"Baseball is LIFE!" - Zerin

So Zerin's latest obsession is, you guessed it, baseball. It started out small... Bryan pulled out his old collection of baseball cards, which led to him sharing some of them with the kids, which led to favorite teams, which led to favorite players, which led to hours upon hours being spent organizing them in different ways, which led to baseball games and games of pepper, and the NEED for baseball outfits...you get the idea.

He will get home from school and play catch with Liah, or pitch to himself, or catch his own flies for as long as I'll let him. He will also now sit through an entire 3 hour game of baseball. I know this because he spent all week telling me his team (the Cardinals) would be playing on Saturday. He got his chores all done and watched the clock religiously all day. When the time came, he flew down the stairs and planted himself, looking like a soldier ready for battle. Now, Bryan isn't a yell-at-the-tv kind of guy when it comes to sports...he loves sports, but he rarely watches them. Zerin is apparently out of a different mold. He was yelling at the players, the ump, and nearly cried when his team lost in the final inning. During quiet moments of the game, I could hear him spouting off facts and tidbits about the different players. He even took notes! He wrote down all of the players that they highlighted, and tried to write down all of their stats...he then went to work at making his own baseball cards for them, because his stats were more accurate than ones on the backs of the cards he can buy at the store...but he still wants ones he can buy at the store. Such a funny kid.

Oh, and I told you about finding his cardinals baseball shirt at my friend's garage sale? Awesome. But as he has studied baseball players, their habits, their manner of dress...he realized that all baseball players wear necklaces (he found one in the garage and now refuses to take it off...for anything), and they spit a lot, which yay, he now does....grrr.

He even asked his teacher to show him how to write his name in cursive so he could "autograph" his own baseball cards. He won't practice his regular handwriting without an act of congress, but he will practice that autograph for hours when it's time for bed. He asked Bryan to take these pictures for his baseball pre-rookie card. He wanted him to make them look old because they'll be worth more, faster.

Here's the equation that basically sums up my son...

Donald Trump + Rudy + Albert Puholtz = Zerin