It's the final weekend of the fair, so we had to head out to get our annual dose of dust, sun, fried foods and carnies. There were ponies to be ridden, baby goats to be mauled and Rae even let Kay go down the giant slide by herself. (Though she - she being Rae - panicked the entire time.)
I'll see if I can't get the video up later. It's a lot of fun to watch her bony butt go flying when she hits the bumps.
At only $1, making rope is easily the best buy at the fair.
Kaylee loves llamas.
REALLY loves llamas.
Kids go in tha cage. Cage goes tha watah. Shahks ah in tha watah.
We've rearranged the house a bit in anticipation of additional moves, necessitated by tearing up our kitchen floor and replacing it with tile. Kaylee discovered that it created the perfect dance studio — complete with wood floor, mirror and radio within the reach of three-year-olds.
This is a big deal. She can now make music whenever she wants. And the girl loves her music.
Rae and I had already split up for our post-dinner duties. So while she headed off to scrub the bathtub, I proceeded to pick up the dinner dishes.
And the music came on.
And she started to twirl.
And I stopped to watch.
When ABBA came on I smiled a bit because she immediately fled the room. I was already forming stories about how I learned about her great taste in music at a young age. Stories that I would tell family and friends and would-be suitors should the need to brag about my little girl arise.
Then I heard the familiar CLAK CLAK CLAK CLAK of the high shoes as she ran back into the dining room — and I immediately gave up on my dreams of the perfect story and did what any dad would do. I grabbed the phone and started recording as she resumed her twirls and pirouettes.
And then she surprised me.
She asked me to dance.
Now if you're reading this, you probably know me pretty well, so it should come as no surprise to you that I don't dance. I just don't. Even in the privacy of my own home, when I'm all alone, I just don't.
But I've always said that if anything could get me to dance, it would be a request from my daughter. And up until now, she has had zero interest in dancing with dad. Even at weddings she'd dance with Mom and brides and grandpas and total strangers — but not Dad. It's always been a little relieving and a little heart-breaking at the same time.
But this time I got my invitation. And I jumped at the offer. It was just a couple of quick spins around the room, no more than a minute at most, but it's one of those moments that I'll always remember.
Even if she lost interest shortly after I turned off the camera.
Even if I got in trouble for not cleaning up the table.
I cringed a little bit when Kaylee announced that she had a baby in her tummmy. (Actually a doll stuffed up in her shirt.) But I have to admit, she makes a damn cute new mom.
I went to the Ren Fair this weekend and all I got was this awesome mermaid tat* with my best friend.
* And a turkey leg. And a parasol. And a ride on a giant wooden swan from a man with horrible teeth. And chocolate. And a llama ride. And an elephant ride. And ...
I've been holding onto this image since I returned from Syracuse. (I'm not lazy - I just kept forgetting that it was on my phone.)
Rain is to the desert what that first snowfall is to those in the Midwest. It's exciting and new and you've had a LONG time to forget how inconvinient it can be.
But mostly, it's for playing in.
Now, we can't exacly make snow angels or snow forts - but we can play in the giant puddles that form in the street in front of the house.
And we did.
And I couldn't think of a better way to spend my first day back after a week away from my girls.
Because my sister is making me look bad (what with her blog post a day and all) I decided to break out the editing software and put a little something together. It's not much, but the source material is cute.
Rae shot it, so you can't blame me for the orientation. Maybe if you rotate your monitor on it's side?
In other news
Kaylee's class was visited by a special teacher who taught them all about their hearts. Kaylee even got to "listen to her heart beeping in her skeleton cage."
Kaylee had her first Valentines Day party at school. She hand-made cards for the entire class. Every other parent took the easy way out and bought valentines. LAME.
Kaylee is VERY interested in her valentines. Especially those from the boys. I try to tell myself that it is because they have Wolverine, Spider-Man and the like on them – but I know better.
The kid is going through a bit of a regression in her verbal skills. Instead of speaking in the complete sentences we're used to, she has reverted to grunts, squeals and general "baby talk." I know it's just a phase (and probably something she picked up from the kids at school) but it is annoying the hell out of me.
Kaylee is also regressing when it comes to going accident-free all night. But apparently she's decided that she'd prefer to share the love – and climb in bed with us to do the deed. Makes for an interesting 4 am wake-up-call.
We're off to an engagement party tomorrow night. One of Kay's favorite teachers is getting married in a traditional Muslim ceremony and invited a couple of her favorite kids to the celebration that evening. Kay is very excited (especially since her BFF Sara is coming too) and I'm sure there will be plenty of pictures to follow.
Tonight on the drive home from daycare Kaylee asks how Daddy will get home from New York. So I tell her he'll be coming home on an airplane. She says, "We'll pick him up?" with a little bit of excitement ticking her voice up at the end. Then she imitates my whispered waking her up to do just that, "Kaylee, time to pick up Daddy at the airport." The grin is enough to tell me that no matter how late it is when Mike gets back, Kaylee and I need to be at the airport to meet him. Some things are just more important.
Mike's at work on Sunday evening and Kaylee and I are in the car on our way to the grocery store:
"Mommy, Daddy lells* at me a lot."
"He yells at you?"
"Yes, a lot."
"I think he just wants you to be a good listener."
"But it's not nice to lell at people."
* Kaylee's current definition of "yell" is being told what to do. It doesn't involve raised voices, no, just "Please eat all your tortellini." Daddy lells at her and so does Mommy – tough life kiddo.
That's how far Kaylee is willing to walk on her own. (As long as we're not at the mall. Then it's only about 15 feet.)
We took Kaylee out to Saguaro National Park and hit the trails. She was a trooper – up and down hills, around cactus, through the wash and all the time out front. (She was the leader after all.)
She was careful not to get cactus stickers in her butt – and was on the constant lookout for snakes. She managed to avoid both – but I got cholla-ed.
The poor thing finally tired out when the car was just over the next ridge. But that just gave her an excuse to finish up the trek on my shoulders.
My Christmas present to Rae this year was a family portrait. We're still waiting on the final shots (I'm told the DVD of images is waiting for me on my desk at work) but here's one of the out takes the photographer sent me.
The holiday decorations have been stripped from the house. The tree is shedding it's needles in a recycling pile. Toys are strewn about the house. Sounds like it's the perfect time to look back at the Christmas that was 2009.
Santa brought Kaylee a princess castle. Santa originally didn't think too much of this gift, but Mrs. Claus insisted. As you can tell by the fact that Kaylee was content to stare at the box forever, Mrs. Claus knows what little girls want.
Writing funny captions is hard. Especially when you were up way too late playing Xbox. (Don't judge me. It was broken for a month and I have a lot of catching up to do in Modern Warfare 2. This M16 isn't going to level-up itself.)
But apparently, this thing is pretty damn cool.
Strawberry Shortcake was also a hit. The fact that she had even heard of the toy baffles me, yet that is the only thing she asked Santa for this year.
One of Kaylee's favorite books right now is the story of Edgar Degas' Little Dancer statue. So, since we were in STL, we just had to take a trip to Forrest Park to visit one of the castings.
Watching her run around behind to make sure she was wearing her "peach colored ribbon" was priceless for a dad who's favorite class was usually art history.
Unfortunately, we went late enough in the day that she was too grumpy for pictures.
I must have tired her out with dinosaurs at the Science Center.
Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess. Princess Kaylee had never quite embraced the idea of Halloween. The year she dressed as a bee she screamed so loud her father the King and her mother the Queen never left the castle. The year she dressed as Spider-Man her royal parents took her to the kingdom of Lame (otherwise known as the City of Tucson's Safe Trick or Treat at TEP).
But unlike years past, Princess Kaylee was very excited about the concept of Trick or Treating this year. (That either had something to do with her recent discovery of candy or her lack of an bug-inspired costume.) The idea of traveling the land to show off her pretty dress AND get candy in the process appealed to her vanity and her sweet tooth. So her father the King and her mother the Queen were looking forward to a trouble-free evening as they packed up their princess and drove over to a friend's kingdom. (Because everyone knows that TWO princesses means TWICE the candy.)
But in a fairy tale, nothing ever goes right the first time.
Now it is not clear if she was so excited about the evening that she just forgot to powder her royal nose — or if the extra large dress was just too much for her to handle in the royal bathroom — but in the end, there was a royal mess.
And a wet floor.
And wet shoes.
Oh yeah, and a wet dress.
The kings and queens were overjoyed.
Luckily, princess had the power of not one, but two queens on hand. (Not to mention the vast wardrobe of a girl of similar size available.) The floor was cleaned, shoes were swapped out and the dress was hand-washed and blown dry in under twenty minutes.
Soon the two princesses and their mothers the queens were off to the kingdom of Sam Hughes to ravish the countryside with cuteness — while the kings stayed at the castle to terrify young visitors, eat candy and play Xbox.
