Balanced on a Shelf

Greetings once again readers. Hope every one's enjoying their week. Weather sure has sucked lately. Well, the last few weeks, really. Tried taking Mia to the park the other day because the SUN was OUT!! She was super stoked to hit the swings, but everything was very wet, and it was cold and windy. We'll have to wait for a warmer day. Over the weekend, nothing too exciting to report.  We explored and wandered around Carroll University after dropping some food donations off at the campus. Holy crap how the place has changed. Jill and I were baffled. Everything was different, but it was fun walking around. Mia enjoyed going up the stairs at the campus center. Maybe someday she'll go there. Who knows. It'll be up to her. This weekend, we're heading to Illinois, plus before we go Jill's setting up for a big sale in the area. it's a big kids sale so we're ridding Mia's old toys and clothes that don't fit. Should be a good opportunity to make some cash and minimize the clutter.

So a few days ago, Jill did some cute braids in Mia's hair. She loved it so much that the next day when she woke up, the first thing she asked me was "Daddy, do braids in my hair?!" So, of course Daddy's got to do it right? I searched Youtube up and down and could only find these advanced french braiding, princess braiding, dreads, etc etc etc...Eventually was able to get a diagram on Google and after about 4 tries, I got it right. They weren't perfect, but I swear that kid sure as hell didn't care. "DADDY YOU DID IT YEAHHHH DADDDY! Do another??" So I ended up doing three braids. Made me quite happy. Like when a kid learns to walk, ride a bike, or master an instrument. I taught myself to braid and for the first time in quite a while, I was proud of myself.

Today during the lovely thunderstorm, Mia and I watched the Chelsea game with Grandpa. It was an awesome win for the Blues. After John Terry's amazing header in the goal, Mia said "YAYYY CHELSEA SCORED! Daddy, now we clap!" Love this little girl so much. She had a great nap on the way home, and for a few hours when we got in the door. Allowed me to work on a new art project. Can't discuss much about it, because I'm not sure if my older bro reads my blog. Let's just say, its' a birthday gift for him, so he better love it.

Before I end this blog, I feel it's important to discuss what happened Tuesday with the bombing. My heart broke when I was getting in information at work from customers throughout the evening about the bombing. Running a marathon, you'd think you'd never have to worry about an attack of that nature. Of course the crazy people are trying to find a conspiracy behind this, which is not only insensitive to the people who perished, but also idiotic. That's all for now. Thanks for reading!

Draw a Crowd

Greetings. Been an interesting rainy week so far. Glad to be off today, unlike last week when I was working 2-10. Over the weekend, Jill's parents came up to celebrate a late-Easter. Dinner, a little easter egg hunt were the highlights of Saturday. We also cleaned the former Guinea Pig room and will be turning it into a nice play room for Mia. We even got some nice carpet as well. Look forward to getting this started and finished. Myself and Grandpa put together Mia's little playhouse my Mom/Dad/Sister got for her for her birthday. Didn't take long get up and she absolutely loves it. Even has a pink chair in it (which is currently floating in the river on the side of our house.

All of the current rain has really put a damper on my time off with Mia. Can't play at the parks, can't play soccer or hit up the swings. We did keep quite busy though. Dropped off some left over guinea pig litter at the local humane society. Mia loved all of the dogs and cats. Surprised she didn't care for the rabbits, but that's alright. She went from cage to cage checking out the different dogs. When they'd bark she'd quickly grab me and say "DADDY WHATS THAT!? THEY BARKING!" You know how kids say "why?" a lot? well she tends to say "whats that?" a LOT. It's more cute then annoying so we'll leave it at that. Anyways, she thoroughly enjoyed the dogs and also the cats. She'd say in the highest pitch "hiii kitty!" Totally adorable. As soon as we got by by Dad, she was too tired to chat, and ended up napping for a few hours. Oh well.

Nothing too exciting going on this weekend. Hopefully the weather improves for once this week. ALMOST complete with the Lil Wayne portrait. Hopefully will complete by next week. HOPEFULLY. That's all for now. Thanks for reading.

Just Keep Swimming

Hello friends. Lots to discuss tonight, so let's get to it! Last week (and into this week) everyone in the house has been ill. Jill's got a double ear infection (mostly better now) and of course Mia's got a gnarly cold. Nothing worse then a snotty, upset and angry toddler. You wipe the nose, get all that crap off her face and she takes her arm and swipes her nose again bringing out MORE boogers. Gross, and redundant, but pretty much happens ALL day. Hope she gets better soon. I've got a lingering cold that needs to leave too.

Monday, our guinea pig sadly passed away. Not the best way to start out the day. Mia and I walked in the room and she was just laying there...Mia asking "what happened to Riley? I don't hear any squeaking". Pretty much talked about it the last few days. It was incredibly sad to break the news to Jill since it was HER piggie. We love our pets and when we lose one, its like losing a family member (as lame as that sounds). The good news, is that we can turn the guinea pig room into a nice play room for Mia. Going to get some new carpet in there, and I've got a mural to paint eventually. If the weather stays nice tomorrow, I hope to take her to the park, either play some soccer or maybe basketball. We've got to build her new play house in the yard too, but I want to wait till the 30 degree temps are gone. Come on Spring!!

No days off this week. Worked a Wednesday for the first time in a few years. Luckily, Jill's pop drove up to spend the day with Mia. Got some nice work done on the LIl Wayne Portrait. I want to get this thing done quickly so I can work on a last minute idea for my older bro's birthday coming up. Plus, a slew of other projects that I need to work on.

Mia had a great Easter. We didn't make it down to Illinois on Saturday, but we did visit with my family and have Easter dinner PLUS a little egg hunt for Mia. She loved looking for the eggs and after finding them all, she wanted to do it again. We may do something this weekend.

Oh, and one last thing-The announcement for the new Nemo sequel sounds great. Hopefully it won't go the same route with the last sequel (Cars 2) and not be that great.
That's all for now. Thanks for reading :)

Ship in a Bottle

Greetings! Usually, I try to type up a new blog entry Wednesday night, but unfortunately, Jill's been pretty sick all week, so I had to skip last night. No big deal, right? Yesterday was Mia's birthday, but we celebrated on Saturday with both Jill's and my families at a hotel near by (that my in-laws were staying at). It was a fantastic time, despite Jill getting pretty sick later in the afternoon. Mia got lots of great gifts, got to play in the pool, play some games and overall, enjoy spending time with everyone. Later in the evening, she wanted to roam the hotel in search of kids, the elevator (which she calls alligator) and of course, a band in the bar to watch. Hopefully the weather improves soon because she got a lot of great outdoor stuff!

Yesterday, I took Mia over to visit one of my best buddies who recently told me him and his wife were expecting a little one. We haven't seen him since Mia's 1st birthday party, so a visit was clearly in order.  She was quite shy at first, but eventually warmed up to him. I thought she'd like his cats, but she wanted nothing to do with them. I later found out as soon as we left that she likes "little kitties, not BIG kitties Daddy". Sorry kid. I'll remember next time. Mia also visited with Grandma at work (gotta get that birthday cookie, right?) and later, I took her to the music store. Probably one of my highlights of the day (besides seeing my best bud) Mia was playing probably the most expensive electronic drum kit at the store. AND she was playing it quite well! We sampled different kits, and she even wore the headphones too. It was quite adorable watching her play with her little crown on. Before we left, she pointed and named the different brass and wind instruments. Other then that, that's about it for her birthday. Hopefully the next one, Jill isn't feeling so horrible, because she felt so bad that she couldn't do anything with Mia all day. A year ago, we were in sunny Florida. Could REALLY use some of that nice weather right about now. Mia saw her helmet in the garage yesterday and kindly asked "Daddy, bike ride?" so I took the bike out and we rode a bit in the cul de sac. Luckily, it wasn't too bad out :)

Lil Wayne portrait is coming together nicely. After this, I've gotta get moving on sports portrait. May have to start it sooner then later. This weekend, it's Easter on both sides of the family. Hopefully Mia can handle the drives. That's it for now! Thanks for reading

A reflection of, wait, she's TWO YEARS OLD ALREADY??

Greetings readers! A week from today, Mia turns 2. It's crazy how fast the last year went. Last year around this time, I made some points and reflected on what I learned in my first year as a Dad, and gave advice as well. Tonight, I'll once again, reflect on the last year.

After she hit one, she had a good amount of teeth in her mouth, but throughout the year, she teethed, and teethed HARDCORE. We had some pretty rough nights with her sitting up for many hours. I was told many times by people "just put booze on her gums" but it just wasn't gonna happen, sorry folks. Somehow, we got through the teething stage, and currently, it would appear that all of her pearly whites are in.

She mastered walking this year as well. It was pretty awesome to watch, actually. This little bugger crawling a bit at her very first Christmas, and at her 2nd Christmas, she was running around giving out presents to people yelling out "OH MY GOODNESS PRESENTS!" One of my favourite things to do with her, is just simply walk with her hand and hand through the stores. It's even more enjoyable when I'm off the same night with Jill and we can walk with Mia together. Like tonight, roaming Mayfair Mall. I'm sure the people behind us didn't care for it, but screw it, this is our family night together!

She's developed a lovely picky eater attitude. REALLY loves cheese in its many forms. String, shredded, grilled cheese etc. Luckily, she loves the different fruit packets, eats bananas and of course, and noodles (also in it's many forms). Veggies are tricky with her, but it's a work in progress. Like most kids. She's not a big fan of meat, except hotdogs and some chicken.

Over the last year, she fully developed her creative side. Both art and music occupy that part of her little brain. She has created all kinds of different water colour/acrylic/ finger paintings. She also loves to colour and create "birthday cakes" out of Play Dough. Always says "happy birthday" to whomever she makes it for. One of my favourite activities with her is drumming. She really rips on the drums. Over the last year, she got more confident with playing on my kit. Used to require my lap to sit on, and would noodle around a bit. In recent videos, she's developed some awesome chops and kills it on the snare while sitting on the throne solo.

Car rides have gotten somewhat better over the last year. Still, we bring the portable DVD player in the back for those long drives to Illinois just in case. Surprisingly, we haven't had to use it in the last few car trips to Chi-town. In fact, she prefers to sing songs on the drive. Whatever keeps her happy and as long as it isn't Beiber.

Mia knows all of her major colours, can do the ABC's perfectly, knows some shapes, can count to 20 roughly, and can name off animals and their sounds really well. Going to the zoo quite often over the last year really helped in that category too. Plus, she's got quite a bit of animal books. Her vocabulary really developed over the year as well. By One, it was the basic "Momma, Dadda, Grandma, Grandpa". Soon, she was repeating phrases, animal noises, etc etc. Even at the doctor check up recently they said "she says way more then a normal 2 year old does". Aw, our little chatterbox :)

One of my other favourite things that she's working on is playing soccer. Well, kicking the ball, really. We've kicked her soccer ball around our house and Grandma/Grandpa's house a few times on those cold winter days. Can't wait to get out in the park and play with her again. Last year, we hit the park a few times, so I'm going to try to do more when this white crap melts.

It's been a crazy year with it's ups and downs, but we're loving every minute of our beautiful daughter. I couldn't imagine a better child in my life and look forward to whats in store for us in the next year. Thanks for reading everyone!

Closer

Greetings. Just finished watching a very awesome performance broadcasted on Youtube of Tegan and Sara live from SXSW. It was supposed to start at 11, but it started 30 minutes later. BOO! Oh well. Totally worth it, plus I got some art time in working on this ridiculous Weezy portrait. I hope I never see his face again after I complete this thing for my friend's daughter. The performance was quite awesome. Wish I could have seen them in Milwaukee last week. Mia and I enjoyed our time off today. I recently switched from hard contact lenses to soft ones. My hard contacts, I've had for a very long time and year after year, they'd get dried out. Well, the eye doc suggested soft lenses, and sure enough they work quite well. Today, Mia and I went in to order some, and headed over to Steffans soccer to mainly poke around, see what I can't buy. So a while back I was paging through a Soccer.com catalog and showed Jill a pair of purple and pink Nike cleats, the Mercurial boots. I said "I bet these will be what Mia will want to wear for soccer cleats when she's older. Today, FIRST shoe she sees on the shelf. The EXACT same pair I showed Jill. "Dadda, put on my foot??" Already into soccer. Hopefully it lasts. I can't wait for Spring soccer to start. It's gonna be so awesome. Later tonight since Modern Family was a repeat (curse you March Madness) we got Mia all dressed up and headed to the Mall for a picture with the Easter Bunny. She was totally not into it, till the photographer bribed her with a frog stuffed animal. Plus, Jill had to sit with Mia and Mr. Bunny. The picture turned out nice, which is what matters. Mia was running through the mall so excited to see the rabbit but when she got too close, she grasped onto my leg.

Took a rad video of Mia drumming a few days ago. She really went to town on my kit and it was quite amazing. She loves music almost as much as I do :) Anything else I can quickly mention before heading off to bed? It was a late night last night. Mia crashed at 2am. Hopefully she sleeps well tonight.  Alright, that'll have to do for tonight. Thanks for reading.

I, Pessimist

GREETINGS! Hey, what a surprise, more snow on TUESDAY again! This winter thing is getting old eh? Mother nature can turn the winter down anytime. Sooner then later would be better. Mia still enjoys the white obnoxious frozen stuff, yet can't wait for warm sunshine, grassy hills and frequent bike rides. Did a little sketch over the weekend, this little hammerhead shark with a hipster stache. I dunno why, but I really liked how it turned out. Cute, simple and unique. Could do a colour version some day, we'll see. Over the weekend, I got to hold my adorable little nephew Easton Saturday. he's so cute.

Today, she had her 2-year doc check up. Normally, every doc visit doesn't end well. Especially when there are shots involved. We didn't think she was getting any today, but she ended up getting one for Hep A plus some blood taken to test for lead paint. First shot, she took it like a total champ. She didn't even get upset in the slightest bit. We were pleasantly shocked and quite stoked. Then they escorted us to the lab for the blood test. This one, a little tricky. They wanted one of us to hold her quite tight and they had to take blood right out of her arm. As uncomfortable as she was/looked, she took it like a champ too. I did my very best to distract her. It actually reminded me of the time, my little brother got a staple or two put in his head after falling on his noodle in my parent's kitchen many many years ago. I knew he was hating getting the staple put in, so I distracted him. Man, Mia surprised all of us. The nurses said "Wow, that was unbelievable!" She didn't care for the band aid afterword, but it was defiantly a great doctor visit. She told everyone she saw today about it in great detail. Looks like she's pretty average for height and weight. Awesome.

In other news, our computer is back to normal and fully updated. New memory sticks in and a fan were installed to keep the inside from overheating. Can finally do some photo editing and such. Next up will be my laptop, which isn't a major priority.  Thursday, Chelsea's playing. Hoping for another win. Pens had a great victory over my Dad's Bolts. Gotta keep the momentum going Penguins! :) That's all for now. Thanks for reading :)