How bad do we have it for the food network in our household? Jessica was told by Abby that she shouldn’t talk to Abby for a while because Abby was on TV like Rachel Ray.
Abby was cutting things (fake things with a fake knife) for a while and talking as she did so and then she stopped and said, “OK, don’t go away, I’ll be right back but we’ve got to take a quick brake.”
I do so hope that she starts picking up on more Alton Brown 😉
Last night at dinner I was helping abby with letters and I wrote PAL. She identified the letters “P-A-L.”
Then I asked, “What does that spell?”
“Pal.”
And thus I am now the father of a girl who has far more knowledge of letters and words than I expected of a 3 year old. Not that I thought Abby was dumb, but this is rather amazing for my brain and heart. She’s growing up fast!
So today a man at the zoo kindly offered to take a picture of Jessica, Abby and I. Evie was asleep in the stroller so we let her keep sleeping.
My stinking digital camera has a ‘powerful’ auto-focus feature. You’ll notice how powerful it is below.
At least the elephant was doing something fun.
Abby and Evie pictures from this evening can be viewed here.
This morning I gave Abby a small piece of spicy cinnamon chewing gum because I could tell that she wanted to have some gum. She has delt with spiciness well so far, so I wasn’t afraid of burning her mouth out or causing her life-long emotional harm for one small piece of gum. She agreed with me that she would not swallow the gum and with delight in her eyes she took the piece of gum from my hand and delicately placed it into her mouth and started chewing. About 45 seconds later it was in the trash for being too intense, but she didn’t swallow it, which is better than I can say for my vague recollection of my first gum experience. She did well for not enjoying the intense flavor.
When I was a little boy I think we tried to promote the most outlandish lies about gum and how long it sits in your stomach and how it will kill you because it turns into a fire breathing porcupine that is guaranteed to erupt out of your stomach one night while you’re asleep. Needless to say I was rather worried to learn what my fate would be after swallowing my gum. I’m still here, so you know that I survived the fire breathing porcupine. Whew!
Abby didn’t go to sleep right away for her nap. She came out and said, “I can’t go to sleep, there’s a spider on the paper towel by my bed.” I went to tuck her back in and get rid of the spider. I looked over and failed to see the spider. The problem is that I was looking for the wrong thing. The Spider was the flight options on the Frontier Airlines napkin Jessica had snagged for her bookmark last Wednesday!
Abby has Hockey boots. Not really, but she has boots that she calls hockey boots. Why? I blame Julia Roberts. She was in that one movie with some guy who had problems with gerbils… Richard something or other. She played a prostitute who had a thing for very tall boots. So… in my family tall boots (unfortunately) were called ‘hooker boots.’ So, Abby, not having a clue what hooker boots are has hockey boots. And let me tell you: she can play all of the hockey in boots she wants, as soon as she takes up fishing, its over.
Tonight one of Abby’s dolls began crying. Jessica then said to her, “You better feed her.” Abby lifted up her shirt and placed the baby doll’s plastic mouth on her chest. We all chuckled at this innocent mimicry.
About 2 minutes later Abby walked over to the couch with two of her babies and said, “Mommy, you better do it. I don’t have any milk.”
In what has to be one of the sweeter things said in the last couple weeks (even in the mix of Evie’s arrival) Abby said to me tonight on the way home from dinner, “My heart loves your heart, Daddy.” Which pretty much makes a dad feel about as special as ever. Its good to be Abby’s dad and even though she’s having to grow up and transition into a big sister she’s still my precious little first daughter. She will be until the day Jesus takes one or both of us home.
My heart loves her heart, too.
Sometimes when I look at Abby’s goldfish, Goldy, she’s floating up to the surface with her tail higher than her head. And I start to panic. Then, just as I start to think, “Goldy’s a goner,” he/she/it starts swimming again. The fish was sleeping. Doh! This is not a huge deal, but it is amazing to me that this fish is even still alive. And she’s growing, too. Abby likes to feed her and to pet her, and take her for walks. However, we only let Abby feed the fish, all other activities are strictly imaginary.
When the fish floats to fake me out, I’m frightened, but not forever. [a light alliteration to practice my alliterational skillz]