Sixteen Plus Six! - Jan 29

A few weeks ago we know that Chloe turned 6. Yesterday, on the 28th, my beloved stupid Honda Civic turned 16. LOL. January 28th has been a date I have had burned into my brain since I was 20 years old. It's the day I purchased my first new car(a car I really, REALLY wanted) and most importantly it was the DUE DATE for my monthly payment. When you are 20 years old and responsibility isn't your middle name, if you get someone to give you a car loan you make sure you pay for it on time. Over the years, I have put a significant amount of time and money into making this car exactly how I wanted it. Unfortunately, these vehicles became highly sought after by thieves so driving it and leaving it places became less than desirable. The running joke was we basically had to take Heather's car anytime we went somewhere we planned to park where we could not see the car from where we would be. Ask other (previous) owners of this car and they will tell you the same thing, oddly enough. Anyway, after much precaution (and years of garage parking)I managed to keep hold of the car and sixteen years later, here she is.

Chloe LOVES daddy's Si.

So this January 28th I decided to pay tribute to my now 16 year old car by allowing my now 6 year old daughter to help me give it a wash. Now yes, I know what you are thinking. Brian, we are in a drought. Brian, you aren't supposed to wash your car. Ha! Well, my logic is this: it's not illegal to pay a car wash to wash your car. I'll conserve water in other ways. I actually use very little water by comparison and I'm teaching my daughter valuable life lessons about car detailing and stuff so um, yeah. Don't be mad. But seriously, it does make me happy that Chloe expresses interest in cars and I love that she basically thinks my car is the coolest thing on the planet. It may just be a stupid Honda Civic to most people, but to Chloe and I, it's way more than that. =)

Just a few pics. Have a great weekend, folks~

-B

Season Of The Force! - Jan 22

Okay, I feel like I was just writing a post about us going to Disneyland. October, was it? Well whatever it was Chloe's birthday (as you know)and as a gift we told her we would take her....but we never told her when.

I guess this marks year 3 of us going to Disneyland (on or around) Chloe's birthday. In the last 2 years, we actually managed to be there ON Chloe's actual birthday. This year, however, we were about a week late. Really the only bummer about that is they literally just took down all of the Christmas decor and some of the areas and attractions are not running for various reasons. Lucky for us, Chloe has her main rides and attractions that she likes to do so all in all, no big deal.

The big thing they are touting right now is their whole "Season Of The Force" thing in which they basically transform "Tomorrowland" into (more) "Star Wars" themed attractions. "Space Mountain" became "Hyperspace Mountain" and they opened an entire building which used to be their "innoventions" building into a split level Star Wars museum thing where you could stand in line for 45 minutes and meet Darth Vader or Chewbacka (which Chloe did not want to do) or go upstairs and it's like superhero themed stuff. They have new versions of what happens on the "Star Tours" ride which actually was pretty awesome. If you have been on the ride in the last few years they do this thing where they take a picture of someone in the seats while they are waiting for the ride to start, and that persons picture becomes part of the story. They put the photo up on a screen and say something about how the ship needs to return because this passenger has something important they need..well anyway the only time we got to go on the ride IT WAS CHLOE! She was so jazzed. As I recall, on one of our previous trips it was Heather. So far it has not been me. Anyway, The "hyperspace mountain" thing was cool, I'm not super into Star Wars but I can appreciate what they are trying to do. To me, the coolest part of the whole thing was they randomly had these "Storm Troopers" on patrol walking around taking pictures with people but either I had never noticed before or this is new but they were now able to "talk" to people. "STAND HERE!!" they would say as they point to the ground and then people get pictures with them. Anyway, they are starting to step up their game on their character interaction which I think is really cool.

Nothing highly out of the ordinary to report from this trip. We learned that Chloe (with shoes on) is over 48 inches which on pretty much enables her to do any ride she wants. We did the "Silly Symphony Swings" like 5 times and each time they measured her and asked how old she was. Chloe would say "6" and each time the response was "WOW! YOU ARE A TALL 6 YEAR OLD" and I would be like "yeah, she just turned 6 a week ago." Apparently, you still have to be 7 years old to not have to ride on a tandem swing..but she didn't care. Next year.

Here are just a few pics from the trip. Once again the signature book was a big hit so we tried to get as many characters as we came across. Have a great weekend, folks. =)

-B

STEEEE-RIKE! - Jan 15

After much deliberation, we finally settled on having Chloe's birthday party at a bowling alley where we could be inside away from the cold(and potential rain). Every year the daunting task of planning some kind of birthday party for Chloe (which as you know arrives just about 2 weeks after Christmas) always sneaks up on us. We know it's there, we know it's coming, but we haven't been able to get out of it's way yet. The biggest problem being that the party basically has to be indoors and it has to be somewhere that can accommodate like 20 kids and all their parents so we will forever be trying to come up with ideas for Chloe's parties that fit the bill.

This year, after racking our brains and trying to come up with a plan for something Chloe would enjoy it suddenly became clear. A few weeks prior, one of Heather's friends kids decided that instead of doing a whole big birthday thing they would just take a few friends bowling and call it a day. The idea seemed like a good one to us so we did some investigation and Chloe's bowling party became a thing. A few friends quickly became like 17 or 18 kids. LOL. We spent a few hours on the lanes, ate some pizza and chicken fingers, opened presents, passed out some cupcakes and that was that! Chloe had a blast and that was the main goal, obviously. Here are just a few pics from the party. Have a magical weekend, folks ;-)

-B

Happy 6th Birthday, Chloe! - Jan 8

It's always amazing the things in your life that you can remember as if they happened yesterday. It is equally amazing that sometimes you cannot remember what actually happened yesterday. LOL. Today is Friday so that means that it is actually 6 years since the Friday, January 8th that Chloe was born on. I can remember going to sleep in the ridiculous hospital bed in Heather's room the night before trying to discuss with Heather if we woke up the next morning and they decided to deliver the baby which name we were going to choose. Funny, I don't remember there being really a 2nd choice that we almost went with I just remember it was going to be Chloe. I remember the next morning thinking maybe they would run some test and tell us that day wasn't going to be the day. I remember when they told us it was going to be the day and in what seemed like a few minutes they were wheeling Heather out of the room and I was changing into hospital scrubs. I remember being in the delivery room on the "can't see anything" side of the sheet while they were performing the C-section on Heather and waiting what seemed like forever to hear a baby crying like you see in the movies. I remember looking at Chloe on the little table thing where they weighed her and cleaned her up and I remember them letting me cut the umbilical cord(which at that point was just for the sake of having the experience because it was certainly already cut, if you know what I mean). I remember looking intently at just being in awe, not really being able to comprehend this was our child and hmmm who does she look like, almost like being in a dream where you are watching what's happening to you from a 3rd person perspective. It was a surreal experience to say the least and like I said I remember the whole day very clearly.

This blog thing has been a really weird but helpful way for us to keep track of the insanity that of the last 6 years have been. So many moments and milestones. It's really fun sometimes to just randomly click back and see how much things change. From crawling to walking to diapers to potty training. From birthday parties and the 4th of July, to simple trips to the park. And who could forget all the trips to Disneyland(believe me there were a few that I choose to forget, lol) as well as our longest road trip adventure to date last year when we drove to Oregon. We lost our Dog Abbey and our cat, Kitty, but also welcomed a new family pet, Penny, into our home last year as well. Who knows what year 6 has in store for us! All I know is, 10 more years until she can drive and 12 more years until she can have a boyfriend. =P

Chloe, Happy 6th birthday. You are the smartest, coolest, craziest little kid we could have ever asked for. I'm sure the one thing both Heather and I can agree on remembering that first day 6 years ago was just loving her so much the second we saw her. Having a kid is definitely one of the weirdest, most insane, amazing, ridiculous, awesome things that has ever happened to us. I don't feel like we could have been any more prepared and at the same time any less prepared for this journey, yet here we are.

So from the first photo perhaps you may have noticed that Chloe is now completely missing her top teeth. This kid is a savage. A couple days ago I jokingly told Chloe to go in the bathroom and pull her tooth, so she went in the bathroom and tried to pull her tooth. It didn't come out right away but it did start bleeding just like the first one which she cried about for a minute and then stated "it's ready to come out, I have to pull it". She reached into her mouth and popped that sucker out. I feel like I was the one who wanted to pass out. She did it without hesitation and now she basically looks like an entirely different kid to me. =)

As an early birthday "gift" to Chloe I finally was able to complete one of my older "retired" r/c race cars with 2nd hand stuff so that it would be fully functional with it's own remote so that I could start teaching Chloe how to drive with it. I don't know how old I was when I got my first R/C car but I can tell you I loved it and to this day I would tell you it was the best thing I could have been introduced to. I know I wasn't 6 but I figure it might be something fun that we can do at home. We have been using it the last few days and she is getting much better with it. It's fun to see her enjoying it. She told me to tell all my friends at the track how good she was at driving it(not joking). =)

Happy Birthday Chloe! xoxo

-Mom & Dad

Twenty Sixteen! - Jan 1

Boom. It's 2016.

No, literally, today is New Years Day. I say that because I watched the ball drop and then realized that I forgot to finish posting this so here I am and the first thing I'm doing in 2016 (after brushing my teeth and kissing my wife) is writing a blog post. =)

Last week on Friday was actual Christmas Day so I figured I would post a few photos of Chloe opening a few of her Santa gifts. Her list wasn't long and Santa was able to deliver what Chloe had hoped so that was good. Heather and I ended up getting Chloe (among other things) a thing called "Sew Cool" which is this weird, magic, kids sewing machine that somehow Chloe saw in the store and said she saw in a commercial and wanted one. We had never heard of this thing so we looked it up on Youtube and she became obsessed with watching random people make videos about using it. Apparently it uses a combination of top and bottom needles that penetrate felt and somehow it cams the threading of two pieces of felt together enough to appear it was stitched with an actual needle and thread. Anyway we got it for her and quite literally by the end of Christmas day, she had blown through every single include piece of material as well as a bonus pack I purchased separately.

Also, a few days after Christmas Chloe's big front tooth finally came out. It was kind of a bloody mess but she handled it like a champ and now she looks...WEIRD! Completely different if you ask me and her remaining front tooth is super loose as well(and pretty crooked since it can move around freely). It should be out, soon. Chloe is a champ though I have to say. The night it came out, after a wiggle it began to bleed from the gum line. After a few spits of blood into the sink, Chloe reached in and just pulled that sucker out on her own. You hear stories about kids like this and you just don't believe it. Most of the time kids will wait until the tooth absolutely falls out on it's own. Not Chloe. Nope. It's the 2nd tooth I've witnessed her reach in and pull...which is good because I'M NOT DOIN IT. LOL.

Happy New Years, folks. Have a great weekend.


-B