Harper Grace

We came down to Little Rock last night to visit Jenna's brother and meet our new niece. We went to the zoo and out to eat before retiring to the hotel for the evening. The kids swam and we thought they'd pass out from exhaustion, but we weren't quite that lucky. 
We're spending our Sunday with them before heading home. From the looks of things we're missing another big storm. At least our luck kicked in somewhere.

 

Easter 2012

Happy Easter weekend everybody.  I hope your holiday was wonderful.  Ours was fairly busy but enjoyable.  

The big story of the weekend was Campbell giving her pacifier to the Easter Bunny.  As you know we've built it up big time over the past 2 weeks.  She was all excited but on Saturday morning we went to the Easter egg hunt at our church.  Guess who was there. The...Easter...Bunny

I went home and got her pacifiers and brought her one.  Well, stage fright set in.  A 5 foot person in a bunny costume can kind of do that I guess.  She wouldn't go near him.  She wouldn't even look at him.  I had the good camera out and rolling to capture the moment in it's HD glory, but she just hid behind us.  She walked over to me with her arms out with that scared look.  So I stopped filming and picked her up.  She put her head on my shoulder looking away from the Easter bunny. 

Then the funniest thing happened.  She took the pacy out of her mouth and-without looking mind you- threw the pacy to him behind her back.  When I say she threw it, I mean she THREW IT.  It went about 30 feet and skidded up to the bunny's feet.  She was so proud the rest of the day.  "Gave pas to Eater Bunny! Big girl!"

It was classic.

Too difficult to imagine

One of the hard things is limiting the number of photos in photo gallery.  Personally, I'd put them all up but that is a waste of space and bandwidth.  The default limit on this site is 30 images so I try to adhere to that.  Picking out the 30 then becomes an exercise in how much editing is necessary.  Short version is I'm working on it.  

I'll share this photo with you now because I've flagged it as a favorite.

Back to normal

After only a few days we are back to normal around here. Noah was excited to see his friends yesterday. Cam couldn't wait to get to Stephanie's. Jenna and I...work was long and miserable :)

I'll post a photo gallery when I get a chance as well as publishing the posts I wrote while there. Just trying to get back in the swing.

Here's a pic from this morning that'll tide you over though.

Happy Birthday Jenna-2012

Jenna's birthday was last Friday.  The day was far from her's, however, as both kids (and her) had haircuts and one of Noah's best buds had his birthday party that night.  The next day was all her's though.  Breakfast in bed followed by an adventure at the Lower Buffalo.  We had a picnic with some amazing scenery and then we gave her gifts to her on Whitaker Point.  We went to eat that night with the Greens and she fell asleep before 10PM.  Pretty good day if I say so myself.

Yak yak yak

Campbell has decided Noah's remote control for his moon nightlight is HER phone. She sleeps with it and wags it around with her at all times. This morning she was holding it to her ear and talking 100 miles/hour into it. I have no idea what she was saying but I hope whoever was on the other end could understand.
I had to ask her with whom she was talking and then she pulled it from her ear, covered the 'mouthpiece' with her hand, and said "No no Daddy. Not now. On phone."

Long week

Sorry for lack of updates but we've had a full plate not to mention a series of unfortunate events.

Last Friday we were supposed to go to ElDorado to meet our niece Malia who flew in from Arizona for the event. Instead, we had to bail on the trip when Noah was sent home with a stomach bug. He ran a fever all weekend and still has fallen asleep before bedtime this entire week so far. We also missed Magga's birthday party. He was hoping to go even on Sunday. 'I feel better now, can we please go to ElDorado now.' It was pitiful.

On Monday morning a friend I have worked with for 8 years and was Jenna's boss for 7 years tragically passed away at the age of 49. The only way to describe it is surreal. Everywhere I've worked this week has been with all of us in a fog. It's hard to imagine what the next few weeks will hold much less beyond.

Last night at 1AM sharp the germy bug claimed Campbell. She was so pitiful while I cleaned it up and Jenna held her. I stopped by at lunch and she put her head on my shoulder and said "Hurt Daddy." Nothing is worse than a little kid sick.

It wasn't all bad though. Noah got his second stripe in karaté and officially became a member of the ATA with new patches, belt, and extra. I'll put the video of him up tonight. He was super pumped.

Something else happened yesterday. Can't quite remember what it was. Seems like it was a big deal but it's just eluding me :)

Teachable moment

I pride myself on being the type of Father that imparts wisdom to my kids. I know some mistakes have to be learned on your own but I think it's important to reveal my own mistakes to my children so they may learn valuable lessons without the humility of some wrong turns.


Today I was able to teach Campbell green food coloring and vanilla look the same from the back and you should take the extra time to prevent a Dr. Seuss inspired breakfast.


I'm not sure she sees the error though. Maybe she's doomed to repeat my failings.