Dad Camp 2014

Kristin took a trip to Atlanta last week to attend a youth ministry conference. I took most of the week off work and proceeded to do some serious father-daughter bonding. Since everyone survived the experience mostly unscathed (at least emotionally) I thought I'd add it to our family chronicle.

Walking home from school was our first family activity after Mom left, somehow we managed to scrape everyone's knee in the process. It cracked me up so I suppose that was our first lesson about Dad Camp, dramatically less sympathy points were available.

Rub some dirt on that, you'll be fine.

After that we went to the library where I was introduced to Elephant and Pig books, and I returned the favor by introducing the girls to a dinner of Cheetos and Baked Beans.

Wednesday Nora and I planted some bushes in the yard in the morning. Abby and Nora found some princess jewel rings that morning which they decided had the secret magical power to let them talk to each other wherever they were. All day Nora walked around saying, 'See my ordinary, totally-not-magical ring Dad? It's not magic at all.' and then proceeded to whisper something directly into her completely ordinary ring.

After school we went to ballet. It was a watch day and I told Nora she could follow along at the back of the dance hall, so she thought she was pretty big stuff.

Thursday was 'D' day for the Kindergarten alaphabet countdown and Abby had been telling Nora all week how her class would be getting doughnuts. Nora was a little upset so we decided to make doughnuts for breakfast so everyone could have one.

To be fair to Abby, she had asked me if she could stick a doughnut in her backpack to bring home for Nora. In all honestly making doughnuts was also a little bit of self preservation, getting chocolate glaze off of the inside of a backpack sounds like a more of a job for mom.

That evening we had small group at our house. After dinner the girls were playing in the living room, Abby had bridged herself between the coffee table and couch when I heard her say, 'Hey Nora, tickle my feet!' Hilariously, that worked out not nearly as well in reality as it did in the minds of a certain 4 and 6 year old.

The past few weeks we've been working on thinking about what we do before we do it, proceeded by such hilarious lines as, 'Nora, pretend to kick my face!' and 'Dip me darling!'.

Friday the girls woke up before 6 so we went out for breakfast.

In the evening we went to International Night at school. Abby sang a couple of songs and we visited booths about different countries. I believe Japan was their favorite because of the Japanese Pocky Sticks (biscuit sticks covered in chocolate).

Abby is in pink, just to the left of the music stand.

I'm sure I had a great time, I think the girls did too.

Easter 2014

Easter this year was a bit laid back, with Mom's sprained ankle and Dad camp coming up and all. I'm especially enjoying seeing the girls grow in their understanding of the holiday. Sorry for the delay in posting about it, I guess we can always back date it.

At any rate we hit all the high points: we dyed real eggs, hunted for the chocolate filled ones, and were even visited by the Easter Bunny.

Despite her bum ankle and working a crazy Easter morning Sunday School shift Mom put together an awesome dinner to top it all off. It was a great day.

Abby's 6th Birthday

We started off this snowy April 15th with traditional birthday pancakes. Dad was informed that he was now the only member of the family to never have seen snow on his birthday, maybe we'll have to move to Australia for that. We also continued the traditionally off-key singing of Happy Birthday, luckily Mom came in and rescued Dad and Nora by the end.

Nora and Mom delievered cupcakes to Abby's class in the afternoon. Abby was kind enough to show Nora the Kindergarten ropes, and after initially being overwhelmed Nora was feeling like pretty big stuff herself.

In the evening we opened presents, the biggest being Abby's first bike. We took it out for our first ride on the sidewalk, mom may have sprained her ankle in all the excitement.

Not sure where it fits in the bigger story, but Nora had a great time dancing with Olaf all afternoon.

Berry Bitty Birthday Bash

This past Saturday we threw Abby a Strawberry Shortcake themed birthday party. It was nearly 80 by 11am so we decided to have the party outside, it was warm and sunny but very, very windy. The guests went to various shops in Berry Bitty City.

The first stop was Strawberry's Cafe where guests decorated their own aprons.

After that they visited Lemon Meringue's Salon where they each received a make-over.

At Blueberry's bookstore they popped balloons that had a challenge ticket inside. Once they completed the challenge they earned a Strawberry Shortcake coloring book as a reward.

After such an exciting morning it was time for an awesome lunch.

With a delicious and well themed cake.

Finally we took a bat to a Strawberry shaped pinata and opened presents. Nora got Abby a Frozen Blu-ray which has been running more or less non-stop ever since (if not running on the TV the Abby and Nora authorized version is always being belted out).

All in all an awesome birthday party.