Go Cubs Go!!

We made it back from Chicago safely. Dylan was a rock star as usual. He got to meet a TON of new people and was great throughout the whole trip. A special thanks to Toni for being such a great host! And once again to Nicole for coordinating as perfect of a weekend as there could have been.

I'm both physically and emotionally exhausted...so I'm going to post a recap that my mom sent to her family for now. I'll post more details later this week and a million more pictures. Thanks to everybody who made this weekend so special...it was super hard but Zach was smiling down on us...and in case you haven't heard...the Cubbies are in 1st place now!!

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Yesterday the Harsch Clan and the Lichtenbergers and many friends attended the Cubs game at Wrigley Field. In case you missed your Baseball Tonight highlights, here is a brief recap of the game:

CHICAGO (AP)—Day, night, home, road … Rich Harden(notes) says the when and where don’t matter.He proved it Sunday with a dominating 5-2 victory over the reeling, aching Cincinnati Reds that put the Chicago Cubs atop the NL Central for the first time since April 21.After being told that manager Lou Piniella was pleased with his six-inning, one-hit performance, Harden smiled slyly and said: “Yeah, and it was during the day, too, wasn’t it?”Harden, whose previous Wrigley Field day victory had been Aug. 24, 2008, snapped two inexplicable trends: Going into Sunday, he had a 1-5 record and 7.38 ERA in day games (vs. 5-1, 2.23 at night) and a 2-5 record and 7.59 ERA at home (vs. 4-1, 2.03 on the road).

At 9 am before the game, the Cubs let a few of us on the field for a brief ceremony. We circled on the warning track near the left field foul pole (355 feet from home plate) and joined hands, prayed the Lord's Prayer, and sang "Take me out to the Ballgame". We left a little part of Zach in Wrigley Field--and took some Wrigley Field dirt with us.

Here is a picture of us on Wrigley Field before the game--perhaps a little tear stained. Bobbie and the rest of us have mourned hard the last few days---her wedding anniversary was July 16th. This was Bobbie's first time to Chicago without Zach in the last nine years.

We returned later to watch the Cubs win and move into first place in their division. There were about 30 of us at the game.Bobbie and Dylan and the rest of us did fine.It was a perfect summer day in Chicago and it was so nice of the Cubs to let us have our little memorial.