A little bit of pride...

I learned early on with Jaycee that kids are a source of great pride in a parent's life. When she was little, I was so proud that she was a happy girl and that she was being fed well and that she had everything she needed. As Jaycee and Jayden grow, I notice that the things I am proud of change.

I have noticed that when you have a baby in a stroller or cart, they are mostly invisible to people (except to baby lovers). As they gain communication skills, the invisible effect disappears. Today at Costco, Jaycee was standing at the check out with Jess and the checker struck up a conversation with her. I was so proud to watch her interact with an adult we identified as safe. She was very sure of herself. She stood tall with her hands on her hips in a confident way and looked him in the eyes as he asked questions. The conversation went like this:

Checker: What is your name?

Jaycee: My name is Jaycee

C: How old are you Jaycee?

J: Uhhh ( a slight pause as she situates her fingers to show only two) I'm two

C: You are a very smart little girl, aren't you?

J: Yes (hands on hips)

With that she said bye and was on her way. When I saw her standing there confident and sure of herself, I couldn't help but think we are doing something right. I don't mean that in a bragging way, but it was a real boost to my belief in our parenting methods. I always told Jess that I want to raise my kids to be confident, competent, and kind people. Today I saw two of those attributes displayed right in front of me. Now if we could just work on he kindness...

When life gives you lemons...

Ever have one of those months where everything seems to go wrong? Well I am experiencing one of those months. I prefer not to go into details, so you just have to take my word for it.

Let me put it like this, as the famous saying goes: When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. But what if life is giving you a truckload of lemons and when you start to make lemonade you realize that you are out of sugar so you get into the car to go to the store, but the car won't start and its leaking coolant from the water pump. Know what I mean? Anyway, I am posting now, because I am starting to think we are finally turning the corner on our stressful month.

For some reason I have this idea that officially stating in writing that our rough patch is done, it will be. Okay, enough of that, back to work...

Not mud dada...

Disclaimer: the following really happened and it is really gross. Consider yourself warned.

For those of you who know me, feel free to skip down a paragraph or two. For everyone else, I have some faults that I willingly admit that I really haven't tried to fix. Today, two of those faults collided in spectacularly disgusting fashion. I am a chronic procrastinator and I hate doing laundry.

I have a research paper due that I should have been working on for weeks, but instead I am doing in in the closing days of the due date. Unfortunately, for Jaycee, that means she is on her own playing. She has been a good girl all day and has been playing nicely and, for the most part, quietly.

I took a moment to check on her and see what she was up to and found her in her room. She was in her bed laying down and reading a book. Happy with the situation, I left her there to enjoy her Elmo book.

About 10 minutes later, I was typing away when I heard her walk up behind me. I turned to see what she wanted and she asked "Dada, what's that?" as she held up her hand. I looked at it and saw poop all over her hand. Realizing I was going to have to do something about it, Jaycee quickly retracted her question and told me "its mud Dada".

She could tell I wasn't convinced and I told her to go to her room so we could figure out what happened then clean her up. When we got there, I looked all over for a diaper she may have found or removed from the bin but I found nothing. Then the stink hit me. I lifted up the back of her shirt and saw "mud" coming from her diaper going all the way up to the middle of her back (no exaggeration). I momentarily contemplated taking her outside to the hose. Then I looked at her bed. It looked like some sort of war had taken place. The picture is the load of laundry generated by this disaster. (If you look closely, which I don't recommend, you can see that her little stuffed doggy got the worst of it.) While Jaycee was in the bath, she wanted to make sure she cleared up the situation and she told me "Dada, not mud".

What did we learn today? When I have something really important to do, something will go wrong. I also learned that if Jaycee is talking about mud and she isn't outside, I should probably get the hose ready...

Happy Mother's Day!!!

Another year as a Mother has arrived for my wife. I just wanted to take a quick second to tell her how appreciated she is today and the other 364 days. If she ever wonders if she is a good mother to our little girls, all she has to do is see how much they love to be with her and near her. Jayden can be having a horrible day with dada and as soon as mama steps in she is back to smiling. She doesn't even have to see her, she only has to hear her voice and Jayden is fine. Then there is Jaycee. When she hears her mama's car pull up, she starts dancing around yelling "Mama home, mama home!" Then the rest of the day she spends asking when she'll be here.

Jess is the best mom I know. She lives and breaths for our little ones and I know that her time and attention she gives to them will help our little girls grow into loved and loving people. They are so lucky to have an example like their mama and I'm enjoying watching them turn more like her everyday...

Its a jungle in here...

Jaycee loves animals. She is interested by them, no matter the species, size, or abnormality. We have 3 little dogs and a huge cat. The dogs are pretty good at avoiding the Jaycee train and staying out of her way. The fat cat on the other hand is hindered by his size and can't get around as quickly as the dogs, so Jaycee can pretty much catch him whenever she wants.

For some reason, she is infatuated with Toby the cat. She will not leave him alone. She just wants to lay on him, with him, and just generally love him. The cat isn't very receptive and usually cries but cannot escape the toddler grip. The weird thing is, Toby is probably the least entertaining animal here, but Jaycee only wants him. I know I'm not exactly a cat person, but I am perplexed. I thought kids like dynamic and active things, which Toby is neither. You would think with all the running around Jaycee is making Toby do, he'd lose some weight. Then again, she makes me run around a lot too...

Quick and gross...

Hopefully you aren't eating or getting ready to eat (that was a fair warning). So I was getting breakfast situated for Jaycee and I the other day. She had her bowl of Cheerios and I had mine. She was eating Chocolate and I was eating Honey Nut. She saw that I had something different, so she decided she needed some of mine. So she stood on the other side of my bowl and looked inside to figure out the best way to steal Cheerios. As soon as she popped her head up and hung her face over the edge of my bowl, she unloaded a sneeze that made the milk splash in her face. Now, for the gross part. I had just poured the bowl and couldn't justify throwing it away, so I finished eating it. Hopefully none of you think less of me than you already do, but when it takes 20 minutes to get situated enough to get my breakfast together, it was a matter of weighing the pros and cons. Add it to the list of "things that I never would have done before kids"...

All I need is an excuse... I mean reason...

I really need very little encouragement when it comes to buying new gadgets and devices. Jess, on the other hand, is a lot more logical in her approach. She asks questions like, do we really need that? and will we use it? I ask questions like, what store should I buy it from? and what is the quickest route to that store? With that in mind, I was very excited when Jess finally caved in to the pressure I have been putting on her to buy a DSLR camera. She was never opposed to the idea of having a nice camera to take awesome pictures, but that logic thing got in the way and she thought that the money was better spent (or saved) on something else. With enough money saved, she gave me the green light.

I am obviously stoked to have a new toy to play with, but I am most excited about the prospect of taking some awesome pictures as our little ones grow. I won't kid myself into thinking I am Ansel Adams or anything, but I have already noticed how much more forgiving this camera is. As a matter of fact, I think Canon should hire me as a spokesperson. I see the ad campaign now: "Real Pictures, Real People, Canon". Or Nikon, or Sony. I can be bought. Really. My wife will negotiate the details, she's the logical one...