Train up a child

I'm told that stubborn children are a blessing and I'm trying my best to look at Teagan that way. Not easy. Though lately, I've gotten a glimpse of what people mean when they say that it will pay off when she's older. We've been trying to teach her about modesty and that in order for shirts to be modest, they need to have sleeves. My dear, sweet, strongwilled little girl has taken this to the extreme and refuses to wear short sleeved T-shirts, claiming that the sleeves aren't long enough to be modest. We aren't even talking about capped sleeves. Legitimate, all away around the arm T-shirt sleeves and no amount of explaining can convince her that they are modest enough for her to wear. As frustrating as it is, it is refreshing to see that she will not be moved - on this issue, anyway.

I'm reminded of a scripture in Proverbs - Chapter 22:6 - "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it."

How comforting. Teagan has renounced most of her dolls that don't have modest dresses and explains that there's only one thing that makes her sad about Sheriff Callie (a Disney Jr. show that features a feline sheriff) is that she doesn't have sleeves.

We are incredibly fortunate to receive gobs and gobs of gorgeous hand me downs from my sister-in-law who has a little girl three years older than Teagan and even taller and skinnier, so her clothes are perfect. I had thought that tank tops were okay for little girls while they were young, but this little woman will not be swayed. Even when the clothes come from her favourite cousin.

It's cut her wardrobe way down and makes mornings a little frustrating, but when it comes down to it, I'm trying to be grateful that my little girl is showing the potential to be set on the right path and not deviate from it when others try to convince her to stray. Even her mother. <sigh>

Swimmin' Cousins

Living in a small town has taken a bit of adjusting in some ways, and has been a welcome change in others.

For instance, when we signed up for swimming lessons with Parks & Rec in the next town over and Teagan and her cousin, Sam, were the only two children registered for the class. It was amazing. 

I had talked up swimming lessons for a while, trying to get her excited about them and she couldn't wait to go. Until the morning we started. Then it was like pulling teeth to get her out of bed to go. But after many tears (mine) and much begging and pleading (again, mine), we arrived and all was well.

Their teacher, Miss Nancy, was a kind, grandmotherly type - not the stereotypical college student we were expecting. She was perfect for these two. She spoke to them very softly and they didn't have to wait long when she was doing one on one things, which was great for their first experience.

Right off the bat they practiced putting their heads underwater - a struggle I've never won even after nearly 4 years of bathing her. But she did it for a perfect stranger and that was nice to see - especially if she has a prayer of attending school in the near future. Tara (my sister-in-law) and I sat at one end of the pool, far enough to observe and not be tempted to intervene at every possible juncture when she wasn't listening to her teacher. It was a good exercise all around.

They were so proud of themselves for doing well and wanted to go back the next time. What a relief it is.

These two get along swimmingly for 3 year olds. Pun intended. They play very well together and are just so darling to watch interact. Now that we are living so close, I'm excited to watch them grow up together and have a built in friend through their formative years.

What with it being flu season and all, there were occasions when Sam didn't come and she was a wee bit devastated, looking for him through the glass doors. I was both surprised and impressed when they continued on with the lessons, even with just Teagan. Private lessons for the price of public? I'll take it!

They graduated from the first stage and went right into the second, with Mr. Gordon. Teagan, who does well when she has a heads up about new things, was less than excited about their new teacher who looked a little different than Miss Nancy, but warmed up later. They had two other children in their class and got a little rowdy at times, but did well overall. She LOVES putting her face under the water - to the point of scaring me - and is working on the front crawl (scooping ice cream). She jumps in, paddles, kicks, blows bubbles and picks things up from the bottom of the pool. For two sessions of lessons, it's pretty impressive stuff.

Of Moths and Men

We don't have pets now. We won't have pets later. That was decided before Martha the Moth made the poor decision to fly into the house - Martha just sealed it.

One on hand, I'm proud of Teagan that she approached a moth without any fear or trepidation and on the other, I'm wondering what she won't touch considering how ugly this moth was. 

It was resting near the oven when Teagan audibly gasped and cried, "It's a butthly!" (Teagan for butterfly) and picked it up by a leg. Which tore off, so she picked it up by its wings. She wanted to return the butthly to its rightful home outside, so threw it in the air, only to have it fall very quickly back to earth. If moths had hindsight, this one would have put a little more effort into flying away. 

"She will be my pet!" Teagan exclaimed with glee, apparently interpreting the moth's injury as a plea to stay with her. So, I reluctantly pulled out a glass, poked some holes in some plastic wrap and allowed her to gently place her new pet in its enclosure. It seemed to be DOA, but I didn't have the heart to tell her. She confirmed with me several times that I had indeed provided a way for the butthly to breathe, but I think her concern would have been better placed with the poor thing's missing limbs. 

To distract her from the fact that her new pet wasn't moving, I asked Teagan what its name was. "Takawana," she replied, without missing a beat. This girl has the most creative names for dolls and pets - I'm nervous for her progeny. Unless she winds up in Utah, and names like Shoosh, Blones and Takawana are in the top 10. It took me a few times to get it right when I tried to repeat it back to her, so she decided that Martha was easier to say. So Martha it is. Was. 

I never quite know what she will remember (the scabby old dresses and T-shirts that I try to hide in hopes she'll wear something that <gasp> actually matches only to have her ask for the hidden items specifically, months after I've put them away) and what she will forget ("Please make sure you wash your hands after you use the toilet!") so when there is doubt, I try not to get rid of things. We returned from an hour of play in the backyard to find Grandma doing dishes, Martha's makeshift habitat now resting, overturned,  in the dishwasher. I tried to distract her with talk of colouring and all things shiny, praying she wouldn't ask about her pet. Mission accomplished - who doesn't love shiny things? 

We were talking about insects the next day and without thinking, mentioned that one looked like Martha. I held my breath and waited for the weeping and wailing upon discovering that dear Martha was no longer with us. Unnecessarily, as she simply asked, "Who?"

Martha, you made a lasting impression on me and the cats, dogs and small rodents everywhere who have you to thank that the Richards will be settling for digital pets for the foreseeable future. Rest in peace, my winged friend.

Cyclical Questioning

I’ve never known a child who asked more questions than Teagan. Granted, she’s the first child I’ve ever had, but I hope it’s just her and that my next ones don’t ask nearly as many. Most of her questions revolve around “Why?” and I can’t seem to answer them well enough for her, because they just breed more questions. Questions like “Why is that a house?” and the age old “Why is the sky blue?”

Lately, I’ve been caught in a net of questioning and I can’t seem to answer my way out. Por ejemplo:

Driving down the street:

Teagan: “What was her name?”

Me: “I don’t know.”
Teagan: “Who was dat?”

Me: “I don’t know.”

Teagan: “I’m asking Daddy. Daddy, who is dat?”

Buddy: “Sally.” (just to end the barrage of questions)

Teagan: “Who’s Sally?”

Another day:

Teagan: “What’s dare names?”

Me: “I don’t know.”

Teagan: “Why don’t you know dare names?”

Me: “Because they’re strangers.”

Teagan: “Why are day strangers?”

Me: “Because I don’t know them.”

Teagan: “Why don’t you know them?”

Me: “AARGH!”

Teagan: “IS it nighttime?”

Me: “Yes.”

Teagan: “Why is it nighttime?”

Me: “Because it’s dark.”

Teagan: “Why is it dark?”

Me: “Because the sun is down.”

Teagan: “Why is the sun down?”

Me: “Because it’s nighttime.”

Teagan: “Why is it nighttime?”

She doesn’t believe me when I tell her I don’t know, so she pushes me until I can make up an answer. From this day forward, my strategy is just to answer with confidence and pray for minimal follow up questions. Pray for us.

So Long, Library!

Of course there are libraries where we live now, but I wanted to pay special tribute to our library in Las Vegas. We’ve spent a good amount of time at the Windmill Library since it opened just miles from our house shortly after we moved into our house. We got to know some of the librarians there and attended quite a few storytimes. Teagan really enjoyed storytime, singing the songs and reciting the poems, making the mad faces when they asked her to make mad faces and doing every action they suggested (I took her mostly because I enjoyed watching her listen to and follow instructions.) She looked forward most to the stamp the librarian gave you at the end. She would curl up in a ball at the end with her hands on her head and wait for several minutes for them to get to her. An outsider might have thought she was braced for a bomb or an earthquake, but it was just a stamp.

We also participated in numerous reading programs. One of those programs was the “1000 Books Before Kindergarten” program Teagan started when she was about 2 and a half. Since then, we’ve been filling out reading sheets, 100 books at a time and taking them in to the library for a stamp, a prize and the next sheet. Resolved to finish what we started before we moved, a few hours before we loaded the truck we headed to the library, laden with nearly 50 books and a dozen movies to return and a list of books 901-1000 – heavily featuring titles like “Everyone Poops” and anything that began with “The Berenstain Bears and”. I wanted to make it a family affair, a sweet little moment together, as I felt we needed to celebrate something so exciting. Well, that exciting thing took a more exciting turn when we unloaded. I strapped on the diaper bag and grabbed the gigantic bag of books and movies (we’d been relying on the ones we’d borrowed since we packed ours) from the boot while Buddy got the kids out of the car. I started to straighten up and heard a yelp and whipped around to see what was wrong. A scream this time. “Hold still!” Buddy yelled at me and continued to tell me that Teagan was attached by the hair to the incredibly strong Velcro on my diaper bag. So, while I stood still, hunched over at the back of the van, Buddy held Mason with one arm and tried to free Teagan with the other. I do not exaggerate when I tell you it took several minutes and as my legs began to burn I asked what was taking so long. He finished then and I turned around to see my sweet girl. The top of her French braid had been snared and it took a whole lot of effort and a whole lot of crying to free the poor little thing. So, with a tear streaked face and tangled, fuzzy hair, still whimpering we embarked on a sweet little moment together. She greeted her friends (the cutouts from Monsters University and Frozen) returned a record number of items and claimed her prize – a book. It was pretty perfect that Miss Joanna was the librarian working the children’s desk – she always greets Teagan by name and always found something nice to say about the way I looked when I was pregnant with Mason, even if it was a lie…which it had to be. Glad we got to say goodbye to her. Everything else went off without a hitch, except that we’d forgotten a few items at home and had to make plans to come back anyway. Which made the fact that she couldn’t bear to part with the beloved Alvin and the Chipmunks CD we’d renewed countless times. I made plans to return it on the sly with the other few items the next time we visited the library. The real last time. So long, library!

For a girl who can't stop talking...

...she didn't say much.

I learned an important lesson in reading all the way to the bottom of e-mails and sang the praises of my friend when she texted me on Friday night (not Saturday, bless her heart) to make sure I knew Teagan was giving a talk on Sunday. No. I did not. So, while I was preparing my Relief Society lesson (wrong place at the wrong time and asked to sub) on faith and repentance, I found some good material for Teagan's talk on Jesus Christ being our Saviour. On Saturday we told her she would be talking in Primary and she was all for it, really excited to use the microphone. So we practiced that night reading our scriptures into her toy microphone. Not the same, we know, but she'd hear her voice sounding different and we had some fun with Daddy reading "wo unto you" scriptures into the mike in his already booming voice. Sidenote, his buddy compared him to Barry White the other day - a nice change of pace from Kronk. Even Mason got in on the action.

She was totally pumped to speak, until it came time to sit at the front in the Talk chair. She sat on my lap for the entirety of opening exercises, which should have told me everything I needed to know about what was to come next. She remained cool and confident as she strode up to the pulpit and then promptly froze. I will celebrate the fact that she made it up there and didn't run away screaming. Our small victory is that she stayed at said pulpit for as long as it took for the talk to be said. By me. I'll admit, it's been a few years since I gave a talk in Primary and it took me back. I tried to whisper in her ear what to say, but the silence became so uncomfortable, I had to break it and deliver the talk as if I were Teagan, saying things like, "Teagan knows that Jesus Christ lives and she loves Him." I felt more than a little silly, but the teachers smiled at me politely. 

An overzealous photographer, I wanted to capture some of the moment but knew it was inappropriate at the time. So we recreated the moment after all was said and done. I couldn't get her down from the pulpit after church, she delivered an epistle when no one was staring at her. But she looked the part.

And I took the opportunity to chastise the Primary kids as a whole after they'd all left. This photo is a little more accurate as to how the whole ordeal really went. But I was reassured that many a Sunbeam's parent has recited their talk for them and that it wouldn't be the last time I'd have to do it. Look out, kids. There's deep doctrine coming your way when "Teagan" gives her next talk.

 

One good thing that came out of the whole ordeal is that she loves looking through the Gospel Art Book and talk about Jesus. Win.

Hide and Seek - Tips from Teagan

Yesterday, I had the privilege of participating in a game of Hide and Seek with Teagan, my three year old. I had a lot I wanted and needed to do, but decided to take the time to play with her, which hasn't happened much in the last two months for some strange, cute little reason.

I am so glad I did. It's the first time we've played that she's really gotten the concept. Usually she suggests Hide and Seek and insists I hide with her, leaving no one in the role of seeker. I don't have to tell you it's rather a boring game to play that way. Just spending those 15 minutes taking turns hiding and seeking while the baby slept peacefully in his swing made up for the other 8 hours of the day that were frustrating and difficult. I need to remind myself to play more often. Besides a little recharge to the ol' Mom Battery, I also picked up a few helpful hints when it comes to playing Hide and Seek with Teagan.

1. Be sure to giggle as conspicuously as possible. Especially if you're in a room that echoes.

2. When you plan to hide in a different room, be sure to slam the door as hard as is humanly possible.

3. Mutter "Ow!" and "That hurt me!" as loudly as possible when you're wriggling under a table a few feet away from the person who is counting.

4. When your opponent is having a hard time maintaining their composure while counting in the face of #3, ask astute questions like, "Why you laughing, Mom?" and carry on conversation while you make your way to your "secret" destination.

4. Hide in plain sight every so often to throw your opponent off.

5. By all means, if you find a good hiding place, reuse it multiple times. Waste not, want not.

6. Sound hide-and-seek strategy suggests you hide in the exact same place as your opponent did on your next turn. They won't see it coming.

7. To speed things along and thwart your opponent's (read: mother's) plans to squeeze under a desk, simply skip the numbers 4 through 9 when counting aloud.

And there you have it. A hilarious take on what used to be a fairly boring game. She is at such a fun age, where she's able (but sometimes refuses) to communicate what she wants and we're able to reason with her...unless she's tired, hungry or otherwise cranky. Of course, said communication isn't always 100% effective. It feels more like a game of Mad Gab then anything else at times. Especially when it comes to playing together and her trying to tell us exactly how she'd like the puppet show or the role play to go. I always do it wrong, making it frustrating for both of us. Take today's direction, for example.

Teagan: "You be chicken liver pirate witch."

Me: "Um, what?"

Teagan: "Chicken liver pirate witch."

I mulled it over several times, changing consonants and altering emphases.

Me: "OH! Jake and the Neverland Pirates witch?"

Teagan: "Yeah." I believe this was made more confusing by the fact that she doesn't watch the show, nor do I believe there is a witch involved. She then went on to hand me a "magic wand" and tried to tell me precisely what to do with it - at whom it should be pointed and what they would turn into.

The other day she wanted to pretend it was cold inside our house and brought me a hat, scarf and mittens to wear and wanted me to shiver. Then she caught snowflakes on her tongue. The more I pay attention and play with her, the more I'm in awe of her creativity and imagination and am able to let myself be silly...when no one else is around.

She has very specific ideas for how she wants things to play out when it comes to role playing, so yesterday's impromptu, unscripted game of Hide and Seek was a breath of fresh, understandable air. Love my little lady.

The Doctor is in. See her at your own risk.

Should Teagan enter the "family" business and decide to become a nurse (Mum & Kristina) or a doctor (Grandpa and Brandon, although he'll never refer to himself as "doctor") I may have made the world's wisest investment by purchasing a medical play kit from a friend. For $3. That three smackers may take care of me in my old age. 

Since Amy dropped it off on yesterday morning, I have received no less than 20 check-ups and Teagan's dolls have all been given a clean bill of health. She has been so into role playing lately that I couldn't help myself and jumped at the chance to add to her dress-up clothes. She surprised me and knew what to do with most of the instruments and picked up the rest after being shown once.

She started out with dolls and Hungry Hungry Hippos, until she was comfortable with how to use everything and now everyone she meets is in need of a check-up. Here's what you can expect with Dr. Teagan Richards...

She listens to your heart (mostly just makes sure you have one) and adds her own "buh-boom, buh-boom" sound effects. 

She checks your eyes - I can't say vision here, because the evaluation goes something like this: "One eye, another eye. Two eyes - looks good." Not incredibly thorough, but you can't argue her logic. 

She'll take your temperature and tell you if you're hot or cold - I was about to strangle her father when he told her you can take a temperature somewhere else besides your mouth. He meant your armpit, but you can imagine the conclusion to which I had jumped. Phew, dodged a bullet there. She's branching out and trying it in her dolls' necks, when she can't quite get it under the tongue.

You'll need a shot every time, but don't worry - hers don't hurt. I'm trying to give her a healthy does of reality with my shots and prepare her for them hurting. So she'll cry, or have her dolls cry for a few seconds but then a hug makeseverything better. Poor thing won't know what hit her when I take her in for a check-up in a few weeks.

Overall she does a fantastic job (and her co-pay can't be beat) but we do need to work on her bedside manner a bit. You'd think you were about to die, given the look on her face when she listens to your heart.

She graduated to human patients after a while and we were lucky enough to be first in line. She checked baby brother and he "looks good". And Daddy had a heartbeat, so he was given a clean bill of health. We're very thorough.

Shocker - her schedule isn't full so she is accepting new patients. Step right up...but have a second opinion on speed dial.

The Pwincess Phase

It's upon us. The Princess Phase. It was all very cute and innocent when she started taking an interest in the Disney Princesses, and of course, we indulged her - we love Disney! But I always told myself we wouldn't call her "princess" or make her believe that the world would treat her like one. We're still 1 for 2.

This girl takes role playing VERY seriously. I have to pay close attention to the way she introduces herself in the morning, because heaven forbid I call her "Minnie Mouse" when she's a "pwincess" that day. She could be a pwincess, she could be Minnie or she could be Millie from Team Umizoomi. And that makes me, by association, pwince (unless Daddy's around), Mickey or Geo. She came in the other morning and told me, "Teagan's a pwincess, Daddy's a pwince." Feeling left out, I asked her what I was. Without skipping a beat, she responded "A dwagon." Ouch. We've had the same conversation several times since and each time she tells me I'm a dwagon. Guess it wasn't a one time thing. But she did clarify the most recent time that I'm a pretty dwagon. A purple one. So there's that.

If her father is around, he plays the prince - which makes sense. But when he's at work, I have to fill the role. But when we try to dance, I'm told that the prince's belly is too big and she decides to wait for her Dad (although she seems to think that he has a baby in his tummy too.) 

She often comes over and bats her eyelashes, clasps her hands together and asks, "Please dance wiv me, Pwince?" I just can't say no.

She favours her pink Cinderella princess dress, but her costumes certainly aren't limited to that. She wears a dress every day lately, regardless of our activities. Sometimes her Minnie Mouse ears double as a crown and sometimes she gets even more creative.

I left Teagan and Daddy alone for 5 minutes and found them both with pairs of Teagan's big girl underwear on their heads as "cwowns". Initiated by Brandon. He's going to have to be the one to tell her where they actually go, because she won't listen to me when I try to tell her. For the next week, she insisted on wearing one of these crowns all day.

Just so I wasn't a complete fuddy duddy, I acquiesced to her request for me to wear a pair. They ended up looking more like a scrub cap than a princess crown, but I look more like a land monster than a human being, so it's probably fitting.

We've upgraded to bloomers in the last little while, and those seem slightly less offensive. And once in a while, they even match. And make me feel like I'm on the set of Newsies.

As long as we're limiting our princess treatment to dancing with princes and wearing pantie crowns and not making demands and ordering us around like servants, I'll be okay with this little phase. At least I hope that's what it is.

Teagan's Twist on Playing Dress-Up

If I haven't already mentioned that we have incredible friends, then shame on me. I'm sure by the end of this entry you'll be convinced. Several months ago, my sweet friend Dynelle, who has two girls, brought me a wee Dora chest full of Dora Princess dress-up clothes that her daughters had outgrown. Teagan was in heaven. Not long after, my dear friend Katie gave us a bag of dress-up clothes that her little girl was finished with. To sweeten a deal that you wouldn't think could get any sweeter, Dynelle gave me a little bookshelf she'd turned into a closet for dress-up clothes. It's darling. 

Dressing up has brought out Teagan's creativity like I haven't seen it before. Some of the combinations that she comes up with have me rolling in the aisles. Namely, Dwight Schrute's evil twin sister on a Hawaiian vacation and The Wicked Ladybug of the West, as seen in the photo. She's quite partial to the ladybug costume, and she's oblivious to the fact that it grows shorter and shorter. She loves to "fly" off the couch and is always pairing it with something weird, like a witch's hat or pajamas. It has been such a hoot.

She still loves to experiment with her dress-up clothes - thanks to Daddy, we've added glasses and redneck teeth - but has taken it to the next level with her own clothes and accessories. It's a good thing we don't leave the house much. Or perhaps this is the reason why? Every day is a new fashion adventure. You never know when she'll pop out wearing a onesie that was too small months ago, paired with her floaties and Sunday shoes, or wear full-on rain gear (minus pants) do do puzzles. Sidenote: she has picked up on hiding her hand in her sleeve, pretending it's missing. Sooner than I thought it would happen, but she thinks it's hilarious. She'd make Lady Gaga proud with one "costume" (her word) of her booster seat strapped to her behind and a dish towel over her head. What a gal.

It used to be that she would hole up in her room and curl up with a good pile of books. Now, if I leave her alone for longer than 2 minutes, she's emptied every bin in the place - socks, hats, pajamas, bloomers, panties, you name it. The first few times, I lost my patience and demanded that it be cleaned up immediately. These days, I will take half an hour of peace in exchange for 10 minutes of clean-up. And yes, that's a backwards bathing suit underneath leggings.

When she wakes up before Brandon leaves, he assumes the role of saint and takes care of her until he has to go to work. About half the time, she wakes up as he opens the garage and comes to wake me. The last week or so, she hasn't woken me, and instead busies herself destroying her closet. There are some days when the extra few minutes of sleep is worth it, but sometimes it is decidedly not. So. Much. Bending. She cleared the bottom shelf of every shred of clothing, so I moved it all to the top rack. Now, she stands on various totes and diaper boxes in order to yank everything from the top shelf.  We'll just say I'm fostering her creativity and allowing her to exercise independence. Sigh.

Hatty Birday.

There's a chance I may need to clarify for Teagan how often birthdays actually occur. Perhaps when she understands the concept of time in days, months and years. We're currently celebrating birthdays several times a week, sometimes multiple times a day. She's taken to making birthday cakes with her play food and they are a sight to behold. Not to mention delicious. I, myself, had never thought to make a birthday cake 1/3 pizza, or top it with grapes, eggs, oranges, onions and fish but it was visually stimulating, to say the very least.

She sings Happy Birthday all. the. time. It's one part darling, the other part maddening. Because I always have to be paying attention so I can blow out the candles at the end.

 A little more abstract are her Play-Doh birthday cakes with toothpick candles. She throws quite a party.

Wet 'n' Wild 'n' Walloped.

This summer, the biggest water park in Nevada opened up precisely 4 miles from our house. A dream come true, right? We hemmed and hawed about getting season passes, since I'm large and charge these days and there wasn't much for Teagan to do. But she was free and we figured we'd get a whole lotta use out of the passes. Especially since they were open until 8:00 on weeknights. With Brandon getting home between 5 & 6, we thought we'd head up there a couple of nights a week after he got home and wear Teagan out just before bedtime. And what with me not having a car, I wouldn't be able to go during the day unless a friend invited us, and who's to say that our kids will want to do the same things? A brilliant plan on our part to get plenty of use out of it, we thought. 

We were out of town as the park opened but as soon as we got back, I told Teagan we were going to a water park and although she didn't really know what that meant, she caught the excitement. We were dressed, packed and sunscreened anxiously awaiting Brandon getting home from work, ready to execute our foolproof plan.

 

Except that the powers that be changed the hours of the park without updating their website. So we found ourselves all sunscreened up with nowhere to go at 5:45 PM when they turned us away. I don't know if you've ever promised a 2 year old something, gotten them dressed for said something, made it out of the car all the way to the gates of something and had to turn back. Not an easy task. She handled it much better than I thought she would, but as a mother, I couldn't bear disappointing her so - the girl is a fish and the prospect of swimming is always exciting for her. So I started going through my mental rolodex (also no easy feat these days) of our friends that had access to swimming pools. After a few attempts, we got through to my friend Amy who told us we were more than welcome to swim at her community's pool. Hallelujah! Teagan loves the water and loves pretending. She clung to the pole on the steps claiming that she was "Just like Diego!" I say "You can take the girl out of Vegas..."

 

Love him.

I love watching my little girl "swimming" so confidently. I love even more watching her swim towards her daddy.

 

 Who needs the rides at a water park? Isn't that what dads are for?

We swam all by ourselves for quite some time. What, I ask could be better than having a pool to yourself? Having some of your favourite people arrive unexpectedly to swim as well. Our friends, The Statens and The Wilsons came to swim and Teagan loved playing with their little girls. We swam for a couple of hours and thoroughly enjoyed the after-effects of Teagan sleeping in until the 8 o'clock hour. Granted, she toddled into our room in the middle of the night and never left, but nevertheless, bliss.

We did make it to Wet 'n' Wild enough to get our money's worth, mostly Teagan and I tagging along with friends, but we decided to make a night of it as a family one Friday night. Hearing that it hadn't been crowded on Friday nights, we thought we were in the clear. But it happened to be a Dive In Movie night, so there were more people there than I was comfortable with. But we braved the Wave Pool, which Teagan LOVES. Particularly when her Daddy is there, because he takes her all the way to the deep end. She's so brave. We did a few rounds on the Lazy River, where she insists on swimming by herself, so Brandon and I float in our tubes and do our best to hold onto her lifejacket (which she detests.) Then we thought we'd head to Paradise Cove, the "kiddie area" that is a little too advanced for Teagan. The water is freezing and she'd never shown an interest. Until now. And she'll never show an interest again. She waded into the water and was having a great time and then a crowd started to gather. Brandon and I looked up at the very moment the infamous 300 gallon bucket of water began to lean ominously. We glanced at eachother briefly, apparently not long enough for me to effectively convey my message of "GET HER NOW." There were so many people congregating that Brandon couldn't quite reach her before all 300 gallons pummeled our baby into the ground, completely leveling her. I'm not being dramatic, she was in the worst possible place at the worst possible time and she took the brunt of it. Broke my heart. Brandon scooped her up from her hands and knees and she cuddled with him for the better part of an hour while we sat and peoplewatched until she was cold enough to want to go home. Not exactly the way we envisioned our family night going, but it ended very sweetly with out-of-character snuggles.
Next year we may just stick with community pools. Take that, Wet 'n' Wild!

{Post date: 8.9/2013}