Well, girls, we had our first dance recital this last weekend.

We turned it into an event.

Pop, Gammies, Aunt J, and all your Midland cousins came to watch.

Grandma and Grandpa even came up for the weekend.

It was fun!

H, your Friday evening performance was fantastic.

The doors opened at 5 PM and the show started at 6.

K, we were so worried you were going to be tired and not make it through with your 7:30 bed-time.

But the lights went down and you were as happy as can be watching the dancers come and go as one routine finished and another began.

We all went to Rosas for dinner after the show was over.

There is only one little hiccup in all this.

Mom absolutely fell in love with being a dance mom. The discipline, the routine, and the community of it.

At the same time, H, you have said you don’t want to do dance next year.

Ha!

You still have time to change your mind, of course, but we love you no matter what you choose.

And who knows.

K, you certainly loved practicing with your sister!

I can still hear the song:

Yes, I am a panda bear
When I dance I shake my hair
Bounce my knees, tap my toes
Shake-shake, bounce-bounce, tap-tap toes

I love you.

-Dad

H, I got to take you on another lunch date today.

I am tired, and I have some chores I need to do at home – so I was on the fence about it until nearly 11.

But there seems to be such a short window for doing this.

Not long ago, you would cry so much when we dropped you back off after lunch, it was hardly worth coming to steal you for a one-hour date.

And soon, you will be in kindergarten – and I am not even sure we can easily come and steal you away then.

Until then, I want to kidnap you for every second I can get.

So, I picked you up today and we went to Rosas.

You asked for sopapillas (again) and even took the receipt up to the counter when it was time to pick them up.

I loved the one-on-one time!

Until…

Until mom crashed our party.

She showed up right before we finished eating, to surprise you and say hi.

And we both dropped you back off at school right after naptime had started.

K, we are gonna start lunch dates with you as soon as we can drop off again with minimal fanfare.

I can’t wait.

My girls.

I can’t wait to hug you both again in about an hour.

I love you.

-Dad

It’s swimming time again!

We got our pool passes this last Friday and we were at the Tech pool 24 hours later.

Unfortunately, when we got there, we discovered that the pool was still closed.

Mom checked the website again:

10 AM

We looked at our watches again:

10 AM

So we walked around the front of the Rec Center, only to find the entire facility locked up, and a few dozen students standing around waiting to get in.

Long story short – they forgot to update the website and planned on opening at noon.

H, you thought we were not going to be able to go to the pool at all and lost it, crying more than once.

While we waited, we ran to Target to get a pillow for mom and swung through Wendy’s drive-thru.

When we got back with our food at 11:30, they had opened the pool.

K, you loved the water.

You had a bright smile on your face the entire time we were there.

And H, you are such a big kid.

I think you would have stayed another 3 hours if we had let you.

The only downside of the day was that I didn’t use sunscreen and ended up with a little bit of a sunburn.

I can feel it now as I type.

Let’s make the most of this summer.

I love you.

-Dad