Effington

Greetings. Lots to discuss, so let's get at it, yes? Over the weekend we had a massive family gathering. My half bro and his kids drove in from Michigan for a visit. We arrived a bit late since Mia was napping earlier. She had a rough morning and really needed to get that sleep in. Didn't want her being a crab-puss. And like we guessed, when we arrived after she had her nap, she was pretty cool with her

cousins. A bit shy of Todd, but that's alright. My older bro and I hit up the park with Grandma, Todd and his kids PLUS Jill and Mia. Because the soccer field was uncut and had long grass, I made a big ass mistake. While we were practicing corner kicks, I went to take a power strike and somehow misjudged the kick and destroyed my right big toe (should have shot with my laces and toes DOWN) It hurt so bad, but at the moment, thought I had just stubbed the toe. When I got home, saw my toes were all bloodied up. Felt so incredibly stupid. The nail looked broken and was oozing juices.

The worst part-I have a game this Sunday. Well just about 4 days later, my toe is slowly improving but after thinking about it for quite a while, I decided it'd be best for me to sit this week out. All week at work, I've been limping around a bit. Today before I cut a TON of grass, I took some shots (with my left foot) to see if I can at least plant the right while shooting with the left. Not bad. Jogged a tiny bit too. I'd prefer to give it a full rest before playing a long game. If I was to risk it, I could hurt it worse, and I don't want that.

Today as Mia waved goodbye to Jill as she left for work, I decided that I'd declare today "Daddy-Daughter Day". She was in tears watching Jill leave and I quickly thought "hey, after breakfast, we'll walk Remi, get dressed and go to the zoo!" She was super stoked. We packed her back pack with some snacks & a water bottle. I have NEVER seen her so excited. "Daddy, I got my back pack, LETS GO!!" She had no patience for traffic either! Hahaha. So we spent 2 hours walking around, taking in all the animals, fish and everything in between. Later, Grandma came over so I could tackle the back yard grass cutting. Was like cutting the Everglades.

Friday is Jill and Mine anniversary. Time sure flies. 5 years married. I get a lot of "you're stupid to be married at work" but honestly, I couldn't imagine my life with out her. So much as happened in these 5 years and I look forward to the next 5. See what's in store for me and the Mrs. :)
That's all for now. Thanks for reading :)

Falling Like Rain

Hey folks. Okay, first off the bat. I have NO idea what in the hell happened to the blog. Last weekend in Illinois, my phone tried to sync with something and for some reason, every picture that was on my blog was deleted. So, if Blogger can't retrieve the pictures, I'll have to go in and find every single one of them. A very tedious task to take on, but I'll do it if I have to. I almost debated about starting a new one to avoid the task of finding every single picture again, but since I've got some great followers and readers here (thanks guys!) plus I've got two+ years of entries, I didn't want to just delete everything.

Anyways, Friday we made a last-minute trip down to Illinois for a funeral/wake service. Well, sort of. Jill stuck around for it, I had to head home for work. Jill's good friend's Dad passed away, so with the drop of the hat, we were Illinois-bound. She spent most of the day with her friends, Mia, I and Grandma hung out for the day. Monday, they came back. It was great seeing my girls again after work.

Today, nothing too exciting happened during day. Went to the sports store in search of another pair of soccer socks. I turned around and I saw Mia with a box of Nike soccer cleats. "Dadda, I try these on?" Sure why not! She tells me "I sit on the bench, take my shoes off and put soccer shoes on.." We did this for about 10 or so minutes. She tried on a slew of different cleats. She just had to see all the different colored cleats. I also found her stacking soccer cones too. When I said "hey we gotta go" she replied "No, I"m busy right now Dadda". After a visit to Jill's work, we soon went in to visit Grandma and lastly Grandpa.

Later, we went to dinner at Rock Bottom in Milwaukee by the Riverwalk. Our good friend Leanne was supposed to meet us there, but somehow one of us went to the wrong restaurant.  Oops! Great dinner, fantastic beers and we still met up with Leanne to chat before the performance. I've got my half bro coming into town this weekend for a big family pic nic thing Saturday. Should be a great time. I also got word that they are FINALLY starting the adult pick up soccer THIS Sunday, but I'm already scheduled to work 11-7 so I'll miss the first game, sadly. No big deal. The season will be nice and long. That's all for now. Thanks for reading. Hopefully I can fix the blog soon :P

CHELSEA FC 2013 UEFA EUROPA CHAMPS!!

BLUE IS THE COLOUR!! Greetings folks. Great day for the Blues. My team. My Chelsea Football Club. Visited my Dad today to catch the Chelsea vs Benifica game. This was surprisingly a close game. Thought Chelsea could have done even better, but the first half proved that Benifica wasn't going to go down.  They played real well. After Ivanovic's beautiful goal, I got scared because Benifica nearly got an equalizer. In the end, the Blues took the title and it was an awesome game. Like last Wednesday, Mia slept through the entire game.

Mother's Day weekend went real well. Jill loved her picture with water colour paint tracing of her hand with 3 flowers (3 representing her third Mother's Day) Cut grass, dinner with Jill's family and Sunday night, my family. Overall, great weekend.

The other day, Mia sadly ate it on the driveway and scraped the side of her noodle not too far from her right eye. I swear, all head injuries are near the right eye. The worst part could have been that she didn't want to wear a band aid, or that I had to dig dirt out of the corner of her eye. As a parent, you've got to be prepared for everything and i didn't want the small pieces of dirt getting deeper in the eye.

Later today after dinner, Jill, Mia and I went to the park. BEAUTIFUL night to go to the park. This park, we've never been to. Sorta in the middle of nothing between Brookfield and New Berlin. I guess.
Mia didn't wanna leave, but we had to hit up Trader Joe's before heading home to watch a very great episode of Modern Family.

Going to be starting a wedding gift for a good friend soon. May not make it by the wedding, but it will be really great. Before I call it a night, been making tremendous strides with some soccer training in the back yard. Especially nice now that it's cut and the ball is easier to get under. Been shooting against my garage side while Mia plays in the sandbox. Usually lasts about 12 or so minutes before she wants to do  something else.
Okay that's all for now. LATER!

The Mighty Sparrow

Greetings. Watching a little bit of Hell's Kitchen before heading off to bed. Normally, I'd stay up later then I need to, but probably could use a good night's sleep. Over the last few days Mia and I have been having little tea parties in the morning. It's pretty adorable how she pours "tea" for me and has little cup cakes. I love her imagination. How many Dad's out there would have a dainty little tea party with their daughter? All of them should :) Had a delightful day off with Mia today. She absolutely loved her sunflower dress (with matching hair piece) that she rocked all day long. In fact, while eating pizza tonight she didn't want us to take it off her! Did a lot of running around with my little dove. Man, the last few days getting things together for Mother's Day, she's just been super great and patient dealing with the dilemma's. It's too bad she didn't wanna go with my original idea...But that's okay because Plan B will work, and plan A will when she gets older :) 

Visited Jill at work today, plus Grandma for some grapes and a cookie, stopped to get some bread at KT and finally, hang with Grandpa :) She lasted about 10 minute over at Grandpa's before crashing for a nap. Ended up missing the entire Chelsea vs Hotspurs game. The ended in a draw, which is fine, but would have been great if they had a solid win. Oh well. At least I got to watch the whole game with my Dad. After she woke up, we hit the park for some fun before dinner. Jill had a late appointment so I wanted to take full advantage of the gorgeous weather and keep Mia happy. This kid LOVES the swings. Just absolutely loves them. We of course played Mia's favourite game at the park where she roars at me like a lion and chases me around the park. It's funny because she'll catch me and say "Daddy, you're safe, have some juice (pretend) then she flashes that signature smirk of hers and roars again. 

Later, we went home and we took Remi for a nice walk. When we got back, she played in the yard a bit. It was hilarious how she wandered over to the fence by our neighbors and stared at Liam, the little boy there. He was nervous how she just simply stared and watched him play in the sandbox. She didn't say a word for like 5 minutes until I asked her "whatcha doing Mia?" "Daddy, he plays in the sandbox like ME!" 

Solid day off with the kiddo. Love these days, especially when she's delightful, patient, loving and friendly. Jill's familia is coming up this weekend for Mother's Day, so it should be fun. That's all for now. Thanks for reading!

Mouth Of a Tiger

Hello! Didn't get the chance to write in the blog last night. Way too exhausted from an otherwise insane day. Over last weekend, Mia and I went to Madison for my oldest bro's birthday. We played soccer at the nearby park. Felt great kicking the ball around, playing keeper and overall, enjoying the day off. Sunday morning, we went to the zoo for the first time this year. There will be many more visits again, like last year. She was totally stoked checking out all the animals. She even wanted to go on a pony ride. I was hesitant at first because I remember last year she wanted nothing to do with the carousel after it started, but Tommy (bro in law) and Jill saw how excited she was about riding a pony so I said "eh why not?" Like I predicted, it didn't go well. Once she sat on him (of course she gets stuck with the biggest pony) she was fine. But after they strapped her in, that was the end of it. Luckily they gave the cash back and we moved on from there. She kept talking about it throughout the day. "I don't like the ponies they're scary!" 

Yesterday, she was a nightmare child. Terrible two's have hit my little girl hard. I was changing her into new clothes, she said she wanted to go potty. Fine. Sat her down, she didn't do anything. Tried getting her diaper on her and all hell broke loose. She got SUPER mad and very hysterical. Eventually I was able to get the diaper on and her skirt. Tommy came in and she got upset with him too. We tried taking her and Remi for a walk, she was STILL mad and freaking out. Took her back home, and set up her water table. BOOM, problem solved. This morning, I got nervous about changing her again. I don't want her to transform into Demon Mia again. Luckily, she was fine, and has been in a good mood all day. I know the terrible 2's are a temporary thing, but damn it takes a LOT out of you! You have to try SO very hard not to yell at them because deep down you know it's pointless. It's not like she's in a state of mind where she can reason with you and understand that her freaking out. "Oh I'm sorry Daddy I'm freaking out over a diaper that I wear every day, I'll behave". No, it has to be the body growing or something. Anyways, so that was fun. Later in the day when she was happy, we hung out in the front yard, she sat in her yellow chair with umbrella yelling at speeding cars "SLOW DOWN!..Sigh, Daddy, They weren't listening". Had me laughing quite a bit. 

Today, she had a little victory. Well, at least for me. After the last few days of gorgeous 70s-upper 80's weather, the temperature dropped quite a bit. low 50s. Well later it got better, so we hung outside for an hour or so. Okay, her little victory, sorry folks. After a lot of time on the swing she wanted to go down her little slide. Great. She said "I'll climb the ladder" and wouldn't you know it, she did it flawlessly. I don't know for sure if She's done it before for my Mom or Jill, but it was the first time I ever saw her climb the ladder, get herself situated on the slide and go down. She'd even land on her booty, shake it off and do a happy dance followed by a high-five. I was pretty stoked. The little victories and accomplishments are great and it shows me how smart and confident she's getting. 

Okay, that's all for now. Thanks for reading!