I often lament, mostly to myself, that I do not post on the blog frequently enough. There is no shortage of post-worthy material. Only a shortage of time. Although, if I’m being totally honest, then this weeks shortage of time is mostly due to the fact that in the past five days I’ve watched three superhero movies. Iron Man two and Capt. America we’re just warm-up laps. Primers get me ready for last night… When I saw The Dark Knight Rises. Batman rules.
Anyway, I thought I’d try something of a summary post this evening as I sit on my back porch listening to the drone of the air-conditioner and enjoying a Budweiser. I’m worried that the summary won’t really do justice to the events I’d like to share. After all, if I really wanted to capture the true essence of Ruby turning out all the lights in the basement so that she could go into the bathroom and take a poo using her headlamp then I kind of need to write that post on the spot. The problem is that Arden has figured out you can talk to your cell phone. I used to be able to use the voice dictation feature on my iPhone to post with Arden in my lap. But now, whenever I sit down and start talking to the phone, she leans in front of me, looks at the screen, and starts yammering away. The iPhone is incredible device… But it hasn’t figured baby squawks yet. So the blog that was started about the baby is now being slowed down by the baby. Whatever… pooing by headlamp… Can you beat it?
Now for a few other highlights from the week. On Tuesday, I had a first. The kind seem strange that it almost one year into this stay at home dad thing I’m still having firsts -But I guess that’s something I should be grateful for. Friend of mine from school that I teach at recently had a son. His son is about six weeks younger than Arden. He is taking a leave from teaching as well-not a full year but the four months that his wife didn’t take at the end of her maternity leave. Anyway, they’ve organized a parent and baby swim class. Hil did something like this with Charlotte when she was a baby. Ruby pretty much got looked over in this department. Arden will get a grand total of two classes in the pool. I suppose 2 is better than nothing. Anyway, was lots of fun to be in the pool with her in a focused way. We have done lots of swimming together but there’s always been other kids around. It was nice to have her one-on-one and try a few new things. But what I really recall about this experience was how dog tired she was at the end of it all. I never have trouble getting her up from her nap. I was feel bad waking her up we have to go somewhere… But I suppose that’s the life of a third child. Anyway enjoy the picture of her completely passed out. It wasn’t easy to wake her up on Tuesday afternoon when it was time to pick the older two girls up from camp. She was completely the zonked.
On Wednesday, Arden and I went on a little mission. Hil is turning 40 this year. She’s taking it pretty well. And is excited for her trip to Canada’s Wonderland to mark the occasion. Arden and I headed to see if we could find a gift for her. I knew exactly where I wanted to go. I checked the website for location and store hours. I packed sufficient supplies and the bike trailer. I waited until she woke up from her morning snooze. Unfortunately, this establishment failed to note on their website that they were closed last week for their annual summer vacation. The bike ride home-entirely uphill because our city was built on the side of one-wasn’t that much fun. But we did pass by a very nice park with some shady trees and a wadding pool and that is where Arden had her first encounter with pigeons. They were very interested in the pretzels she was eating. I wasn’t quite sure how to proceed in this situation. Do I encourage the pigeons for the sake of a good blog post? Or do I shoo them away for the safety of the baby? Arden seemed genuinely intrigued by the pigeons and the pigeons themselves seemed willing to keep a respectful distance from the baby as long as I supplied them with some pretzel crumbs. Which I did willingly. It’s amazing to think that birds are the descendants of dinosaurs and that we co-exist with them. Who knew that all it took was some pretzels?
And finally, I thought I should mention what an incredible week Charlotte has had at her fabric fun camp. This camp is run by two teachers from the hippo nursery school where Charlotte has been attending for three years and Ruby is currently enrolled. The week of program is entirely based around working with textiles. On Wednesday Thursday and Friday Charlotte asked me each morning if we could go early so that she could work on her knitting. She learned how to felt, she picked up some basic sewing skills, and she absolutely had a chance to explore her creativity. It was amazing to see what she had to present at the art show at the end of the week. And it was incredibly awesome to see how proud she was of all that she had done.
We are having a pretty awesome summer, over here. It is such an incredible gift to have this time at home with my kids.
3 Ginger Snaps 