Thanks

In honor of Urban Meyer stepping down as Head Coach of UF today...

Well, we've been told

Tonight, when the theme song for Elmo's World came on TV, my 21 month-old daughter turned to her parents, put one finger over her lips and told us to shhhhhh. Yes, we were silenced in favor of Elmo. This is getting out of hand.

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

when it is as cold as it is now....there is no better place to turn than to your dad's fuzzy Gator slippers...

Last year, I wrote a post called The Dichotomy of You. In that post I said to Mia "You are who I live to protect...Yet, you are to whom I have to teach life's hard lessons". This, of course, means I want her to learn about life without having to experience the bad that is often the finest teacher. Recently, I've been giving thought to what I want for Mia in her life and I've really been struggling with a very related thought...I want her to have every opportunity available to her, yet in some perverse way I'm worried that she'll end up taking advantage of opportunities that frankly scare the crap out of me. A brief example of this is I want Mia to grow to be a confident, self assured person who isn't afraid to take on the world...However, I reeeeeealllly don't know what I'm going to do when she says "Dad, I want to go to school in London". Actually, I have a pretty good idea what I'm going to do. I'm probably going to crap my pants and try to have her mother talk some sense into her...or me. At this point, I really can't even think of the next iteration of this scenario where she actually saves up her own money and says "Dad, I'm going to school in London. My flight leaves Thursday". Somewhere inside I know I am trying to have my proverbial cake and eat it too. I also know that I'll never do anything to hold Mia back from her life just because of my fatherly fears. But, damn, that doesn't mean I'm not going to worry about her.

Oh Christmas Tree...

Tonight, we put up the second Christmas tree of Amelia's life. Naturally, the last one didn't really count. So, for all intents and purposes, this is her first tree. While we did most of the heavy lifting, she did do her best to help.


Amelia sizing up the situation...



She decided she wanted her baby to touch all the ornaments as well...



What's a tree without a Gator ornament?

Normal, right?

I don't want to come across as lazy or unloving, but I was wondering if anyone had any objections to me hooking up one of these on Mia's crib so she doesn't have to wake me up to get her a drink at night when she is having her coughing spells...



Yeah, they're for hamsters. So what?? Don't judge me.

Pushing through

I have to give Amelia credit. She has been a trooper the last few weeks. I wouldn't really say she is sick, but she has been dealing with a runny nose and bad cough for about 3 weeks now. So, she has woken up throughout the night all during that time unable to stop hacking up a lung. On top of that, she damaged the nail bed on multiple fingers by sucking on them too hard. This has left the damaged fingernails a lovely shade of death. So, when she probably felt smoker's lung, a snot mustache, and crypt-keeper fingers were enough, she got a small rash on her face the other day while we were eating lunch. Luckily, that went away after an hour or so. Unluckily, that seems to mean it was an allergy of some kind. All that said, Amelia has not turned into a fussy mess during any point in time. So, for that, I commend her. I'm pretty sure her training at being sick as an infant has prepared her to tough it out when things aren't going her way...plus, she's doing a lot better with the cough-affected sleep than her mother and I are.