Bubblemania For My Four Year Old

I’ve blogged before on birthdays so you can relive history if you have recently joined me.

Yesterday was my oldest daughter’s birthday party. It was pretty cool. We had a “Bubblemania” party. Basically, there were buckets of bubble soap and bubble machines everywhere for the little ones to play with. We also had Aria’s little pool set up as well as her “Bouncy House.” Everything else was the usual little kid party fare…cake, candles, presents, and breaking up 4-year-old fights.

All the mom’s came to this party. One other dad came. Anyone else notice this trend? I can’t complain because I can always find an excuse to miss another kid party. (Grass needs mowing, work to catch up on, hair needs to be washed…)

I can’t believe how fast these four years have gone by. My little girl is now the big girl and getting bigger everyday. She knows she’s getting bigger too….she reminds me everyday.

Dawg House

As I hinted at in the last post, this house is about to be bursting at the seams with femininity. My good friend, “Dawg” will be bringing his clan down for a yearly visit. His family includes his wife, of course, plus three little girls. Yes, there is someone out there living with more estrogen than me. We were all friends in college, even lived together for a while. When the college days were over, we made a pact to visit each other once a year. This would have been our turn to visit them, but as you know, my wife is pregnant and can’t make the trip.

Our visits have definitely changed over the years. We’ve gone from it being just the four of us to doubling our number at 8. We used to all get in a car together and take a little road trip. Now we have to be a little more creative. One time we even rented a Suburban so that we could all ride together on a trip to San Antonio.

As far as the name, “Dawg”… I honestly can’t remember how that got started. We both call each other “dawg” almost exclusively. I’m sure I’ve called him by his real name before, but I can’t remember when it was. He calls me on the phone, I say, “What’s going on dawg?” to which he replies, “Not much dawg.” Our kids and wives even refer to us as dawg. Sometimes it’s “the dawg” as in, “Go ask the dawg if you can play with his Wii.”

We’re really looking forward to their visit. Stay tuned.

Still Here

Yes, I’m still here and still blogging. It’s just been crazy busy around here.

My brother and I dug trenches around the house to install a french drain. We built some raised beds to move some large shrubs into, and even built a new retaining wall on the side of the house to divert water away from the garage. The hard work was not in vain; we just had a crap load of water dropped on us and the garage, which usually floods, is bone dry.

We’ve also been trying to visit friends and relatives before the new baby arrives. My wife is about to drop a new kid (number three gal in the house) and opportunity for road trips will cease to exist. Obviously, I have not been at the old computer in several weeks.

Staying busy like that has one major down side besides just tiring you out. It makes the summer months pass even faster. I looked at a calendar today and realized that I’m almost on the downhill side of my summer break. This is some gut-wrenching news. My list of things to do before school starts is getting shorter, but it doesn’t look like I’m going to get to the end of it. Anyone else ever feel this way?

In other family news, my three-year-old mixed herself a glass of “pink milk”. “Pink milk” is really just milk with Nestle strawberry flavoring mixed in. “Pink milk” does involve some heavy lifting for a three-year-old. First of all, getting the mostly full gallon of milk out of the fridge without dropping it into a “leche lake” is a fairly impressive accomplishment. Then, the huge container of “pink” has to come out of the cabinet along with a clean cup, lid, spoon for mixing, and a towel for cleaning up the powder mess. My daughter mixed the whole thing and then put everything back up without a trace of evidence anywhere to attest to her miraculous feat. I must say, the “pink milk” was a little heavy on the powdered mix. You could almost call the concoction “red milk”. I bet it tasted good though!

Well, it’s good to be back in the world of the typing. I’m off to stock up the fridge for some good friends coming to see us this week. I’ll let you know what happens with four more “gals” in the house. It’s going to be “Seven and Me and Dawg”. I’ll explain later.