Baby A's First Birthday Celebration

Baby A enjoys the butterfly cake her mother made for her on the occasion of her first birthday.

Big Sisters Don't Suck On Their Fingers

Scene: C. is playing with baby A., keeping her entertained.

Me: "You sure are a good big sister, C."

C. <gasps>: "I'm a big sister! And I still suck my fingers!" <Frantically throws her comfort item, "ducky," onto the bed behind her.>

In the meantime, I go over to the window and close the blinds because the bright sunlight is shining directly in Amelia's eyes.

C.: "Good idea dad! Close the blinds so no one else can see that I suck my fingers!"

Yes, dear. That's why I closed the blinds: so no one could see that my six-year-old daughter still sucks on two of her fingers.

C. <visibly relieved>: "I think the only people who have seen me suck on my fingers are in our family. Don't let anyone else know that I suck my fingers, okay dad? Let's keep it a secret. I don't want anyone to know."

Okay, kid. Your secret's safe with me.

Of Toilets and Dead Flies: Two Firsts for Baby A, and One for Me

Baby A., who is two days shy of her first birthday, accomplished two firsts today: a) She discovered the toilet. (I found her standing in front of the toilet, leaning over, and playing in the water up to her elbows.); and b) She found a dead housefly on the kitchen floor and tried to eat it. (I assume the fly died of heatstroke.)

Come to think of it, that last one is a fatherhood first for me -- I have never before had a baby find a dead fly on the floor, much less try to eat it. Leave it to A. the Vacuum to come up with that one.

A Six-Year-Old Misunderstands

Scene: Katie and C. are grocery shopping.

Katie: "We need to get some Whole Milk for [baby] A."

C.: "Don't we always get a whole milk?"

Katie grabs a half-gallon container of Whole Milk off the shelf.

C.: "THAT'S not a whole milk!"

Long-Distance Phone Call with My Daughters

I was out of the state last weekend. On Friday, I got a long-distance phone call from my kids:

C. <whispering>: "Daddy, you are the most specialist daddy in the whole universary [i.e., "universe"]. You are so sweet! I love you! Dad, you're going to think this is strange but the day before yesterday I was so sad without you and couldn't go to sleep, so mommy let me borrow your pillow. It's so big and fluffy.

Me <thinking>: So kinda like me?

Me: "Oh. Did it help?"

C.: "Yes!!"

Me: "I'm so glad."

.....

S. <holding phone but turned away from it, talking to Katie>: "Why do I have the phone? Why am I supposed to talk to dad?"

........

L.: <Chatters a million miles a minute, relates all sorts of informative, detailed info about what they've been up to during my absence.>

I confess, my kids entertain me with the differences in their personalities.

Fathers' Day 2016

L. made a Father's Day card for me today. It contained a fill-in-the-blank section titled, "Things I Love About My Dad"

[Note: quotation marks below indicate L.'s answers to the prompts.]

I love the way he: "tickles me and buys me ice cream"

I love it when he: "buys me ice cream"

He is very: "crazy"

He makes me happy when he: "plays with me"

I think my dad is: "very funny"

I got a kick out of her answers. Apparently, I am a "crazy" and "very funny" father who buys his daughter ice cream periodically.

Dangling Modifiers Amuse Me

On our way to Rocky Mountain National Park on Friday June 17th, Carl and I stopped at a restaurant for lunch. While perusing the menu, I laughed over the description of an item labeled "Carolina Pulled Pork." It noted, "After being rubbed and mopped, we slow simmer our pork for 13 hours till it falls apart."

This, of course, begs the question: Why on earth do the makers of Carolina Pulled Pork need to be rubbed and mopped before they simmer the pork? 'Cause I can't see how that would make the meat any tastier.

My Six-Year-Old Daughter Finally Gets Her Turn to Come to Work with Me

I took C. to work with me today. Unlike her older sisters, she actually listened to at least part of my lecture. (Her sisters are well-practiced at ignoring me. They do it all the time at home.)

Me, to the class: "FDR and his brain trust had three main objectives in launching the New Deal---"

C.: "Dad, what's an 'objective'"?

<Students giggle>

I explain. Then C. asks another question.

Me: "Remember how you're not supposed to interrupt me in the middle of class? Can you just write down your questions and save them for later?"

C.: "Okay."

I turn back to the class and keep on talking about the New Deal.

A little while later, C. rushes over to me mid-lecture to show me a piece of paper with an indecipherable question scrawled on it.

Uh, by "later" I meant after class, dear daughter.

I Don't Speak Eight-Year-Old-ese

I took my 9, 8, and 6 year-old daughters grocery shopping with me this afternoon.


Scene: standing in front of the assortment of frozen breakfast items


Me: "L., what kind of waffles do you want?"

L., jumping up and down, : "Boobs! Boobs! Boobs!"

Me: <bewildered stare>

S: "She means blueberry."

Me: "Ooh, okay." <I put a box of blueberry waffles in the cart.>

S: "I have to translate for her."


Yeah, I can see that. And thank you.

Six-Year-Old Daughter to the Rescue

Yesterday . . .

At the end of a particularly rotten day, with my stress level in the stratosphere and feelings of discouragement and failure at an all-time high, I plopped down on my bed. I absentmindedly opened the nightstand drawer and glanced inside. Atop the usual assortment of junk, I found a single sheet of folded paper -- something I had not placed there. Puzzled, I picked up the paper and unfolded it. It contained an ink drawing -- a sketch of my six-year-old daughter, C., handing me a bouquet of flowers and saying, "These are yours." At the bottom of the sheet, C. had written, "I LOVE YOU!!"

Bless that sweet child! Oh how I love her!!

A Triple Daddy-Daughter Date to go see Kung Fu Panda 3

Movie Review of "Kung Fu Panda 3" . . .

6-year-old: "I wish you didn't bring me to this movie."

8-year-old: <absolutely terrified of the bad guy>

9-year-old (the panda-obsessed child): "That was a GREAT movie!"

Discussion in the car after watching the movie Kung Fu Panda 3 . . .

L.: "Why did the mommy panda hide her baby in the box and then run away? Why didn't she take the baby with her?"

Me: "Because the wolves or whatever were chasing her and she was afraid they'd catch her and kill her and the baby so she hid the baby to keep him safe."

S.: "But why didn't she just keep her baby and not stop running? Why didn't she try to outrun the beasts?"

Me: "She didn't know if she'd be able to outrun them or not and she wanted to make sure that her baby would be safe no matter what happened to her."

S.: "I don't understand why she'd do that for her baby. Why would she risk her life to keep him safe?"

Me: "That's just what parents do. They sacrifice their lives if that's what it takes to keep their children safe."

S.: "I still don't understand."

Perhaps someday you will, dear daughter. Perhaps someday you will.

Take Your Daughter to Work Day

I took my eight-year-old daughter, L., to work with me today. I teach college. Here is her evaluation of my teaching style: "You talk too much."


The long commute to work offered L. a chance to chatter nonstop to a captive audience . . . 

L., on the subject of her school's yearly "movement program":

"Next year in third grade I have to dance with boys. That's so gross! It's disgusting! And the fifth graders always have to square dance with boys! That is so so icky! [A friend] had to dance with boys in this year's program and even gave each of the boys she danced with high-fives!"

Me: "So does that mean she liked dancing with the boys?"

L.: "Well, judging by the look on her face, I don't think she liked it. But she did it anyway."

Being the sympathetic type, I commiserated with the young lady. I told her that when I was in first grade, our teachers made us learn the Virginia Reel, thus forcing me to dance with girls. And I found that pretty darn revolting. All those cooties! Ick!

L. didn't think my experience was nearly as horrifying as the prospect she faces next year in school. Perhaps I should've simply agreed that dancing with boys sounded gross indeed.

After class got out, L. expressed dismay. Looking over the empty classroom, she asked, "Dad, don't the students have to push in their chairs before they leave?"

Me: "No, it doesn't really matter."

L.: "Oh. [My teacher] wouldn't let anyone leave her classroom until all of the chairs were pushed in under the desks."

College teachers these days! They let their students get away with anything! They're so much less disciplined than second-grade teachers are!

Grocery Shopping with Mommy

Scene: Katie and six-year-old daughter, C., are grocery shopping

Katie: "We need to get some Whole Milk for [baby] A."

C.: "Don't we always get a whole milk?"

Katie grabs a half-gallon container of Whole Milk off the shelf.

C.: "THAT'S not a whole milk!"

In Which My 9-Year-Old Daughter Puts Me In My Place in Front of a Class of College Students

S. went to work with me today, which meant she got to sit through a two-hour college-level U.S. History class. But before sitting silently for 120 minutes, she called me out in front of my students for failing to count correctly.

I have 14 students enrolled in that particular course. At the start of class, I made a mental note of how many were present. Then I said, "Looks like we're missing five students today." And my math genius of a daughter said, "No dad, you're only missing four."

Me: "Well, there are only nine students here. That means five are missing."

S.: "No, dad. There are ten students. So you are only missing four."

I counted again and, sure enough, there were indeed ten students in class. My nine-year-old daughter can count better than I can. And proved it in front of ten college students today.

I think I'll leave her home tomorrow.

Little Miss "Elite Gold Honor Roll" Herself (straight A's all year long)

Haste Makes Waste, or, How an Exploding Can of Dr Pepper Made Me Late

I dropped a can of soda pop this morning. Which wouldn't have been a big deal. Except it exploded. Everywhere!

It happened as I was getting ready for work. I was running late and, in my haste, dropped the can in the doorway of the walk-in closet. My Dockers and shoes and socks took the brunt of the blast, but the high-pressure stream of brown liquid shot out of the can and across the master bathroom. After capturing the wriggling, writhing can, I put it in the bathtub. But not before the bathroom floor and walls were covered in a fine brown mist. The same sticky mist coated the the toilet, the bathroom counter, the mirror, the sink, our toothbrushes, the toothpaste, my can of shaving cream, and so on and so on.

As I frantically wiped up the mess, I discovered that the brown mist on the walls went up higher than I could reach. I just left that part alone. I think it looks quite decorative, adding color to our otherwise bland white walls.

I quickly changed clothes, wiped down my fancy dress shoes with wet wipes, and ran for the car. Not until I was behind the wheel out in the bright Texas sunlight did I realize that the lenses of my glasses were also coated in the same brown mist, which, I assume, means my face and hair are as well. I'll just tell my students that I'm trying out a new cologne called "Dr Pepper."

The can contained only 12 ounces of liquid, yet it spewed forth approximately 7,153 gallons of the stuff. Why oh why do spills such as this always -- ALWAYS -- defy the laws of physics?

Postscript: a few days later . . .

If You Spill It They Will Come

Remember the exploding can of Dr Pepper? Well, apparently my rushed cleanup job left Dr Pepper residue behind. As a result, we have been fighting off an ant invasion in the master bathroom for the last few days. But maybe if we just leave the ants alone, they'll clean up what remains of the Dr Pepper and then simply go on their merry way.

Yeah, and I'm six feet tall. Sigh.

The Making of an Eight-Year-Old Grammar Nazi

A few days ago, the kids and I were in the van headed for home. S. and L. asked about an acquaintance of ours . . .

Me: blah blah blah "She's good people."

L., shouting from the rear of the van: "Dad, you used incorrect grammar!! You're supposed to say 'She is a good person'! Don't you know correct grammar?!"

Oh dear. I have created a monster.

Middle-Aged Growth Spurt

C., age 6, upon first seeing me this morning, "Dad, why do you look so much taller today than you did yesterday?"

Me: "Because I grew a lot overnight."

C., holding her hand level with the top of the couch backrest, "Yesterday you looked like you were this tall, now you're way up there."

Hooray! I've finally hit my long-awaited growth spurt! And just when I was beginning to lose hope, too. I wonder if I'll make it up to six feet tall.

Maybe if I'm lucky my voice will change as part of this process, too. I'd love to be able to sing as low as that guy from the Oakridge Boys.

School's Out for the Summer!

This afternoon, we picked the girls up from school and took them out for ice cream to celebrate the end of the school year. When taking their photograph, I asked each kid to say, "I survived [_] grade!" Instead . . .

L said, "I hated second grade!"

S said, "I'm gonna miss third grade because I LOVE [my teacher]."

And C said, "I survived kindergarten!"

Baby A, meantime, had lots of fun sampling her big sisters' ice cream cones:

But boy was that ice cream cold!

In which my nine-year-old daughter complains about the dearth of electronic devices in our house

Yesterday after S. came home from school, she told me that she got into an argument with her best friend over whose family was the poorest. I do not know what evidence the friend used to support her position, but S. pointed to our alleged lack of electronic devices as proof of impoverishment. Apparently, she was still upset about the matter, because she got right up in my grill and angrily shouted, "Everyone else has smart phones and ipads and all sorts of electronics dad! All my friends have phones! L's friends have phones! But we don't! We don't have any electronics! None at all!"

Pfffft, young lady! What do you call the radio / cassette player I got for my ninth birthday, huh? That's electronic! What about the Sony Walkman I got in 1985? Huh, huh? That's electronic! And so is the stereo system / record player I got in 1987. And the stereo your mother got when she was a teenager.

We also have a desktop computer and two laptop computers. Yeah, I know two of them are broken and the other one doesn't work at all, but we *still* own them. Our house is practically overflowing with electronic devices, kid!

"No electronics," my eye!

Dirty, Sticky Walls

Dear eight-year-old daughter,

That object you are wiping your applesauce-begrimed fingers on is not a napkin. It is a dining room wall. And defending your action by stating that applesauce is "gross" does not provide sufficient justification for sliming the aforementioned wall.

Daughter Number Two Surprises Me

L: "Dad, you're not like Gru." (the main character from the movie "Despicable Me")

Me (cautious, unwilling to supply the child with any ammo): "Yeah. I'm a little different."

L: "You don't have skinny legs--"

Me <thinking>: Oh, crap! Here it comes.

L: ". . . and you don't get big around the middle as you go up from your legs. And you're not bald."

Wait! What?! I'm NOT bald? This from Leila? Stop the presses! Somebody write this down and record it for posterity!

That kid never ceases to surprise.

In Which My Eight-Year-Old Rates My Intelligence Level and Finds it Wanting

Yesterday, L., age 8, told me that on a "weirdness scale" of one to ten, I was a ten.

Then she said that on an "intelligence scale" of one to ten, I was an eight. I asked, "Why eight?" She replied, "Because you didn't know that Michael Jackson's nose fell off, you didn't know that spiders have eight eyes, and you didn't know that starfish stick their stomachs out inside-out in order to catch food. I need you to be smarter than me if you're going to be a ten."

The conversation improved when she told me that on a kindness scale I was a nine. But then she said that on a height scale I was a five. Curious as to her reasoning, I asked why. She said it was because she compares me to "Uncle Glade" (my younger brother, who towers over me). She said she could only think of one adult who was shorter than me but could not remember the individual's name.

Clearly, I need her to spend some quality time with my friend Doug, or perhaps my sisters. Maybe that way I can rise higher than a five on her height scale.

Conversations with L. are sometimes confusing, often bewildering, but never dull.

A Visit to the Chick-fil-A One Launch Party

This evening, the girls and I attended the Chick-fil-A One Launch Party at our local CFA. We did not go to see the unveiling of the new app, however, since we do not have smart phones. We went so the girls could get stickers, free cupcakes, and, most importantly, see the Chick-fil-A cow.

Bringing the baby along was a serious miscalculation on my part. It started off well, with the baby, who is 11 months old, happy to have a seat at the table.

But then the cow arrived. Baby A was more terrified than I have ever seen her. When she first saw the cow, I was holding her. I felt her whole body stiffen up. She dug her fingernails into my forearm as she held on tighter. Then she burst out screaming. I took her back to our table, far away from the cow. But as the cow made the rounds through the restaurant and got closer to us, A. kept turning around in her seat to check on it. Each sighting brought on another round of hysterics.

The other girls and I tried to block her view with our bodies, but then she tried even harder to spot the perceived danger. She kept craning her neck, spotting the beastly bovine, and bawling loudly. She kept this up until we left the restaurant.

In the meantime, the other girls enjoyed a photo op with the cow.

Baby A has probably never been more relieved in her life to see her mommy. When we arrived home, she practically leaped out of my arms and into her mother's.

I don't think she'll be rejoining us any time soon on a trip to a CFA event!

My poor baby! I think I've scarred her for life!

Colette the Kindhearted, episode 2

Remember how Colette (age 6) was kind to Savannah yesterday morning? This morning it was Leila's turn to be on the receiving end of Colette's generosity. During the ride to school, Leila accidentally dumped out the contents of her lunch. While picking the scattered items up off the van floor, she noticed that one of them was a bag of chocolates. She freaked out, loudly complaining that Colette and Savannah got Samoas (Girl Scout cookies) in their lunch, while she was stuck with crummy ol' chocolates. (Earlier, Colette had consented to let Savannah once again have some of her cookies for lunch.) So, for the second day in a row, Colette offered to trade dessert items with a sister. Leila jumped at the chance to offload her Easter candy in return for Colette's cookies.

I asked Colette if she was sure she wanted to do that again, since the cookies were hers by purchase. She assured me that she was fine with the transaction because she still had one cookie left at home.

Bless her big heart, I hope Colette doesn't end up being taken advantage of by her big sisters.

Colette the Kindhearted, episode 1

Have I ever told you that Colette is a real sweetheart?

This morning Katie put Girl Scout cookies in the kid's lunches. Leila got Thin Mints, which she had purchased with her own money. Colette got Samoas, which she had purchased with her own money. Savannah, having long since run out of the cookies she bought, got the kind with raisins that doesn't sell well.

While I drove the kids to school, they inventoried the contents of their lunches. Savannah was completely distraught to find raisin cookies in her bag. She started crying and kept wailing about how unfair it was that her sisters got yummy cookies and she got gross ones.

As Savannah raged on, Colette cheerfully asked Savannah if she wanted to trade cookies. Savannah readily agreed. The transaction took place, and Savannah's potentially "catastrophic" lunch experience was averted.

Without even being asked, Colette offered her oldest sister the delicious cookies she had bought in exchange for "gross" cookies in which she had invested no money.

I sure love that big-hearted little girl!