In the middle of August, they took off to New York.  It was a long week back at home for us.  We missed them terribly.  But we got to talk nearly every night.  Team families would text some highlights (like Big C's 2 home runs!)  And, we even got to watch one of the games live, online.

When the day came to pick up Dad and Big C, we headed to LAX, ready to hear all about their week.  Well, this kid talked and talked and talked and talked some more!  It was so obvious that it had been a dream-come-true for him...

Here are some highlights from that experience:

• bunking with the team + 4 coaches (Dad included)
• going to the Baseball Hall of Fame
• eating their fill and then some, at meal time
• BBQ'ing and relaxing at team families' condos
• trading pins with a thousand other boys
• buying souvenirs
• walking around a totally baseball-themed town
• being given a special ring for the tournament
• ranking 18th out of 100 teams
• hitting a home run
• hitting a 2nd home run
• visiting Doubleday Field, home of baseball
• simply traveling across the country to play baseball
• spending 1 last exciting week with teammates he's played with for the past 3 years

And that, my friends, are what baseball dreams are made of...