Ephrata hosted the 16-18-year-old Babe Ruth World Series from August 5-August 12. Our boys arrived on the afternoon of the 3rd - all SIX of them! We got to host players from the Tuscon team and it was a full house and a fun time!
Smoke from wildfires rolled into town and created a hazy blanket for the entire tournament. Opening ceremonies went well and Mitch got to be a bat boy for his Grandpa Johnson's River Dogs.
Bryan and other players from the 1998 champion River Dogs were honored and Bry threw out the opening pitch to Doumit.
Dave was also honored with an award. The field looked beautiful entirely as a result of his hours upon hours of work there.
Three generations of Johnson baseball men.
In fact, Mitch had many roles over the course of the week plus. He helped keep score in the booth and ran the radar gun.
He got to see friends like Cale in the crowd.
And he was a bat boy with Blake for every River Dog game. All the games were played at 8pm, which meant there was very little sleep.
Some tried to catch up on missing sleep during the late games!
Our boys had a rocky start but did make it out of pool play. On their bye day, we took the team to Deep Lake for some cliff jumping.
These boys were typical teens with voracious appetites, late night habits, sleeping in, video games, and phone addictions. However, they were also extremely polite and wonderful with our children!
Some cliff jumping spectators.
Bryan joined the boys in taking the plunge from the 40-footer!
They had a great time and no one was hurt!
The drive home was a very quiet one.
We enjoyed lots of evening meals together, sometimes with the neighbors and their boys, sometimes with a few cleat chasers, but always with good food.
There were several cornhole tournaments with lots of trash talk.
Home run derby in the park was common, as were late night tennis games or whiffle ball on the courts.
They played Legos with Mitch, too.
Our kids were very sad and sorry to say good-bye when we took the boys to their bus in the early hours of Sunday morning. What great memories!
Drake, Sean, John, Addison, Mark and Adrian rounded out our family for 10 days. We love our Tucson boys!
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