December 2014 Update

Ir has been to long since i posted anything and Im sorry . Things have been and always are wide open but thats more of a good thing than bad .

Yesterday I was blessed to be with so many of our Sandlotters in the Kernersville Christmas Parade and it was a blast . 45 foot flatbed covered from nose to tail with Awesome Christian Families that " Rock ".

Many thanks go out to so many people and if I miss anyone please let me know so I can add in .

Christie Massey , for lining up the flatbed and truck along with other things
Tim Matthews , The most awesome driver from Best Logistics
Best Logistics , for the truck and wonderful support of our program
Stephenson Motor Lines ,  for the flat bed
Sarah Rutherford - for the wreath, signs, and for covering meeting while we were out of town
Heather Kavanaugh - For making the brick presents ( lol ), decorating float and anything else Shelby needed ( Sara also )
Josh Massey and Braxton - for helping me build items for float
The Faircloth family for decorating and break down
The Sharpe family for lunch delivery
Wayne Oppel for bulidng and the straw
The Leinhard family for straw

Im sure I am leaving out someone and i apologize but with all these names it just shows how awesome our Sandlot Nation is when we all come together to get things done for our kids and community and that was so evident yesterday and this last week .

With the Christmas season in full swing I hope everyone can take a moment in our fast paced lives to realize the reason for the season ( Jesus Christ ) and how important family is .

Merry Christmas and a Wonderful New Year ,

Lets Play Ball,

Coach Mike

Hey Sandlotters ,

ITS FALL BALL 2014 time and Shelby and I are so excited about this season. Registration has been going very well but the deadline is getting very close so please take the time to sign up if you havent already.

Hope everyone had and awesome summer and all the kids are ready for a wonderful school year . 

Please continue to check out our website for future events and if yall need anything please let us know .

Thanks and Lets Play Ball,

Coach Mike

Sandlot on The Eagle

Hey Everyone . we were blessed to be on the eagle980 am this morning for an hour to talk with the remarkable Bill Flynn . Please take the time to listen to our interview and we hope you enjoy hearing more about everything we are currently doing and hope to do in the near future to reach our youth, families and community .

Lets Play Ball,

Coach Mike

If you feel led to join our vision or need  more information please feel free to call or email at anytime . Donations are also appreciated and you can do so by our Paypal account . Have a blessed day and cant wait to hear from everyone.

A Note from one of our parents .

Hey Sandlotters , Since we are honoring all cancer survivors and remembering those who fought well but lost to this terrible thing . I asked our Sandlot Mom Janel Jernigan who has beaten skin cancer and is a wonderful advocate to write up something for us all .

Please take a moment to read and thanks ahead of time .

Coach Mike

Did you know that nearly 80,000 people will be diagnosed with melanoma this year? That's the equivalent of the entire population of Somerville, Massachusetts. Or Troy, Michigan. Or Buena Park, California. Imagine - an entire town: mothers, fathers, children, teens, friends and lovers - all diagnosed with the deadliest form of skin cancer. 

Melanoma can be deadly. But if you catch it early - before it spreads - it can be treated.

Check your skin - regularly.

Research has shown that patients, not doctors, are most likely to spot melanoma because they are most familiar with changes on their own skin. In fact, more than half of all melanomas are detected by everyday people - just by paying attention to their or their loved ones' skin. Learn how to perform a skin self-exam - and if you see something funny or different, make an appointment with a dermatologist. 

Talk to others.

Don't be afraid to ask about a mole you're not sure about. Ask your spouse, your partner, a friend or family member to help you keep track of suspicious moles and check hard-to-see places. Don't be shy - melanoma isn't, and it doesn't discriminate. Melanoma can develop on anyone - no matter their age, gender or race. 

More information here: http://www.melanoma.org

Hey Sandlotters, real excited about this coming Saturday as we honor all mothers and any women who play a vital role in the Christian upbringing of our youth . Please join us and assist us in letting all of these wonderful women know how much we love and appreciate all they have done for us.

My mom will not be able to come since she will be in South Carolina with my older sister but she will be in my heart and thoughts for being such an inspiration to me from the time they brought me home from The Childrens Home to today.

Mom, Your love, patience, guidance , and grace will be with me for the rest of my life and I am blessed everyday by God by having him choose you as my Mother . I love you and hope you have an incredible Mothers Day.

They say it takes a village to raise a child and my village has been and still is gigantic. My two sisters, Aunts, Cousins, what i call " other Mothers ", grandma's who have been long gone but never forgotten and lil sisters have all been with me and guided me and for this I am very grateful and again blessed.

To my wife, Shelby, God took his time making our paths to cross and our meeting was when it should have been. He had is path for me but for a while I chose another , but when I came back he blessed me with you and I will never forget that day. You are an inspiration to me, your children, your family and so many other people here in our community and beyond . Your dedication to all of us is tireless and has been covered with hurdles but you always prevail. You continue to love, care and spread that awesome "Light " that brightens so many peoples world and most of the time you dont notice or are given enough credit for . You have made me a better man of God, Husband , Father and friend and I love you so very much.

Please take a moment this weeekend to email, call, write or tell in person all of the women in your life who have stood beside you and guided you and once you do this make sure it is not only for one weekend a year.

May you all have a family rich weekend and Lets Play Ball,

Coach Mike

Hey Sandlotters , Been a little while since we have posted anything so I feel right now before Easter would be a great time . We are three weeks into our Spring 2014 season and as always Shelby and I are blessed beyond our means with the families who have signed up . I am so proud to announce another record number of athletes this season and just when I feel it cant get any better , it does .

I could spend the next eight hours typing for all the stories these past few weeks have brought but instead I send out an open invitation to all of yall who have not seen our program to come out and witness the love and joy of our families every single day that I am continued to be blessed to be a part of all the way from our tee ballers to our older athletes in kid pitch.

Every evening and on Saturday mornings become reflection for me out at The Sandlot to cherish all that happened the practice before and the games that will happen next and it is all because of God . We all as a combined family have taken a horse pasture and turned it into a place for everyone to come together to celebrate our young ones through baseball in a Christian setting. AWESOME.

During this Easter weekend I have asked all of our athletes to think about the meaning of Christ dying on the cross for our sins and also his rising , to be more like Christ everyday and to search out what more they can do for others . I also ask you , reading this, to do the same through thought and prayer and once God speaks to you to act on your feelings immediately and dont let it pass. What can we do MORE for others no matter how big or small ? A hug, smile, words of compassion, a favor before being asked, a need for another  - what ever it may be I am sure that at least ONE time a day God allows us to be in a position to shine his light. SHINE ON .

May you all have a wonderful Easter Weekend and See yall next week at The Sandlot .

Coach Mike

Sandlotters and future Sandlotters, 
We will be having a Chick-fil-a sign up night on Wednesday Feb. 19th from 4:30-7:30. If you have already signed up please come by, we would love to see you.If you have family and friends that may be interested please invite them to come and meet Coach Mike and the rest of the Sandlot Families. Hope to see ya there

The Best Elementary Teacher in the Triad Competition

Ok everyone , I mentioned a competition last night on facebook and here it is .

Eric Gonzalez ( The One Project and Sandlot baseball IT guru ) has come up with an awesome app for electronic permission slips and I personally love the idea and am pleased to get the word out for him by letting yall know about " The Best Elementary Teacher in the Triad " Award .

All of us know how under appreciated all of our teachers are and especially this week after our elected officials have clearly shown how they feel about them . Well now Eric is asking all of us to do something about it for at least one teacher and the PTA of the school he or she works for .

You can go to the web address at the bottom and fill out your entry form for the best teacher in the Triad. The winning teacher will win a Microsoft Surface Pro Tablet ( $800.00 ) and the Winners PTA will win $500.00 . NOT BAD .

Please take the time to enter and let show our teachers how much we appreciate them .

Thanks,

Coach Mike

http://skoolzen.com/best-teacher-in-the-triad.html

SPRING SANDLOT 2014 

LETS PLAY SOME BASEBALL

REGISTRATION IS OPEN

OHHH YEEAAAHHH

Hey yall, Our spring 2014 season is coming up fast and I could not be more excited . I know its hard to think of baseball when our local basketball is going on and also snow and ice is on the ground but IT IS HERE !!!

As Shelby and I and the rest of our crew prepares for this season we cant help but look back on how much we have grown in such a short period of time . From an vision to a horse pasture to an incredible attendance and also our following nationwide and further . AS ALWAYS IT ALL GOES TO GOD !!!

The off season has been filled with the usual ups and downs but it has seemed that with every hurdle God gives us tremendous strength to leap far and above and our prayers are to continue that strength cause its AWESOME . Yes AWESOME - for those who are already Sandlotters yall know that I use this word so much and will continue to cause its AWESOME what God has done in my life and allowed me to be a part of . 

There are so many things that we are hoping to accomplish this year and I want to share some of those with you know .

First - Sandlot 2014 . I remember after the first season being so worried about who would return and how many new families would join us and after some deep prayer in my truck driving down the road ( best time for me to think and pray ) I came to the conclusion that if we have 20 players or 200 we would coach and reach the same way. Once I felt that peace it allowed me to " rock On " and its been - yes you guessed it  - AWESOME !!!

Last fall we wanted to see how Kid Pitch and Kid Catching would go and I could not have been more proud of our athletes along with the support of our families . It went great and I am happy to announce we will be continuing that this season . The Kid Pitch / Catch is for our older division only and for those interested we will be starting practice a week early for these athletes only . More of that to be included in an email to those who register before February 29th.

We have had a bunch of requests for Girls Softball and if we have show interest in that ( again for our older athletes ) we will be including Softball this season . If we do not have enough to field at least two teams then we will be bringing in coaches to work with our female ball players during the week to go over softball . We have had four women who have a vast knowledge of softball commit to doing what ever we need to progress that program and Shelby and I cant thank them enough . As always it is going to take getting the word out to everyone about this new division and we will coach and progress as the demand requires . We also are not requiring females to play softball , if they want to continue to play baseball - awesome.

If you sign your female athlete up to play please go ahead and sign up as baseball and in the request box mention softball and we will email yall once we have a final number to see which way we are going to go .

As always , we are going to be out at the fields once we get some nice days and get everything prepared - ALL VOLUNTEERS are welcome and we will be emailing dates once this weather changes ( hopefully soon - cause im ready to work . )

Skills and practice facilities  - I am working on getting two batting cages and also two to three practice pitching mounds built so that we can work more athletes at a time during the season and also if we do anything during the summer ( in the works ).

I am also working on two batting centers for the tee ball and modified tee ballers to strengthen their hitting abilities .

If there is anything else that yall would like to see out at sandlot please email me as soon as you can.

Coaches  / Volunteer and Parent meeting  -  I am scheduling a date and time for all of us to meet to go over even more of what we are going to do this season and also to hear yalls ideas and suggestions of what yall want to do . Please watch for an email very soon along with an updated post here on our web site.

Wanting to see how you can help or donate - In the off season we FINALLY received our 501(3)c status and a Huge thanks to Rick and Patrice Reaves for everything they both have done to make this happen . I cannot tell yall how many hours these two have put into all of the paperwork and research it took to make this happen . 

We have a donate button on our web page and you can specify under three tabs where you want us to use your donation . 

My original vision was to find 100 sponsors at $1,000.00 a year and ask everyone in the Triad to donate $1 . thats it $1.00 . The sponsorships would take care of our day to day expenses along with taking care of the property at Sandlot and anything else realated to THE ONE PROJECT .

$1.00 donations or anything more per person will be used for immediate response to our community. This was the hardest for us to try and define because it is a response with no end and what I mean by that is it can be for anything that has to do with assisting families in our community  - food, clothing, fixing homes , disaster relief, counseling , automotive repair etc. 

Another example is something I wanted to do a couple of years ago and can still do . I saw a tv report about elderly folks in lower class homes who had no air conditioning . With The One Project we can go to any hardware store and purchase window units and install in these folks homes and assist them with their energy bill during the summer - IMMEDIATELY .

This is just one of many ideas we have for our community .

Please take sometime and pray about our cause and if you find it in your heart DONATE.

Donations are not only money - we have already had a van donated and given to a very much deserving family from Sandlot , we have had appliances donated that found their way to deserving families. The majority of our baseball equipment and supplies have been donated along with equipment to build our field and also maintain them.

The ONE PROJECT PONTOON - We have been blessed with a donation from a Sandlot Aunt and long time friend of ours of a 18 foot pontoon boat . We are going to be rebuilding this boat in the next months so that we can take young people with illnesses and their families out for a free day on the lake ( swimming, fishing, tubing and having a blast ). We will also be taking our Sandlotters out for wildlife education and boating safety classes 1/2 day and then fun day the other 1/2 . We already have local wildlife officers who have volunteered to work with our youth and we are proud to have them aboard . If you find yourself interested in this project please let us know and we will be posting a wish list for what we need soon . 

I have spent just about my entire life on the water , from living in Wales and Bermuda to here in North Carolina and there are so many wonderful memories on the water I have from my childhood and now with my own family that we want to share this with others . 

Buddy Benches - many of yall on facebook have seen the story of a young boy who built a buddy bench so someone at school who felt left out could sit on and others would join him or her . This story has touched my heart since I was once one of those kids and now we are going to do something about it . I want to first thank my good buddy Mike Weddle of Weddle Construction ( the same guy who built our snack shack in his fathers car port and delivered it to us ) for his volunteering to help build these benches . Mike's christian values are an essential part of who he is as a husband, father , builder and friend and we are again blessed to have him as a part of The One Project . We will be talking with local hardware stores and lumber yards for supplies and then to all of the local elementary schools in the area to see where we can place these benches . Anyone is welcome young and old to assist in this and we look forward to hearing from yall. If you know of a school or location you would like to see one of these benches please contact us and we will see what we can do to make it happen . PS - Steve Quinn - another awesome carpenter and sandlot member - this is your heads up - lol .

Thanks to all of yall who have prayed for our mission and please keep them coming. As much as we hear the horror stories about technology sometimes its great to know how far out in the world The One Project is known ( especially with our military personel abroad ). Please feel free to come out this season to The Sandlot and experience what Shelby and I along with many other families are blessed to be a part of .

Love to all and Lets Play Ball,

Coach Mike

Oh yeah - we also want to start a tutoring program for our athletes this season so if there are any of you who want to assist in this please let me know . You do not have to be a certified teacher to sit down with a young person and help . You might be surprised who teaches who in the end I know from every season I learn so much more from our youth and families then I could ever COACH.