2010: A Year in Review

January

We packed up everything and started our cross country drive from California to Florida.

February

Spring Training started in Viera, FL.  I enjoyed getting back together with all the other girls!

March

Lots of Spring Training games, and the First Ladies raised the most money for the Alzheimer's Association Walk at Space Coast Stadium!  I also turned 23 on March 22nd.

April

Chilly Opening Day for the Syracuse Chiefs, Syracuse, NY.

May

We woke up to SNOW on Mother's Day in Syracuse.  We also spent 2 weeks back in Viera, FL to help Collin transition to his role as a relief pitcher.  (Lots of love bugs, runs on the beach & sunshine).

June

Collin turned 24 on June 6th, and the Chiefs Girls held a Great American Bakesale!

July

We got to go HOME for 3 days over All-Star Break.  At the end of the month, Collin got called up to the big leagues while we were in Durham, NC playing the Rays' Triple-A team.

August

Saw a lot of family during the road trip to play the Diamondbacks and Dodgers.

September

My parents came to DC for a long weekend.  We also traveled to Philadelphia and NYC.

October

Season's over and we were HOME!  We also celebrated our 1 year anniversary on the 17th at South Coast Winery in Temecula.

November

We traveled to St. Croix, USVI with Anthony and Lauren.

December

We traveled to Ohio for about 9 days to spend time with my family and friends.

I visited 14 states in 2010 (Collin about 17) and flew on more flights than I can count.

Packed up our lives 5 or 6 times, and lived out of a suitcase for a couple months.

We live a crazy life, but I LOVE it and can't wait to see what adventures 2011 will bring :)

Two Weeks...

Two weeks until I will be in OHIO!  The whole entire Sterling Family will be getting together in Ohio for a special Christmas Eve at my uncle's house in Findlay.  There will be about 36 cousins, aunts, uncles, babies, and a pair of amazing grandparents coming from Florida, Virginia, Ohio, Missouri, and California.  The only person we will be missing is my brother Stephen.  He lives in Arizona and has to stay there for work. :(  One of the main driving forces behind getting us all together is my Uncle Maurice.  He is my grandma's cousin and will be 90 in February.  For as long as I can remember, he would always dress up as Santa on Christmas Eve as a treat to us young cousins.  He hasn't done it in years, but now that a new generations of little cousins has bloomed, he is going to don the red suit one last time:)

I love this time of year; hot cocoa, sweaters, gloves, wrapping presents, Christmas carols, family and SNOW.  I can get the afore mentioned in Southern California, except for the SNOW.  I am anxious to be surrounded by my friends and family, sharing memories, eating yummy cookies, and see the snow falling down outside.  ...14 days... :)

The Fall in Review

Oh Me Oh My it has been a while.....let's recap:

September: 
Collin got called back up to the big leagues for the rest of the season.  My parents came to DC for a long weekend.  I went to my parents' house in Florida for a few days and went on road trips to Philadelphia and NYC.

October:
After spending a week in Ohio, we went HOME!  We celebrated our one year anniversary on the 17th at South Coast Winery in Temecula.  We had a fun night out for Halloween in Laguna Beach.  Anthony and Lauren were the red bird and green pig from Angry Birds game on iPhone.  Collin was a lumberjack (he had a beard goin at the time so it seemed appropriate), I was a woodland fairy, and Collin's friend Joel was Collin.  No, not a typo, Joel wore Collin's uniform.. haha- last minute creativity!

November:

Collin and Anthony were invited to be "celebrities" at a golf tournament in St. Croix, USVI.  All proceeds benefited the local Queen Louise Home, a place for abused and neglected children.  We felt so lucky to have been invited and Lauren and I sure enjoyed the time we had in the sun while the guys were golfing.  Although it rained... a LOT, we kept ourselves busy with tasting the local Cruzan rum;)

Tomorrow Collin, Anthony, Lauren and I are running the 10K Dana Point Turkey Trot... gotta burn some calories before all the good food at Collin's Aunt's house!

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

Louisville

Every morning Collin and I find a spot to read a section from our couples' devotional bible and drink a cup of good coffee (or espresso).  We have found a couple of decent places within walking distance of the hotel here in Louisville.  However, at our home in California we have a french press that we use every morning to make the perfect cup of coffee.  I am proud to say that over the past year, I have turned my husband into a coffee snob:)  And ever since I forgot to bring our french press with us this season, Collin has been on a quest to find any cafés or restaurants that offer it.  So, yesterday morning we drove to a cute little 1940's house-turned-café that had french pressed coffee.  And it was worth the drive.

 Since we already had our car out of the parking garage, we decided we might as well go check out the Kentucky State Fair.  We were a little less than impressed.  Last year we went to the New York State Fair and let's just say between the endless rows of booths offering fried.. anything.. a frozen wine sampling tent, a traveling one-man-band and the live show from Canada complete with 3 HUGE bears, our expectations were set a little too high.

*disclaimer: I do not condone the use of bears as entertainment. I'm sure the very last things these bears want to do is ride a Schwinn or shoot some hoops:(

Three positives about the KY State Fair:
1. The huge amount of exhibits found INDOORS... in air conditioning!
2. We got to see little baby chicks hatching:) Cutest.thing.ever.
3. The produce display/competition!

For some reason, I get overwhelmingly happy when I walk into a room full to the brim with fruits and vegetables.  Not just a room of produce but a room dedicated to the care and natural beauty of fruits and vegetables.  I think us humans take for granted what fruits and vegetables are.  Imagine coming across a certain fruit or vegetable in the wild for the first time ever. imagine what the people thought when they first sliced into a big oval green striped fruit lying on the ground and found the bright red sweet juicy flesh of a watermelon.  It's like natural candy!  I think we try and do too much to disguise fruits and vegetables instead of just respecting them for what they can naturally offer.

This is from the NY State Fair last year. I have the cropped image of this picture in four frames in my kitchen!

Blue Ribbon winner! 200+ lb watermelon

Sweet baby chicks!

Collin in the Tobacco section.  

I was convinced I was getting a contact buzz from being in the room.. yuck.

Tonight is our last night in Louisville.  Collin has an eearrrlly wake up call tomorrow morning to fly back to Syracuse.  And instead of making the 12+ hour drive to Syracuse tomorrow, I am going to Columbus to see some friends tomorrow and then I will drive up to my brother's house in Perrysburg and spend some time there:)  Can't wait to see this little gem:

Still haven't quite figured out the correct pronunciation for this darn town I'm in.  Loo-ee-vill?  Loo-i-vill? Loo-vull? Loo-i-vull? I give up!

Big Leagues and Back

One month is an unacceptable time gap between blog posts but I do have a few excuses:)

Let's go back to the morning of July 24th.  Collin and I were doing our daily devotional over coffee at a café in Durham, NC when Collin got a call from the Syracuse manager telling him that he was going to fly out to Milwaukee to join the Nationals for their game against the Brewers that night.  We quickly packed up his things and off he went in a taxi headed for the airport.  I stayed in Durham because he was supposed to come straight back the next morning.  However the chain of events that carried out continued to surprise us and allowed him to stay up for 2 weeks!  It's terrible to see people get hurt in baseball and I wouldn't wish it upon anyone but it just so happened that a few people went on the DL which opened up roster spots and kept Collin from being sent down.  We were even able to go on the Arizona/LA road trip, which is such a special trip for us because we got to spend time with my brother, Stephen, in Arizona and Collin's family was able to come to the LA hotel and Dodgers games!  Oh, and if timing wasn't perfect enough already... Lauren (Collin's sister, whose boyfriend Anthony was up with the Twins at the time) just happened to be going to CA for a wedding that weekend, so I was able to spend quite a bit of time with her too!

After the last game in LA, Collin got sent down. (Ironically Anthony got called up 4 days before Collin, and got sent down the morning Collin did)  No reason to be sad though!--- when we got back to DC, we drove to my brother's house in Ohio, stayed with them for a night and Collin flew out to Syracuse the next day.  The Syracuse road trip this week just happens to be within driving distance of my brother's house, so I drove to Indianapolis yesterday to meet Collin here for four days, and then we will drive together to Louisville on Monday night.  The last couple weeks couldn't have gone smoother.  This is all proof that God has a plan for our lives, and this year we have thoroughly understood that, and have put all our trust and faith in Him.  When you do that, you can live in peace knowing that no matter what happens it happens for a reason.  Even when life throws you curveballs (no pun intended), you can take them with grace because you know ultimately everything will work out in the end and God will provide for you.

All-Star Break

Summer Vacation?  Sorry, not in our vocabulary.  All-Star break?  Now you're speaking my language!

Day Game< Rain Out< Off Day< All-Star Break

We began planning our all-star break a couple months ago, and have been actively ticking off the days since mid June.  All-Star Break is a lovely 3 day span of no baseball.  Unless of course you are IN the all-star game, which would be a huge honor, but since Collin was not, we had a nice little 3 day vacation to look forward to.  Destination: "Home Home."

The guys' last game before the break was in Pawtucket, RI on Sunday the 11th.  I flew out on the 8th, and Collin flew out of Boston after the game Sunday, making for a verryy late trip to LAX Sunday night.  We had 3 nights to soak up every ounce of relaxation, and aspect of being home before taking the red-eye back Wednesday night.  We filled our time with long bike rides to the harbor, a chilly swim in the ocean, home cooked meals and laying by the pool. 

 Some people thought we were crazy for making a cross-country trip for just 3 days, but it was sooo worth it.  We really miss our home!  The bed is bigger, softer, sweeter smelling and our bathroom is ours, and only ours to use.  The best aspect of spending 3 days in South Orange County: the weather.  A perfect 72 degrees and bright blue skies, everyday, all the time, without avail. 

We took the trail through the St. Regis Monarch Beach golf course, to the beach

This is exactly what he deserved to do...

Other news over all-star break:  

• Congratulations to Anthony Slama for making the AAA All-Star Team and also for pitching in the Future's game in Anaheim!
• Congrats to our teammate Chase Lambin for being the AAA All-Star MVP! (if you ever have a chance, search Chase Lambin on YouTube and watch vids of him playing in Japan last year, crazy awesome fans!)
• Congrats to one of Collin's best friends and old high school teammate, Hank Conger for hitting a 3-run bomb in the Future's game and landing himself the title of MVP of the game!  

Best wishes for everyone for the 2nd half of the season!

And the Winner is...

Our Bake Sale was a HUGE success.  We raised over $1800!  Here are some of the goodies I whipped
up:

Strawberry Cupcakes, Justin Maxwell Coffee Brownies, Bally Star Sugar Cookies

Josh Wilkie Milky Chocolate Crispy Squares, Boomer Whiting White Chocolate Pretzels, Chiefs Choo Choo Chocolate Chip Cookies

As you know, the kitchen at our place here in Syracuse is not my own, and it came with NOTHING, so I certainly improvised when it came to doing the baking.  I wrapped a can of Pam cooking spray with wax paper to double as a rolling pin :)

It was also Ladies Night at the ball-park so all of the wives got to throw out the first pitch!

And as for the drawing for the Nats/Chiefs prize pack...

There were four names entered.

Congratulations Carol from Virginia!

Thank you to everyone again for your donations and support:)