Pitching counts

My oldest son's baseball season is about to begin and this is the first year he'll be facing live pitching. Kids pitching to kids. It's a scary thought and not just for the players. Will an errant throw change your little leaguer's passion for the game? Hopefully, after reading this it won't be.

The first thing your little Ted Williams needs to learn is how to properly get hit by a pitch if he can't get out of the way. It should be instinctual, but I've seen kids take a pitch in the worst way. Teach your kid to turn his pitcher's side shoulder to the catcher guarding his head behind back and shoulders. Protect the head and chore muscles and the sting will be gone by the time he reaches 2nd base.

Batters have getting beaned since the game began, but the game is SO much fun, 99.9999999999% come back to play again another day. That percentage would be even higher if today's batting helmets would have been mandated earlier.

Youth leagues provide batting helmets for players from T-ball up, but if you're child is going to play I highly recommend getting your own. And spend the extra $9 and get a face cage. A properly fitted helmet will make you and your little batter feel more secure at the plate and it can stop lice spreading to your house. And while the cage can be something to get used to, it's a lot easier than getting used to reconstructive dental or facial work. I had a friend who had a shiner for a month after a ball went off his bat and hit him in the eye (he was lucky).

The other side of a hit batter is the pitcher. No pitcher wants to hit a batter but when it happens, the pitcher needs to know how to recover. Getting your pitcher to refocus quickly probably starts before a game situation ever happens, but in a game situation, it will most certainly take just the right words. If you're the coach, you've probably been taught some techniques at a certification course. Say something along the lines of, "The sting will be gone before he trots back to the dugout. sometimes a pitch gets away. it happens. now make the adjustment. remember what we practiced and rely on your stuff."

I've been working with my little Cy Young for some time, trying to discover what works and what doesn't. We have a canvas strike zone, supported by PVC piping and nylon netting. The thing even has a silhouette of a batter. I watched all the pitching mechanic videos on YouTube and shared the good ones with my son. In the beginning, I was encouraged to see pitches go into the net. What surprised me the most was when I applied some colored tape in the corners of the strike zone and asked him to pick one and hit it. His strike percentage increased leaps and bounds. Turns out the strike zone was too vague of a place to focus and after defining specific points within it, he was able to dial in and deliver consistently.

Prepare to hit and be hit with the right moves, equipment and practice methods.

Remembering the Tooth Fairy

We live in what some might call a cake-eater community. I mean on the last day of school, there was a rented stretch Hummer there - not to pick up a retiring staff member. Nope, it was there for a single elementary school kid.

Anyway, when my oldest lost his first baby tooth, he'd heard stories of how his peers had received large denominations for their chompers and I'm sure in his head, that money was already spent.

Luckily, when the tooth began to wiggle I contacted the tooth fairy and was able to have a sit down talk with a representative.

Here's what we worked out. I acknowledged inflation and that a mere 25 cent piece probably wasn't going to cut it in comparison to what other children were receiving. On the other hand, placing even a very large monetary amount on a tooth cheapened the event.

Ultimately, we decided to stick with the Tooth Fairy's tradition of exchanging currency for teeth, but to counter the cheapening effect, we decided the currency itself should be special.

So when the tooth finally fell out, my son woke the next morning and found a two dollar bill under his pillow. Subsequent teeth yielded other less commonly exchanged currency such as gold, rare coins and miscellaneous foreign coins.

Now every time my son or I come across a two dollar bill or rare coin, we both think of The Tooth Fairy.

Sounds like big league ball

The playoffs are just around the corner and I have had some time to reflect on my oldest son's first season of real baseball. Well, it was real baseball in the sense that there were three outs and strikes, even though there were 5 strikes allowed per bat appearance.

Around here, kids get 2 to 3 years of t-ball slash coach-pitch before going on to one year of machine pitch and after that, the kids pitch to kids.

After one year of coach-pitch I recognized my son was a little more advanced in baseball than of the many kids in his league. So I cheated the system a hair and lied about his grade in order to move him up to machine pitch. Machine pitch is a developmental league where they go over the fundamentals and more importantly, runs and outs mean something whereas previous years teams switched sides every six batters and runs and outs had no consequence. Well, moving him up worked out wonderfully and he gets another year of machine pitch whereas the kids he played with will go on to kid pitch.

Anyway, my future big leaguer is urging me to be a coach after and I've been thinking how I could top his first year. His team went to the championship game and lost by one run. Actually, I thought it was fortunate to come in 2nd place in the first year in organized ball. It leaves the kids hungry and I'm sure it will drive them to try just that much harder in the years to come.

Over the course of the developmental league season, I noticed the coaches constantly barking out the same things. "Force at one," "force at two," "force at any bag," and other vital pieces of communication. So I had this idea that instead of hearing these commands over and over, it would be fun to hear things you would hear at a major league game. "Programs! Get your programs here!" and "Peanuts, popcorn.. Cracker Jacks!" Imagine the other teams' reactions to hearing coaches calling out "Lemonade.. Lemonade.. Just like Grandma made!"

To make this work, you would have to call these commands while practicing the plays so the kids knew instinctively what it meant come game time. Here's what these coded commands could be:

Klondike.. alerting the catcher there's a pop-up he can catch for an out.

Cotton Candy... Make the easiest or closest out, even at home plate.

Hot Apple Pie (in the sky).. letting the runners know to stay close to the bag in case of pop up

Peanuts, Popcorn, Cracker Jacks.. Force out at 1st, 2nd, or 3rd

Lemonade, Lemonade...There are two outs and runners need to be running on contact

Cold beer here! Telling the runner on 2nd he should be looking to go home if ball goes to outfield (2nd graders like to slide into every bag for some reason).

Well, I could go on and on but to keep things from getting too complicated I'll start with these. If they work well, I'll expand into "Foam Fingers" and "Souvenirs!"

Lessons from 2nd Grade

I can remember going back to school like it was yesterday. Having a backpack full of new pencils, markers, notebooks and folders. New clothes including a pair of new shoes I was positive would help me out run everyone at recess. The memories are so vivid that I was a bit shocked I'd forgotten so much about the first few days of school.

First of all, it's okay to be walked to the door - but only on the first day. I remembered this rule the second day as my child ran off ahead of me as if the principal was handing out free candy. I followed from a distance just to make sure he reached school grounds safely, but trying to convey complete confidence in my child, I told the parents I was walking with that, "I just want to show his little brother where big brother is going." They must have bought it because the walked with me.

Second, a brown bag lunch is better than pizza day on the first days of school. When I was a kid, we had to buy tickets to buy a lunch. Now days the kids have a secret number they enter. It's a much better system. No concerns your child is going to lose the money on the way to school or spend it on something else. But not all kids are as good at remembering the code as my son. So while the cashier was looking through her book of codes to make sure each kid's account was being billed correctly, my son's lunch time was being cut shorter and shorter.

He came home that day with an appetite that frightened me. In between mouthfuls he told me he was at the end of the lunch line and every kid in front of him had forgotten their code. He managed to get a bite of his cheeseburger before the lunch time is over bell rang.

Third lesson, you can never have too much facial tissue. Maybe it's allergies or maybe it's being exposed to so many other nose pickers, but for some reason in those first days of school my boy's nose is like the Terminator. You can blow it out but it just keeps coming back again and again. With that kind of relentless tenacity, the couple of tissues I tucked into his pocket were exhausted before recess. And despite donating a couple boxes of Kleenex to the class, my son wasn't about to call attention to himself by going up to the desk to grab some. Oh no, it was so much more discrete to continually touch his nose to his short sleeve shirt. He came home looking like he walked through a paintball battlefield.

The last lesson - the alarm clock goes off earlier and earlier. That first day of school, my son was fed, dressed and polished a full hour before school started. The second day it he had a few minutes of free time before heading out. And the third day, I was almost sure he was going to be late. My wife and I were trying to adjust his bed time so he was getting up and going to bed in a cycle that was natural for him. For future reference, don't make any adjustments to sleep schedule at least for the first few weeks.

It's recommended that school agers get 10 hours of sleep - and that's actual sleep, not just time in bed. So allowing for the bed time routine, the time to fall asleep and the wake-up routine, you'll probably end up starting the night time routine about 12 hours before school starts.

It's been 30 years or so since I was in elementary school, but as this article demonstrates, I'm still learning lessons from 2nd grade.

babies are da bomb

When we brought home our first baby we might as well brought home one of those motion sensitive explosives you see in the movies. You know, where if someone moves too quickly the whole place goes kablooey? Usually there's a click and then someone spots blinking light or a hears an ever increasing beep beep. The baby equivalent is a persistent scream that seems to get exponentially louder the longer it goes on.

My wife read all the books about what to expect so she was completely prepared to defuse any situation, or so she thought. I, on the other hand, had not read the books and instead relied completely on parental instincts handed down from years of evolution.

Anyway, once your infant is home things are pretty relaxed. Baby sleeps a lot. Sure there are the normal cries for food or diaper changes. But sometimes you can't stop the wailing with food or fresh pants.

As the crying gets louder and goes on longer things get a little more frantic. Your baby seems to be trying to tell you something like, "Cut the blue wire! Blue wire!" But you don't understand, so you check the diaper again. Change the outfit. Offer some milk. Check the milk to see if it's the right temperature. Shake the baby rattle. Give some medicine for gas. Hold baby on shoulder. Lay baby on back. Lay baby on tummy. Wonder if you can give Tylenol in conjunction with gas medicine. Sing. Sing a different song (Take me out to the ballgame is just as good as any lullabye in this situation). Maybe baby doesn't like the words so, hum. All the while the screaming persists and you feel the fuse is lit fuse and approaching its payload fast.

Somehow, miraculously I discovered my first born found the sound of running water soothing. Whew! And when baby number two began to scream "BLUE WIRE" I went straight to the running water only find it was the bathroom fan that defused him.

I knew the running water was a temporary fix and I was going to need to make a calming mechanism for him. One day during a nap I took some multi-colored Christmas lights and pinned them to the ceiling in a decorative pattern above the rocking chair. Each night, momma would rock baby to sleep and he would just stare at the lights and the lights became an alternative to the running water.

My second born found lights not to be soothing but exciting instead. A bigger problem with him was that sometimes he would get all agitated on the changing table. Often throwing a fit, kicking his feet, twisting about, putting his hands in the last place you would want and generally being uncooperative.

To contaminate the volatile situation, I took a page from my dentist. On ceiling over the patient's chairs my dentist has placed "really busy" posters so they can look at something while work is being done. My toddler still has his undersea poster above his changing table. While I change him, I ask him to count the fish, the turtles, dolphins etc.

So if you're unclear which wire your baby is telling you to cut, remain calm. Take a page out of my manual. Put some eye candy on the ceiling. Sing the baseball anthem. Get a mouthful of water and do your impression of a whale. Wear a diaper on your head. Get as silly as you have to. Just know the episode will likely pass as quickly as it came on.

Of course if it does persist, call your doctor and never, ever shake the baby.

Pushing and letting go - Or - When the training wheels are off.

For my son's 5th birthday, we bought him his first bike. Compared to my first bike, a hand-me-down from my aunt outfitted with a banana seat, ape-hanger handle bars with pink and white streamers, his bike was greased lightning. His ride - royal blue, neon green, flame details, pads in all the right places, a water bottle and a racing number displayed in front. Any boy's dream bike right?

Well, the boy upon seeing the gift, hopped on for a photo-opp. We captured the huge smile and the excitement and then, as he was dismounting, he caught a foot and went splat, palms flat on the pavement. At that moment, the bike became a monster and I wished I'd have bought a Razor Scooter instead of a bike (more on this later).

He still had plenty of time to conquer his fear of the bike, so we didn't push the issue. The following year, shortly before his 6th birthday, his interest in riding picked up when he saw his friends riding without training wheels. He decided it was time to slay the beast... well, at least ride it with training wheels on.

A few weeks of riding with training wheels, and I thought he was ready to have the cheaters off. The training wheels may have comforted him but they worried me terribly. Steering with training wheels makes the rider top-heavy and there's a likelihood of catching a wheel in a groove.

The more I pushed learning to ride the bike, the harder he refused. I tried reasoning, "...look at all the people riding bike. I wonder why they do it? Probably because it's fun." I tried bribing, "if we do 15 minutes of bike, we'll have Dairy Queen." We even witnessed a kid taking a spill and getting right back on to ride away, "wow, must be really fun if he wants to get back on after a digger like that."

Another year passed.

My neighbor has a boy younger than my oldest and I saw him riding on two wheels. I asked his dad how he taught his son to ride. He said he didn't. He bought his son a Razor Scooter the year prior and that's where he learned to balance. One day he just picked up the bike and rode it. This was the 2nd time I had heard the Razor Scooter was the key to learning bike so I knew it wasn't a fluke.

So I ask my boy "ever tried one of those scooters." Silence. " What do you say we go get one of those fancy Razor Scooters? "No thanks."

The better part of summer passed and finally, I had enough. I made him practice on back the lawn 15 minutes a day. Somedays he just sat on the bike not really trying - just doing "his time." I think once he realized I wasn't pushing him to ride, or in other terms, I "let go" of caring so much he began to try.

Of course I was pretending not to care. I was watching the whole time; biting my tongue trying not to encourage or help.

After a bit I realized his struggles were steering in rough grass and keeping both feet on the pedals on bumpy ground. It was time to take him to the outdoor basketball court. He was terrified of going ker-plat on the pavement, but I showed him he could go into the grass if he felt he was losing control or wanted to stop.

On the walk to the park, I held on to the bike as he rode. He began to pedal and I released my control of the bike, keeping my hands near his torso until I felt he had "it." Before we even reached the basketball court, my son was riding unassisted.

As predicted, he loves riding. Can't get him off the bike now.

But for all the grief he put me through, I'm definitely getting a Razor Scooter for my next up-and-coming riders.

After it was all said and done. He wouldn't have got on the bike if I hadn't pushed the issue. And he wouldn't have learned to ride it if I hadn't let go.

The potty chair and the psychiatrist's couch

Short of having the throne with a sports, cars or BBQ theme, the dad's spin on potty training will have to wait 'til we're ready to "AIM AND FIRE!" For right now, it's about getting him to listen to what his body is saying.

With my oldest son, the advice was to "... just wait, don't rush it. He'll catch on when he's ready." Whatever. That advice had us in diapers forever. My toddler is able to tell me what he wants through gestures or nearly undecipherable words- clear signs he's ready to learn the wonders of indoor plumbing.

Follow my logic here. Your kid has known diapers since moments after birth. The longer he or she remains in diapers, the harder it will be to train them to use the toilet. The earlier you introduce the throne to him or her, the easier the transition should go.

Step 1, get out the chair and let the kid see it. Don't force anything, just let it be there as if it were any piece of furniture. Don't even call attention to it. Let the child discover it and when he does, say something like "that's for you when you're ready." It may be sitting out months before you're ready to take the next step, but the fewer things that are new and freaky to him, the better.

Step 2 in my process was to pull out the fun potty training videos. I highly recommend the potty training video "Bear in the Big Blue House." Anyway, my toddler watched that video over and over again - not because the subject matter was so riveting, but because it was new to him. Something must have stuck, because taking to the chair was fairly easy. After about 2 weeks of that video, we we're ready to take the next steps.

Step 3 is placing the reward. My toddler is a freak for fruit snacks so I bought a box and placed it in the bathroom in a highly visible but unreachable place. My friend says she used a jar of M&M's. Whatever trips your kid's trigger right?

Step 4 is taking notice of your child's natural rythm and tendencies. Does your kid need new diapers before or after eating, sleeping and waking? Those are good times to try the chair.

I began to notice his diapers were fairly dry in the morning comparatively and thought I'd set him up for success by placing him on the john when he potentially would go. Well, he didn't produce anything that first time, but I rewarded him with a fruit snack for trying. The next morning, he told me his word for fruit snack (sounds like bean - don't ask me why) and so I sat him on the chair again and viola! A few high fives all around and the all important fruit snack reward and I could see the light at the end of the diaper tunnel.

Potty training is a big deal. If done poorly, there's a real danger in emotionally scarring your child for life. If you don't want your child seeking psychiatric help well into his adulthood because of the potty training phase, appreciate the tiniest steps forward. Just sitting on the chair without producing anything is a monumental step forward. Heck, even having an accident is a sign your child is on his way to becoming potty trained.

One last thing, appreciate that your kid is in diapers, because soon as he's in big boy underpants, that little bladder has to go ALL the time.