While many children thrive in a structured baseball environment like Spring Season and Fall Ball, there are even more life lessons that can be learned through working with your peers to solve problems, establish leadership skills, and come together to have fun. This is the core philosophy of Little League's Sandlot Fun Days program. Think The Sandlot movie, where neighborhood kids get together on an empty field and "just play ball" simply to have fun. 

Lake Forest LL will reserve and pay for the field and will administer the signup process to help get groups of kids together. A set of catchers equipment, bucket of balls, a net, and a tee (beginner only) will be stored in the equipment bin at each field for kids to use as needed. While we would like the majority of Sandlot participants to be LFLL players, kids do not have to be a current LFLL player to participate - so invite that friend who has never played baseball before or friend/family visiting from out of town to come join a game! 

Parents should be responsible for ensuring that any league equipment used are properly returned to the equipment bin after the kids are done. We need one Little League background checked volunteer at the game site to oversee the activities and make sure the players are following safety rules. Parents DON'T need to coach, pitch or umpire (unless the KIDS ask you to)! Please note that this Adult volunteer is NOT your child's babysitter and is not responsible for taking care of your child's needs (e.g. bathroom breaks, etc.) - a parent/guardian should be at the site for each participant for the duration of the game. 

Players (kids) make the rules, make the lineups, coach each other and make the calls. Be inclusive of everyone. Have fun! Each player will need to bring their own glove at the minimum. 

The only "rules" we ask that be followed are for safety reasons:

• Batters must wear helmets (borrow one from a friend if you don't have one or forget to bring one)
• Catchers must wear catcher's gear. No one has catchers gear? No problem - just use a net or let the balls gather by the backstop until you run out of balls (bring a big bucket of balls if that's the case!)
• Rotate pitchers so that pitch count rules as outlined in the Little League Rulebook are followed - this is to protect kids from injury to their throwing arm.
• No "on deck" batters and the only player holding a bat is the player in the batter's box.
  

Beginner Players - For young children who are beginners in the sport, but would be comfortable having another player pitch the ball to them. An adult may step in to pitch if kids are unable/unwilling to pitch or a tee may be used. Recommended for ages 7-10, for those who are ready for or have played a season of Single A or are on the older side but have never played baseball before and would be more comfortable playing with younger kids. Reduced impact tee balls will be used. Sign up HERE. 

Experienced Players - For children who have moderate experience in playing baseball. Recommended for ages 8-12, for those who are ready for or have played AA/AAA. Regular baseballs will be used. Sign up HERE. 

Advanced Players - For children who have lots of experience in playing baseball and just want to get together with a group of similarly aged/skilled kids in the community to play ball. Recommended for ages 11-14, for those who are ready for or have played Majors/Intermediate. Regular baseballs will be used. Due to lack of interest in the past, we have not set up a Sandlot for this age group this season. If you have a group of kids together already who would like to set one up and gather a few more interested kids to join,  please email [email protected] to submit a request. 

We are limiting signups to a maximum of 20 kids per game so no one has to "sit the bench" and everyone gets ample opportunities to bat and field. Feel free to sign up for one or more of the sessions - depending on the popularity of the program signups, we can potentially open more time slots.