Stop Me If You’ve Heard This Before…

Our apologies to those of you who expect us to frequent the pages of this blog more often. Jeff’s been trying to keep up with everything at FenwayFanatics.com, with spring training finally in full swing and the first Grapefruit League action taking place Wednesday night against Minnesota. Curt Schilling will get the start that night and Daisuke Matsuzaka will take the hill on Friday night against Boston College, though none of the starters for the first few weeks are expected to pitch more than a couple of innings as the club takes a closer look at the minor leaguers and the possible future in Boston.

Of course, the family has been the real center of attention, with Jakob, who will be four in April, going to school now five days a week and Lea, just shy of 18 months, getting smarter by the second (yesterday, she pointed at the sky and clearly spoke the word: “airplane!”). Mom and Dad just try to take it all in and remember that the kids will only be young once. One note of interest lately is that Jakob is finally getting toilet-trained; he’s been able to use the potty for a long time but it’s only recently that he’s finally decided that he’s a big boy now. Of course, as parents usually do, we try to make a big deal out of it every time that he successfully keeps his pants clean and uses the toilet; we even have a potty song that seems to help enforce the idea since he loves to sing songs all day.

Weekends have been all about the family, too, as we’ve decided to save a few bucks on work around the house in favor of getting out of the house more when Dad’s home for the weekend. The weather has been pretty cold as of late, so we might make a trip to the local playspace or walk around the mall. We had a nice snowfall a couple of weeks ago and have had a few additional snow storms since then so, as the weather warmed late last week and into the weekend, we had some fun in the backyard making a snowman and pulling the kids around on their sleds. Lea’s still not sure that she is a fan of the white stuff yet, but Jakob would play all day out there if Mom and Dad had that kind of energy to keep up with him!

That’s about all from here; the truth is, the weather isn’t going to get much warmer for another month, so we’re doing everything that we can to avoid cabin fever. It won’t be long now, though, before the tulips and the daffodils make their annual appearance, the lawn mower comes out of the shed, and Red Sox baseball returns to the television every night for six months.