The GREAT Pumpkin

Remember the Charlie Brown Halloween special where Linus was waiting for the Great Pumpkin to rise out of the pumpkin patch? I always kind of considered Linus a woosy for it. You just knew the kid was wasting his time. You wanted to just scream, "Wait until Christmas you idiot and Santa will take care of you! Great Pumpkin? Stupid!"

I am now a believer in the Great Pumpkin. My conversion came swift and almost unexpected. There I was minding my own business and a thought came to my head. "I wonder if there are any giant pumpkin competitions here in Arvada" I said to myself one afternoon. After a couple of quick searches on YourHub.com I found what I was looking for. A giant pumpkin competition that was part of the Festival of Scarecrows here in Arvada. I instantly decided I was in.

You see I've been growing a giant pumpkin since early spring of this year in my own backyard. A few times a week I would water it and tend to the flowers to make sure the perfect pumpkin would get a good start. At first it wasn't much to look at. As of July it was just a mass of vines and a few flowers with just a start of a pumpkin. I was actually kind of concerned that it would have enough time to grow before the first front hit so I would at least have some kind of a pumpkin before the first frost hit. Come August however it exploded. You could literally watch the small yellow, round bulb grow and slowly turn into a bright orange pumpkin. In October I knew I had something special. What started as my usual obsession to have the biggest pumpkin on the street turned into a desire to see if I could have the biggest pumpkin in Arvada. I saw that last year's winner in the YourHub article was about 200 lbs and although I had no idea how much my pumpkin weighed, I thought from the pictures that maybe my pumpkin had a chance.

As the competition came closer my faith wavered however. I considered entering the pumpkin under Haddie's name thinking there might be a better chance of winning in the kids division. After all, Haddie had spent a number of hours watering the pumpkin this summer as well as spraying daddy in the process.

At 6:30am in the morning of the big show my good neighbor Darrin was kind enough to come over to help me load the pumpkin in the car. The pumpkin was heavy. Really heavy. I thought maybe I could win the overall competition but I pushed that thought to the back of my mind and kept to my origional plan of entering it under Haddie's name. Certainly someone else must have a bigger pumpkin I reasoned and it was better to play it safe. When I arrived at the show and parked in the pumpkin unloading area one of the two men who assisted me with the unloading said, "Oh this is a big one. I think we've got the winner right here." My faith then gained strength and I put the pumpkin in the adult category.

After going to lunch we returned to the competition for the big weigh in. Nearly a dozen big pumpkins were entered in the contest. After scanning the field I could tell there were two clear favorites and mine was one of them. The second big one was really big, perfectly shaped and a fine specimen. I had to lean over to Amber and say "I think that one is the winner" and I began to regret that I didn't put the pumpkin in the children's competition.

sank. I couldn't see any way that my pumpkin was that much After the children's pumpkins were weighed and the prizes awarded the adult competition began. They started by weighing in the smaller pumpkins. One by one they weighed them in and the top weight increased each time.

Finally they got to my pumpkin and the other pumpkin. To my surprise they weighed in the other big pumpkin before mine and since they had been going in order by size I thought maybe mine had a shot. The other pumpkin came in at a whopping 40lbs above the next biggest pumpkin! My heart sank. They then began to load up my pumpkin. The three guys strained as they lifted the pumpkin to the scale. One commented, "This is a heavy pumpkin." Again my heart took strength.

After placing it on the scale the official weigher started sliding the scale back and forth. I knew it was close but I couldn't see from my position how close. The weigher then asked for someone to give an official check of the weight and then the announcement came. 141.5 lbs! One pound more than the other big pumpkin. My pumpkin was the winner! After pictures, awards and prizes I was given a moment to think a little bit about it all and realized that the blanket toting kid was right. The Great Pumpkin does rise out of the pumpkin patch and bring gifts to all of the good girls and boys. He really does!

Why Blog Posts are Like Tattoos

Blog posts are like tattoos because at the time they may seem like a great idea but one week, one year or even ten years later they may not seem like the best of things. Any post may seem funny, interesting or a release of pent up frustrations at the time, but over time you kind of have to ask what will that information look like to the public ten years from now?

I read a great post by a gentleman with young kids about his recent sex life. The post was very well written, funny and I could really relate to it. I have to wonder however what his young children would think about it if they read it 15 years from now. Or if this person decided to run for President twenty years from now how the public would perceive it. If anything it would make him look human like all of us, but in the wrong hands a post could be turned against him if someone decided to take advantage of it. Like a tattoo loved by a 20-year-old, that same post may begin to sag and become a burden in the archives of the Internet over time. Once it is out there it is very hard to take back.

Just a thought. I still love blogs.

The Truth About the Cooler

The simple fact is that the cooler is Amber's. What guy do you know takes time to pack a nice lunch with grapes and all of the works in a cooler? I'll take credit for the canned beverages. The simple fact is that the cooler that has been sitting in the car is NOT mine.

Thank you for your support.

Raymond

When Potty Training Isn't Going Well

You know you have missed the mark with your two-year-old daughter in the potty training category when she takes off her "big girl panties" and puts on a diaper herself in order to go poop.

I'm not sure where we went wrong but I feel like the message just isn't getting through.

To Put the Story Straight

Okay, the truth is that I asked Amber not to post some of the things that she posted on March 25th, but it is out there for your entertainment now. Yes, I hate the dancing bunny. I however am not against the Easter bunny or anything else that brings me Jelly Bellies. I did see Mary Poppins without proper attire once, but I didn't know that public television could air nudity. And yes I have been teaching my two year old how to break the necks of the little bunnies that are hopping around my yard eating the plants that I've put so much TLC into. To sum it up, I am a bad person. ;-)

Vacation from Vacation

Why is it we always do this? We tried it last fall and it didn't work so why would we think it would work now. I have to preface this by saying that our day time trip to the mountains was great. It was only the times that my head hit the pillow that everything was a disaster. As Amber mentioned we went to the mountains this weekend. A little getaway "retreat" with some good friends from the street. The problem was that Bode decided that sleep wasn't on his itinerary so nobody was going to sleep if he wasn't. To say the least it was brutal.

At one time I thought that Bode slept a three hour block but I now realize he was kidnapped. There can be no other explaination for it because there is no way he could have been silent for a full three hour block on his own. During those three blissful hours Bode was in the arms of some half-crazed, baby starved women who was taking him into the night to make him her own. Three hours later, sleep deprived with wines ringing in her ears she returned him to his pillow deciding that she didn't want kids after all.

To that women I say thanks, for giving me a few great hours of sleep! Next time try taking him for a full eight hours before bringing him back. ;-)

A Lot Behind

Goodness. It has been over a month since my last post. The cruise was wonderful. 80 degrees every day and very relaxing. The blueness of the water always amazes me in the Caribbean. Work has been a little less crazy in February in some, but things are still challenging. Just not enough staff to do everything we should and would like to do. They just announced a new VP this last week so that should help a little.

Haddie start using the big girl potty this last week. There have been some struggles, but a Chuck-e-cheese promise seemed to have given Haddie a little more focus. Bode is thinking about crawling these days. He has started scooting himself around a little and trying to get himself into crawling position. He broke a second tooth through this last week and has been sleeping a bit better latley. All-in-all life isn't to bad.

The Cruise is Almost Here!!!

Amber and I are departing, without the kids, on a much needed cruise next week! We will be going to Puerto Rico, Antigua, U.S. Virgin Islands, and the Bahamas. I'd like to thank everyone for their great "click" support! The "Help Me Fund" was a great success and we couldn't have made this happen without you. The grand total came to $105.36 with almost half of it coming in the first few weeks.

If any of you have ever hit any of the above ports and have some suggestions we would love to hear them! Also, if any of you have any suggestions or positive experiences to share with two parents with some anxieties of leaving their little kids for a week please give us the good word.

My Proudest Moment

Before heading to the great white north we opened Christmas presents with my family. We decided that the last present we wanted to reveal to Hadley would be the Thomas the train set we had got for her because we knew that once she saw it she wouldn't want anything to do with the other gifts.

Hadley had met with Santa twice and on both occasions she asked for Thomas. When the big day arrived we opened up all of her presents downstairs and she was thrilled with her new gifts. After a while everyone slipped upstairs to her bedroom where Thomas had been setup (it took me nearly two hours to get the stupid thing put together). Hadley was riding around on her new scooter in the kitchen and I went over to her and asked her what she had asked Santa for Christmas. She immediately said, "a scooter!" I reminder her that there was actually something else that she had asked for and after a couple of minutes of thought she remembered that Thomas was actually the gift she had pleaded for.

With a touch of sadness in her voice but with real sincerity she then said, "It's all right, it's all right." I couldn't have been prouder of my little two-year-old. She was grateful for what she had received and seemed to have a hint of Christmas in her heart.

I immediately said, "Let's go upstairs. There is something that mommy and daddy got for you that is in your room." I don't believe there was a happier parent or child on Christmas day when she saw Thomas and all of his friends sitting in her room. She didn't eat or play with anything else for the next three hours.

How I Barley Survived the Holiday Blizzard

The Holiday Blizzard

The good news. I'm stuck at home today because of the big storm here in Denver. The bad news is that I'm supposed to fly to Canada tomorrow at 8:00pm. The airport is closed right now and I don't think it will be open until tomorrow. Amber and company are already in Canada enjoying the warm weather (about 40 degrees).

When Children Attack

The Hurricane drew blood the other day. I should have seen it coming but portions of it I couldn't fully appreciate at the time. You see we took Hadley to Toys-R-Us the other day for the first time. I did expect a minor fit at some point in the store but what ended up happening was way beyond anything I had seen before.

When we first arrived Haddie gave me the "why didn't you tell me this place existed d" look. For the first 20 minutes she was really quite good and had lots of fun playing. Then she discovered the Thomas the Train set. She has only ever seen one Thomas episode but she has seen it at least a dozen times. She was having lots of fun moving the trains around and after about 10 minutes I gave her a two minute warning. After two minutes I said it was time ago and then the full force of the Hurricane hit. She literally drew blood. In her own little way she told me that I was going to have to drag her cold dead body out of the store before she would go.

After some difficulty I got her out of the store doors so I set her down. She immediately darted back into the store at full speed. Realizing she wasn't going to get away from me she threw herself on the floor and went into a defensive position that only a ninja warrior would know.

The store manager, he deserves a BIG raise, went into action. This lady was an artist of the highest magnitude. Immediately she went to Haddie, took her straight to the front counter where another employee was already filling a green ballon, had the balloon tied on Haddie's wrist before she knew it and had her out the store door. I figure it must have been part of employee training because they had this down to a science. The nice lady walked Haddie all the way out to our car and was as kind as any employee I've ever seen.

Moral of the story: don't go to Toys-R-Us with the kids, but if you do call the store manager beforehand.

Children + Hotel = Hell with Children

I told my dear wife it wouldn't work very well. I wasn't disappointed. This weekend we went to Colorado Springs for a little getaway. I'm not sure what we were getting "away" from because we brought them with us. The kids that is.

Overall there were a number of successes on the trip but the nights were very tough. I know we couldn't put all 4 of us sleepless wonders into a single room and hope for a magical night of sleeps. Hadley got up twice (one time in hysterics because "daddy's breath stinky") and Bode got up 3 times. In all I think I got 4 hours of sleep (maybe!).

Can't wait for the cruise!

"Help Me" fund update: $167.11 until Amber goes on a much, much needed cruise. Please click on the ads to the right!

A Defenseless Truth!

Okay, okay. Amber's blog today mentioned a few things that allegedly were said by me (actually they were all said and done by me). I am a bad person (or just a man). I don't recall if Amber has ever blogged about this or not but I have a tendency to put Bode on the floor in front of the television and then I lay down on the couch and watch TV with him. I call it daddy/son bonding, but Amber see's it as wrong. He will just sit there starring at the screen for over an hour without a peep. I do the same. He likes it. I like it. And it is the ONLY chance I have to relax in the day.

Amber tends to hold Bode all day. I have to admit he likes it, but I don't think it is good for the both of him. That is where I come into play. I give Bode the quality alone time that he needs to develop other aspects of his personality. I am the ying to Amber's yang.

"Help Me" fund update: $168.14 until Amber goes on a much, much needed cruise. Please click on the ads to the right!

I Don't Have Anything To Blog About

If you want to read about budgets, long hours at work and children who don't let daddy sleep enough please read on.

I was hoping to come up with something funny, amazing and interesting to blog about. Right now one kid is crying and the other is in Time Out for making him cry.

Wanted: warm beach, good food, ande quiet.