A Momentous Occasion

I know it's another gallery update, but this one album requires it's own special post. Debbie gets a haircut!.

Gallery Update

It's Friday afternoon. You don't want to work, do you? Well, here's a nice time waster. PICTURES!!!

Watch the installation of our new windows.
March pictures.
April pictures .
May pictures
Some renovations to Eric's and Lauren's room.
June pictures.
July pictures.
August pictures .
September pictures.
Eric's Baptism.
Pictures from our trip to Greenville, SC, Charlotte, NC, Baltimore, and Ocean City.

Okay, so you may need more than the afternoon.

Doing My Duty

One Wednesday or so a month, you can find me at the Algonquin Library from 6:30 - 8:30 tutoring kids in math. I enjoy it, but it does provide for some surreal experiences. Take tonight. We were quite busy so I was handling 3 students at once. Normally, this doesn't stress me a whole lot, but the issue was the subjects. One tutee was studying about polygons, one was studying exponential growth and decay, and the third was in AP Calculus doing derivatives with the product, quotient, and chain rules. This disparity resulted in some interesting conversations, like the following:
"So, when you add the angles of a quadrilateral, what should you get?" *turn to student 2* "If you are given the population is increasing by 3%, what should your growth factor be?" *turn to student 3* "What rule do you need to use when finding the derivative of x/(x²+2)^1/2?" *turn back to student one* "That's right, so if you are given 3 angles of a quadrilateral, what do you need to do to find the fourth?" *turn to student 2* "Close, but if the population is increasing, should your growth factor be less than or greater than one?" *turn to student 3* "Good, you correctly used the quotient rule, but there's a little problem with g(x). We can't directly take the derivative of (x²+2)^1/2, so what rule should we apply to find that?"
It was a rather exhausting session tonight. So much so that I looked at the clock and said "Is it only 7:30?" Despite all that, I really love doing this. Lauren is funny too, because Mommy has told her I couldn't put her to bed tonight because I had to help kids at the library. So, when I went in to say good night, she asks "You help kids?". She asked about the kids and why daddy helps them, but she does seem to understand this is a good thing and the kids need daddy. It's quite touching.

The Ups and Downs of Fatherhood

Yesterday was one of those classic fatherhood days. For the past 3 years, I have found it difficult to have one of those "bleck" days where nothing goes right. I have also found it difficult to have one of those fantastic days where everything goes right. Kids tend to see to it that you have some really good highs and some really good lows, all in the same day.
Let me start with the lows. Lauren was in a "Let's see what I need to do to make daddy's face turn red" mood. I wish I could have seen it coming, but she was in a great mood that morning and even when I walked in the door. I thought I might have a good night right until I said it was bed time. The look on her face was as if I had taken her favorite doll and ripped it's little head off. In her mind, I immediately transformed from SuperDad to OgreDad with 3 little words: "It's bed time". Things just went down hill from there. She tested me at every step, slowly tinting my face from the normal, healthy, pasty white to ever darkening shades of Daffy Duck blowing his top red. Naturally, I did my best to hide my anger since ... well ... blowing up just tends to make the situation worse. You hold onto that until your spouse asks a seemingly innocuous question like "How was your day?" and you can blow up then. From placing her in bed, until she actually was asleep (or at least willing to not get out of bed and yell out the door) took over an hour. Ugh. As any parent, I absolutely loathe feeling angry at my child, but it happens sometimes.
Now for the high. If you are ever feeling down, feeling like you accomplished absolutely nothing in the past 24 hours, I have found the remedy for that. Simply head towards the bathroom and your toddler will demand to follow you. For some reason, potty training toddlers love to see how others do their business to pick up on any best practices. When the distinct sounds of things going in the water emanate from the toilet, he expression of joy on their face will brighten your day. Their exclamations of "You go Pee Pee!! You push out the Poo Poo!!" will instill a pride that Yes ... you did push out the poo poo and you did a darn good job at it. There's just no better feeling.
Now, the truly gifted child will not need a whole day to give you a high and a low. The good ones can achieve that in a mere 15 second span. Case in point, after her 4th time out of bed and yelling out the door, I marched in, angrily picked her up, and forcibly placed her in bed, which caused the water works to go in overdrive. I wasn't proud of this, but I had had enough of the bed time delays. I waited a bit and then snuggled with her to make her feel a little better. After tucking her in for the upteenth time that night, I was praying this one would stick. Even so, I softly whisper, "I love you". As I leave, I hear the following: "I love you too". Crap. Guess I can't be angry after that anymore.

Eric's 6 Month Update

Eric recently had his 6 month checkup and all I can say is, "What a chunker!"
Height: 28 inches
Weight: 19#13

For some perspective, Lauren reached a weight of around 20 pounds when she was 15 months old. I think I need to start a Debbie Chiropractic Fund soon.