30 Jun 2023 - Baseball in Norwalk and Visit from Sister Karen

 

Ashley, Daniel Jr, Dan, Calvin, Karen, Doreen, Ed

Today we drove to Norwalk, the town we lived in and raised our kids in from Thanksgiving 1977 until Feb 2018, to watch our grandson Daniel Jr play in a three day baseball tournament.  

On the way down we drove through Des Moines and passed by our beautiful state capitol building.  The building was constructed between 1871 and 1886, and is the only five-domed capitol in the country.  The commanding feature is the central towering dome constructed of iron and brick and covered with tissue-paper thin sheets of pure 23-carat gold. There is a protective layer sealing the gold from the weather. The gold leafing was replaced in 1964–1965 at a cost of $79,938. The most recent regilding of the dome was carried out from 1998 to 1999, at a cost of about $482,000.  The dome shines beautifully over the city of Des Moines.

  

We arrived at the brand new Fareway Fields at the Gregg Young Sports Campus in Norwalk.  There are eight synthetic turf baseball fields designed to be playable 20 minutes after the rain stops.  So we had a front pass through unloading some rain on us this morning, so the 1100 hrs game was delayed one hour to 1200 hrs  Parking is still in development so we chose a nearby residential street to park the big brown truck.

Daniel at bat, getting ready to poke one deep

Daniel behind the plate.

Very few successfully steal second base when Daniel is behind the plate

The team wore their Mother's Day uniforms with their mom's names on the back.  Daniel plays shortstop, third base, catcher and pitcher normally.  He is a really good baseball player as is his brother Calvin.  The baseball talent runs in their genes as their dad, Dan, was first team all state catcher and set the record in Norwalk for the number of doubles hit in a season.  I played many years of baseball as primarily a pitcher and my dad Lefty, well if you have been reading my blog you know all about his baseball history!

So Daniels team, "Game Ready 12U", won their first game today 10-5 and then played again at 1400 hrs and won that game 9-8.  So they are seeded number 1.  Tomorrow (Saturday) they play at noon and if they win they don't play again until Sunday.  If they lose they play another game at 1800 hrs tomorrow.  We are so glad we are home and able to see him play in person rather than streaming online!

Doreen and I got back to Ankeny, showered up, and headed to a local Mexican restaurant as my sister Karen arrived in town today and we will be having dinner with her tonight along with Dan's family. 

 

Our mother Wilma was a beautiful artist.  I wished I had her talent.  When our mother passed away from Alzheimer's disease, Karen and I both received some of her paintings. Karen cleaned out a storage unit she had in Texas and brought back some of my mother Wilma's paintings for our kids.  After dinner we transferred those to our truck and brough them home.  Tomorrow morning Karen will come over to the house to see our upgrades since she was here last in 2018.  Here are some of Wilma's creations:

Karen also brought a couple keepsakes from my dad, Lefty - his retirement badge and his metallic membership card in the Iowa State Trooper's Association.  At some point these will be handed down to our son Dan and further to his kids at the appropriate time.  

 

Another awesome keepsake she brought is my grandmother Freda Fett's German bible from 1906 and a pencil sketch of Grandma Freda .  The bible especially is very fragile and so neat!  I was only five years old in 1961 when Grandma Freda passed away, but we must preserve the memory of her for our children and their children.

So, great day here.  Looking forward to watching our grandson "D" play again tomorrow!