Happy Father's Day!

Loving the Dad

We celebrated Father's Day early --tonight-- by having dinner al fresco including homemade guacamole, tin-foil dinners on the grill, s'mores, and a cold rose wine (cream soda for Anna).

Anna decided we should go ahead and give Alex his present...squirt guns!!!  

Right before dinner we had filled up the wading pool, so it was the perfect spot to "re-load" the guns with ammunition.  

We all chased each other around the yard, as the fireflies dodged around the streams of water in the air.

What a great night.  

We're saving his card for tomorrow, and I can't wait to see him open it.  Here's a sneak peek.

In closing, I was looking for a quote about fatherhood, and I stumbled across this one which would seem more appropriate 6 months from now, but I love it so much I think it's good for any day, any season.  Here it is:

"There are three stages of a man's life:  He believes in Santa Claus, he doesn't believe in Santa Claus, he is Santa Claus."  ~Author Unknown

And the rain came down

Anna:  Mom!  This looks like chocolate milk!

Recital

Today was Anna's first (and perhaps last) ballet recital. 

 It was touch-and-go leading up to the performance, but she did a beautiful job.  You could see she was singing the lyrics "Under a Winter Star" throughout, and when she couldn't remember the move she was supposed to be doing she would improvise.  The only hiccup was when she got distracted by the "sparkles" on stage and stopped to bend over and collect them.  These would be the sequins that had fallen off of the previous dancers.  At least it happened towards the end of the number.  But she almost got her little tutu run over by the other dancers leaving the stage, engrossed in sparkly things as she was.





Despite her enthusiasm to enroll in ballet class five months ago, for whatever reason she didn't particularly enjoy the classes this semester, and was very vocal about her dislike.  When pressed one day she told me that she wanted to do HER dance, not THEIR dance.  I told her that to be on stage at the recital she needed to dance the same as the other girls.  When she learned there was a stage involved, not to mention a costume, she begrudgingly relented.  It's too early to tell if this was a turning point for her, or an ending point.  She adores dancing and singing, and says she wants to do drama classes again, which we will do in the late fall.  Ballet re-enrollment is still very much up in the air.  Oh well, next week we begin soccer.  One thing at a time.

Life is the accumulation of experiences, right?