Ok, so now that I have wiped away the tears from writing that my little girl is 10 years old today, I will attempt to make my first post on the blog. Yes, Teresa usually does all of these posts (and what a great job she does with writing them!), but I thought for this momentous occasion I would attempt at writing a tear jerking post that hopefully in a few years, my all-too-soon to be teenage daughter will read and be reminded that her Daddy is actually the sweetest, kindest and smartest man on earth and not the evil 3-headed destroyer of all dreams that I am sure I will become over the next couple of years.
Before I had children, I never really thought about the word "bittersweet", but after the 10 year roller coaster I have been on since March 9, 2005, I am convinced that the person that made up the word had to be a parent! Never has such a tiny wonderful little creature caused such feelings of joy and happiness while simultaneously invoking emotions of anxiety and frustration (well except for my wonderful wife Teresa). It started from the very moment we knew that Teresa was pregnant with "Abby". The excitement of the thought of bringing our first child into the world was quickly followed by the doubts and fears of am I ready for this? And (un)fortunately it didn't end there. When Abby took her first step, we were both thrilled at her accomplishment, but quickly realized, great now we have to child-proof the entire house and walk behind her every step with pillow in hand to catch her if and when she falls. From her first day of school, the first night that spent away from us, the pulling of her first tooth, on and on the list kept growing of the things that made us both happy and sad at the same time. But even though these things gave us such mixed emotions, we realized that just like in the word bittersweet, the sweet comes in the end. So with that thought in mind, the best and sweet parts are still to come.
Even as I write this today, I am so happy and proud of the young lady that Abby has become, I am also saddened by the ultimate realization that my job as her daddy is to teach her to not "need" me one day. But when that day comes, I will know if I did a good job, because while she may not "need" me anymore, hopefully that is when she will "want" me to be her daddy.
Now that we've got all that sappy stuff out of the way, let's talk about the real fun this year. Teresa and I decided long ago (along with the fact that our parents were never going to listen to us when it came to the amount of gifts that they were going to give) that we would not give our kids a birthday "present" but instead we would throw them a party as their present. Each year the kids have gotten to decide what type of party they want. Well, this year Abby decided to remind us of how much she is growing up and requested a simple slumber party, to which of course we agreed. Since this was not going to be the usual type party, I got a crazy idea to get her an actual gift this year. Fortunately, I was quickly reminded of the "dog for Christmas" mistake I made in 2005 (and continue to live with today) so I decided to share with Teresa my idea before I went through with it. A couple of months ago, we were out at a sporting goods store and Abby saw a pink rifle. Up to this point she has not showed much interest in going "shooting" with me, but she is a sucker for anything pink. To my surprise, Teresa gave no resistance to the idea, so I stopped on my way home last Friday and picked it up for her. We agreed to go ahead and give it to her Friday night so that I could take her up to my parents house on Saturday to shoot it. I expanded the excursion to include Noah and Nathan as well so that we could give Mommy a much needed day to herself after the last couple weeks of Abby's surgery and the snow days. We had a blast and Dad even joined us to give a bit of his expertise. I really enjoy getting to watch him teach them things, much like he did with me as a kid - however, I think he is much nicer and has a lot more patience with them than he did me, haha! She proved to not need much instruction as it turns out she's quite the natural. Dad even started calling her Abby Oakley! We were shooting at 75 feet with open sights and she hit within a half an inch of bullseye! Here are the pictures to prove it...
Happy Birthday Abby-Girl!
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| Abby was so surprised and excited |
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| I'm ready to go Daddy! |
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| Papa giving some instruction |
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| Notice the boys climbing in and out of the car in the background |
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| FYI - using a coat for a gun prop is not a good idea as i now have a cute little .22 caliber hole in my Carhartt |
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| And here's the real proof! |
