Tag: family

Happy Easter!

Posted on by Rick Garcia

Good morning all! Buenos Dias! What a glorious day, the Lord is Risen! Even if you are not into that sort of thing, Happy Easter from my family to yours! We hope you have a joyous and blessed day with your family wherever you may be! A buddy of mine had a great quote this morning in regards to even if you don’t celebrate Easter and the Lord’s resurrection. He said “but everyday is a day to celebrate these days”! Facts, big facts! Everyday is a good day.

I am currently sitting in my patio, its 75 degrees with a breeze and I’m having a cup of coffee with a mimosa on the side :)Don’t believe me? Check out my gram, haha. Meg and I have a great brunch spread in the works, pics to come on our instagram page. We are finding the good in today and it is not that hard on a day like today. Albeit, I wish I was able to attend mass in person followed by going to one of our favorite places for brunch with friends and family, I know that isn’t possible right now so I choose not to dwell over it. Instead, I find the silver lining and we will make the best of today. We are in this together, we are all making sacrifices especially the essential workers and our amazing health care professionals on the front lines of this battle. God Bless our essential workers and our healthcare staff, you are in my daily prayers! These sacrifices are not easy, so it is ok to not always be ok. I’m not always ok, trust me! However, these sacrifices are for the greater good, they are for my girls and for one another. Jesus also made a sacrifice, the ultimate sacrifice, giving his life so that we can all have eternal life, pretty powerful.

Our easter Sunday started with the Easter bunny bringing some gifts and goodies to our kiddos. They then had an easter egg hunt which you can see on our instagram page below. Gracie cracks me up, as they were opening their easter baskets, I can see her looking around getting a head start mentally on where the eggs were, lol. That’s my Gracie Girl!

After some Easter Bunny fun, we got ready for the real reason of Easter and that is to celebrate the Lord’s Resurrection! We streamed the live feed from our Catholic Church. It was a little odd but we got in our Sunday best and prayed and participated in today’s Holy mass. It was actually beautiful, the songs were great, readings were on point, we could hear our backyard birds singing as rays on sunshine illuminated our family room. Together, from our homes, we celebrated. My take away from the homily is that we will ALL RISE like our Lord did today and most of us will come out better Catholics, better Christians and better People on the other side. Amen! God Bless you and your families and once again we hope you have a great day, Happy Easter!

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Ash Wednesday

Posted on by Rick Garcia

As I mentioned in a previous post, faith is a big part of me and my family. Both Meghan and I are Catholic and are raising our children to be Catholic as well. Being Catholic in Austin is pretty uncommon, we only have a few friends that are Catholic, which is very different for us. In a few months, Ricky will have his First Communion, which we are all excited for him. That will be a big day.

Today is Ash Wednesday. For those who don’t know, Ash Wednesday is the start of the lenten season in the Catholic Church. Lent lasts 40 days up until Easter Sunday which is the day Jesus rises from the dead. It is a time to reflect, acknowledge our mortality, repent, and help others in need. We all just got home from receiving our Ashes just like millions of Catholics around the world. I am very proud of my children for not going kicking and screaming and for behaving themselves at Mass. Why Ashes? Like many symbols that represent lent (fish fry, color purple, reconciliation) ashes represents repentance. Getting ashes on Ash Wednesday is just a part of being Catholic. Many go to the actual masses but many just pop in to their local Church and get ashes on their lunch break, coffee break etc.. I remember getting Ashes during my workday in a random downtown Church in Chicago because I knew I wouldn’t be able to get home in time and make the evening service. I have vivid memories of getting ashes twice as a kid! Once during school and at night with my parents and now I go get them with my family which is pretty special.

On Ash Wednesday and every Friday during Lent we don’t eat meat. Most think that is weird and ask why no meat? Well, it’s just a small sacrifice to symbolize the ultimate sacrifice of when Jesus died on the cross for our salvation. You are also supposed to give up something you enjoy for 40 days. This year Meg will be giving up pop and I will be giving up cereal which I love. On top of that we plan on giving back to our community and help others in need throughout Lenten season.

I challenge all of our followers whether you are Catholic or not to take this time to reflect and over the next 40 days to pay it forward, be kind, and perform some random acts of kindness.

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Baseball Family!

Posted on by Rick Garcia

I hope you all had a great weekend wherever you may be and also enjoyed Meg’s Valentines Day post, I sure did 🙂 However, I did have to ask her what a lobster meant? Lol. We had a great Valentines Day and long weekend with the crew. We started the weekend with a family dinner. On the way to a Japanese Hibachi style restaurant, which Olivia and the kids loved, she showed me the Lobster Friends episode and we both started cracking up. After dinner, we surprised the kids with their “Nonny” aka grandma flying in from Chicago for a weekend visit. It was short but sweet, Ricky mentioned he couldn’t wait to get home from practice Saturday to play with her Nonny all day. We picked her up at the airport an hour later as her flight was delayed, we then hustled home because Meg and I had reservations for a movie date night. We saw The Gentleman and we both loved it, warning there were a lot of curse words but it was action packed, great actors and story. We were entertained from the start.

Now back to the main topic, baseball! This weekend was a first for Gracie as she had her first two t-ball practices ever (well 3 if you count our session haha) and she loved it! I swear I didn’t force her to play, haha. Meg and I both asked her if she wanted to play baseball or soccer this spring and she said both! I was definitely excited to see she wanted to play and be like big brother. So, we are going to try to do 3 kiddo sports this spring, it was almost 4 smh but we came to our senses as I have to coach one of these teams and it is very time consuming which I will touch on in this post. This spring she will be on the 6U Lake Travis Ice Queens and her colors will be “Cubby” colors as she put it. However, she told me “dadda, I want pink cleats.” She will get pink cleats! That’s my Gracie girl!

I was off Presidents Day and it was a beautiful day here in Austin! It got up to 80 degrees on 2/17! As a kid from Chicago where it’s usually ~10 degrees with the wind chill if we are lucky in February, I enjoyed it even more than most here. Meg’s feedback from her first practice is she needs to work on t-work and I said perfect, I love t-work. I took Ricky and Gracie in the back and we started with the basics. I had to take a step back a few times and recognize Gracie has never played and she is my baby girl so I have to be extra patient. She is a quick learner! We set up her feet, hands, batting stance and swing. We got a lot of work to do but the foundation is being set, Rome wasn’t built overnight. At one point, she said “Coach said hit like this with elbow up”, but that is not what I recommended. This will come up at her second practice which I will get to. After our practice in the yard, I took little man to his training/practice session to keep working on his game. Little man is really taking some big strides. I am so proud of the work ethic he is developing and he is starting to see the fruit of his labor in all his sports but especially baseball. Kid is a natural middle infielder/second baseman. My job now is to not screw up his love for the game. I was talking to my assistant coach who was also there and we just said these boys are better than us when we were 10/11 and they are 7. After a great training session, we went over to Hat Creek (burger place with playscape) for a small break before we all had to go to the fields. As a coach, I had to assess the kids that day, Ricky had to asses and Gracie had practice as well. Trifecta!

Ricky did great at assessments and I was just so proud of him. I wish I could have seen Gracie’s practice but I had to stay and assess the rest of the kids trying out. Meg said she did great and listens very well. It was also very cool to see our friends and Ricky’s friends see Gracie in her baseball uniform and so happy and excited that lil Gracie is playing the sport they love. I know for a fact Ricky is excited to see her play and cheer her on as Gracie is Ricky’s biggest fan. During our practice in the yard, half the time, Ricky was the one instructing and I loved it. Meg mentioned that during hitting drills, Gracie told the coach that my dad said to hit like this and not like how you told me, haha. That’s my Gracie girl, the get it get it get it girl! After practices, our little party animals invited a few friends to pizza and we had a nice meal to cap off the long weekend. I can’t wait to see Gracie play baseball/softball. I hope she falls in love with it, most importantly has fun playing it and making new friends. I will be there to support you, cheer you on and help coach you if you want me to, Gracie.

On a side note, as an 8U National League LTYA coach, which you need to be voted into, I am so glad assessments are over! Time consuming and dedication. Yesterday was the last day of assessments, that caps 211 kids that came out. It was a big commitment and a glimpse into the sacrifice us good coaches put in for the love of teaching the game. However, I am ready to pick my team and get to work! At least I can relax tonight…..nope I have basketball practice at 6:30, ha, Love it! We have to finish hoops season on a high note. We have two games on Sunday and hoping to go 5-1 before the playoffs! Go Thunder!

Enjoy your day!

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