Spring Training Trip 2012 Recap-PART FOUR

For all of you who don't care about baseball, I promise next week I'll be back to my "normal" posts. I can't promise I won't mention baseball every day now and then though! ;) When I start working on my Spring Training scrapbook, this online recap will come in handy!! :)

Sunday (Day 4) we were back at the practice fields in hopes of getting more pictures of the players. We made it to the fields about 30 minutes before the gate open, so we were near the front of the line to get in. The man behind us starting asking questions on the best places to get pictures and autographs, so we shared what little knowledge we had from that Friday. We found out he was from the Dallas area, he and his kids had made the 18 hour car drive to Surprise (eek!) His daughter wasn't at the practice fields, but his little boy (maybe 5 or 6) was there with him (and super excited). 

Waiting with Ashley for the gates to open

Me and Tonya!

Thanks again to Tonya and Ashley for getting awesome pictures during the practice and game! My scrapbook is going to rock! And thanks to those who took pictures of me with the different players (I'm a trusting person just handing my iPhone over to a stranger to snap a picture!) :) 

Michael Young and Ian Kinsler at batting practice

New Rangers pitcher Yu Darvish (he just came over here from Japan). There were so many people pushing so this was the best picture I could get on my phone.

I love Elvis! :)

Pitcher Mark Hamburger

Outfielder Conor Jackson

Sadly I couldn't get one with Craig Gentry, this was as close as I got. He was signing for little kids and had to leave before I could ask him. Again, not going to push kids out of the way for a picture! :)

Pitcher Joe Nathan

Pitcher Mike Adams

Got a better picture with catcher Mike Napoli.

Before the game we waited along the front row where the players walked by on their way to the dugout. We made conversation with a family waiting for the players (the wife and I are now Twitter friends!) Their kids were hoping for their first baseball autograph. At one point Ian Kinsler was walking down the field signing. They were both so excited- I'm so glad Ian was able to sign for them! The look on their faces was priceless! We were sad to leave the game because we knew it was the last Spring Training game we were going to. We had to leave to go home to Dallas the next day. We decided to go out for one more dinner in Surprise. We ate at this Mexican restaurant called Macayo's- the food was pretty good but our waitress was not that great. Once we got back to the hotel, we started packing so we wouldn't feel rushed the next morning. I tell about our last day in Surprise (including how we almost missed our flight home) tomorrow!!

Ian signing autographs (the two kids in front of me are the ones I was talking about!)

A rare Michael Young autograph signing

Leaving the stadium

Dinner at Macayo's

Dinner at Macayo's

For more pictures of Day 4, click here.

XOXO!

Spring Training Trip 2012 Recap-PART THREE

I'm thinking this recap might make 5 days. I hope you are enjoying it! On Day 3 of our trip the team was out of town, so we may or may not have slept in until about 10am that day (we were tired!) A friend in Dallas wanted to treat us to a nice dinner while we were in Surprise, so we spent the day sightseeing and shopping before going out to eat that night. When we left the hotel to go shopping, we saw this car in the parking lot. I kid you not, I still have nightmares after seeing this.

Hey, let's put a head on top of our company car- that will get business. It's like something from a horror movie.

Have I mentioned we really enjoyed the convertible? It was funny because I was tweeting that we were enjoying the sunshine and warm weather while my friends in Dallas were complaining it was 40 degrees and raining. We picked the perfect time to be gone!!

Oh yeah, we are so cool! Too bad there isn't video of me and Ashley doing our white girl dancing in the car. Actually there might be, but we all agreed NOT to share the videos we took (sorry). :)

We made reservations at a place called Fleming's Prime Steakhouse (evidently this is a chain restaurant with locations all around the U.S., including Texas, but I had never heard of it). The service, atmosphere and food were all WONDERFUL! I ordered the filet mignon and it was quite possibly the best filet mignon ever. The Caesar salad was also very good (I'm a connoisseur of Caesar salads- I can tell you where and where not to order one at). :) I might do a post on that one day! :) It was a nice relaxing day in the middle of our trip. I want to give a big shout out thank you to the friend who bought our dinner that night! THANK YOU!!! :)

Lovely ladies. Like my dress? Found it for $13 at Ross. ;)

I never remember which side of Tonya's phone the camera is on, I'm always looking the wrong way! :)

I'm patiently waiting on our food.

Yes, I'm one of those people who take pictures of my food. Yummy. Now I want steak again! :) The mushroom dipping sauce was okay, but I wasn't a fan of it. But remember, I'm picky. I'm sure to normal people it was very good.

A VERY full Rachel leaving Fleming's.

That's all I have time for today, tune in tomorrow for the Day 4 recap!! For more Day 3 pictures, click here.

XOXO!!

Spring Training Trip 2012 Recap-PART TWO

If you missed part one of my Spring Training Trip 2012 recap, go here to see yesterday's post. I think my recap is probably going to go to three posts, possibly four. It was a long trip!! :) I don't want to leave anything out!

So, on Day 2 of our trip (we count the travel day on Wednesday as Day 0), we went to the team practice. We meant to get there by 10am, which is when the gates opened, but we were delayed. It was another beautiful day in Surprise, so of course, we enjoyed the convertible ride to the stadium.

I.Am.A.Nerd. :)

God blessed us with the best weather while we were there!

It was closer to 10:30 before we got to the practice fields, and it was already packed (obviously everyone except the three of us knew about getting there early). They had different "stations" set up. There was a field where they took shifts taking batting practice and fielding ground balls (and catching fly balls). There was an area that was mainly for the pitchers to practice at, and there were individual batting cages. There were also a few fields that were mainly for the minor league players. First, we checked out the field where a lot of the guys were taking turns at batting practice.

The 3 amigas ready for Day 2 of baseball!

Not sure why Craig Gentry looks so sad here. Guess he hadn't seen me yet! ;) (kidding!)

Michael Young waiting his turn to take some swings

Elvis Andrus. It was fun being so close because we could hear them joking around with each other.

Waiting to take some practice swings

Pitcher Derek Holland- we really hope that he cuts the mullet before the season starts!

While walking around the practice area, we ran into Emily Jones from Fox Sports Southwest. She knows us from Twitter, but we had never met her before in person (at least I hadn't). When she saw us, she came over and gave us a hug, and was sweet enough to take pictures with us.

Emily Jones from Emily's Outtakes and Fox Sports Southwest

Some of the players would stop and sign a few autographs as they were walking to different stations. Like I mentioned before my trip, my goal was to get pictures instead of autographs. I saw Mike Napoli signing for a group of people and worked my way over in hopes of getting a picture with him. I noticed these little kids were trying so hard to hand him something to sign, but their arms were too short to reach up where he could see them. I asked them if they wanted me to pass stuff over to him and they said yes, so I handed Napoli a baseball to sign. When I handed him something else for another kid, he looked at me as if to say, "one autograph per person", and I pointed to the kids saying they were for them, I was just the tall person they handed their stuff to. He laughed and said, "Oh, okay, that's fine." He was so nice. He probably signed autographs for about 40 minutes. I was trying to get close enough so Tonya could snap a picture of me standing near him. She kept waiting for him to look up and finally he realized what she was trying to do, so he was nice enough to look up for a picture!

NAP-O-LI

About noon we decided to head to the stadium (which was about a block from the practice field). We noticed the day before some players would stop and sign autographs while they were walking to the dugout, and we wanted to see if we could get some more pictures. You notice in the above pictures I'm wearing the Ben and Skin shirt that I made (courtesy of PlayerTees). If you are a regular reader of my blog, you know Ben and Skin are two of my favorite sports talk radio hosts (their show is on ESPN Dallas radio). We had just walked in and I heard someone yell out to me. I looked over and noticed Randy Galloway from ESPN Dallas radio (he is also Ben and Skin's boss). He was like, where did you get that shirt? I told him I made it. He said he wanted a picture of me and him so he could send it to Ben. I told him I was friends with Ben and Skin and could send it to them on Twitter. He thought it was the greatest thing ever!

With the great Randy Galloway from ESPN Dallas radio!

Ben sent out a tweet about the picture.

Before the game, I was able to get a picture with outfielder David Murphy- he was so nice. A few other players were close by signing, but never got down as far as I was, so I couldn't get a picture.

Just a couple of Baptist college graduates (Murphy went to Baylor)

Our seats were one section over than we were the day before (which meant we got in the shade a little bit sooner). Even though it was only in the 70s, it felt so much warmer (I guess it's that dry desert heat). The game was fun, until some jerk yelled something at Josh Hamilton (which I won't repeat). He yelled it when Josh was walking off the field on his way out, so I'm hoping he didn't hear the guy. I had to restrain from using the wrath of Rachel against the man. But besides that, it was a good day at the stadium!

Some pictures from the game

Nelson Cruz, Elvis Andrus and Michael Young leaving the game (the starters were pulled out in the 5th inning).

After the game, we decided to go rest at the hotel then head out to dinner. We went to a local place called Marley's. They had this awesome corn bread (I think it had peach flavor in it). I know it sounds weird, but it was good (and this is coming from a very picky eater). My chicken sandwich was really good, but Tonya and Ashley said the ribs were not that good. :/ 

Tonya did my eye make up for the evening!

After that we drove around for a while, just to see the rest of Surprise. It's really a nice little town. Pretty much everything is off this one road, Bell Road. Oh, yeah, we may or may not have driven around for about 5 minutes without headlights on after leaving Marley's. We were too busy looking cool in a convertible that we failed to realize they weren't on (to our  defense, the street lights were very bright so it was kinda hard to tell). I won't say who was driving, but it wasn't me. ;) We decided to rent another movie, so we went by Walgreen's again to the Red Box (sadly, there were no more encounters with any more baseball players there).

Okay, I've overwhelmed you enough for today. I'll post more tomorrow! Thanks for reading!! For more pictures of Day 2, please click here!

XOXO!

Spring Training Trip 2012 Recap-PART ONE

Hello my friends!! I'm so sorry I wasn't able to update last week. After getting back from my trip on Monday night, I was busy trying to get caught up at work and honestly, I was just too tired to get online when I got home. My trip to Arizona for Spring Training was FANTASTIC! We had SO much fun!! We've decided to make it an annual trip. I have so much to recap that I'm going to have to break this up into at least two different posts (maybe three).

Our trip almost started out in a disaster when my friends got stuck in traffic on their way to my office to pick me up. They sent me a text about 6:00 asking if there was anyone still around who could take me to the airport (our flight was at 7:20). THANKFULLY my director was still at the office and he was very sweet and gave me a ride to Love Field. It worked out perfectly because my friends got there at almost the same time that I was being dropped off. We got checked in and through security with enough time to grab something to eat before boarding the flight.

Tonya, me and Ashley waiting to get on board our flight!

I made activity books for the flight!

We had a layover in El Paso (because Southwest doesn't fly straight to Phoenix), but we didn't have to change planes. Side note: we had some turbulence coming in from Dallas due to heavy winds. I'm not a huge fan of flying to begin with, but I have to say the pilot did a great job with the landing. We really thought it was going to be a rough one. During the layover Tonya noticed that they had opened the cockpit door and were letting people inside to view it. Of course we had to get a picture!

I was a little concerned our pilot looked about 8! ;)

We finally got to the Phoenix airport a little after 10:30 local time (11:30 to our CST bodies). After wandering around the rental car location looking for Fox Car Rentals (the company we had a reservation with, who, by the way, had the smallest business sign ever- one reason we couldn't find it), by 11:30 local time we had our rental car and were ready to hit the road towards Surprise (about 40 miles away).

Of course we had to rent a Mustang convertible! :)

After Google Maps got us lost on our way to the Windmill Inn Suite hotel, and a long ordeal trying to get checked into our room (very gory details, I might share another time), we finally got to our room a little after 1:00 am local time.  Whew! We were beyond exhausted (we had reached that point where we were so tired we were hysterical- you know what I'm talking about).

We expected to be able to sleep in a little bit that Thursday morning, but we all woke up before 7am (yuk!) Don't you hate it when you are on vacation but can't sleep in. We decided to get lunch before heading to the Surprise Stadium for the game between the Rangers and the White Sox. 

We rolled topless in the convertible! ;)

So, guess where we ate for our first meal in Arizona? If you know me, you won't be surprised at all! It was also on the way to the stadium, so it was convenient to stop there.

Two of my favorite things!

We were very excited to get to the stadium- my sports heart had almost healed enough that it was ready for baseball again! We had really good seats (just to the right of the Rangers dugout). Thanks to Tonya and her awesome camera, we were able to get some great shots!! :)

Showing off our awesome homemade T-shirts!

The back of our shirts!

View from our seats

Some pictures from before the game!

Some pictures during the game!

My Twitter momma Traci (AKA, Mama T) was also at the game, so I met up with her at one point. She is so super sweet! She's one of my favorite people. She gave me some tips on what to do at Spring Training, since this was my first year going. She told me how we needed to get to the practice fields by 10am so we had a better shot of getting pictures and maybe autographs. Thanks for the info MamaT! :)

Me and the lovely Mama T! :)

We had decided earlier in the day that we needed to go some place and buy some snacks and drinks to keep at the hotel (we had a microwave and mini-fridge in it). On our way back from the game, we passed by a Walgreens, so we made a quick stop there. Our hotel allowed you to borrow a DVD player so we rented a movie from Red Box too (by this point we had a feeling we were going to pretty much stay at the hotel that evening instead of going out. We were all exhausted). While we were checking out I noticed that someone had walked by, but I didn't pay any attention to who it was. A few moments later Tonya nudged me and whispered "That's Frenchy isn't it!" Side note to those non baseball fans: Jeff "Frenchy" Francoeur was with the Rangers back in 2010. I actually knew him when he was on the Braves earlier in his career. He is now with the Kansas City Royals who, by chance, also practice at the same place the Rangers do. We both did a quick glance and confirmed it was indeed Frenchy. I quickly wondered if it was appropriate to approach a ballplayer in a drug store. 3.2 seconds later I decided it was and walked over to him (along with Ashley, Tonya was still checking out). He was talking to someone he obviously knew and when he saw me walk up, he smiled and said hi. I apologized for interrupting him but just wanted to tell him we were huge Rangers fans and we really missed him. We wished him the best that season (unless he was playing against the Rangers- but I didn't say that). He thanked me and asked how we were doing. Insert small talk here. I then asked him if it would be okay to take a picture with him. He said absolutely! He commented that he really loved our shirts (but we have now changed that part of the story to say that he commented that he really loved us). Let us live in our fantasy world please. :)

Our picture with Frenchy. Why yes, we did notice that he was extremely good looking!

That evening we ordered food from Jimmy John's (mainly because they delivered and we were too tired to go out). We had rented the movie Courageous. It's a really good movie, but be warned, you will cry. We went to bed fairly early that night because we wanted to get up in time to get to the practice fields the next day.

I don't want to overwhelm you (more than I already have), so that is all of my recap for today. I will post more tomorrow!! Hope you have enjoyed it!! If you would like to see more pictures from Day 1 of our trip, please click here. It will take you to the photo album on my blog's Facebook page. Even if you don't have a Facebook page, you can see the pictures. If you do have Facebook, please feel free to like my page! :)

This trip also allowed me to update my 101 in 1001 list! Weehoo!

XOXO!