San Jose del Cabo, Mexico

Birthday Fun!

Three is a Magic Number

It’s interesting to me that this blog not only comes on the week of Finley’s third birthday, but is actually blog entry

number 150. That gives me a nice round average of 50 blogs per year, with 2 weeks off each year for good behavior. Of course several of those blogs were just a bunch of pictures. To be honest, it’s tough sometimes to come up with interesting nuggets of fatherhood tales to make at least a passably interesting blog.

Sometimes I wonder if I bit off more than I could chew by promising myself to have an entry once a week. It wasn’t so tough in the beginning, because the newness of an infant and it being the first time through this whole parenthood thing, I was able to spout about all the recent stuff I was discovering. Not that I’m not discovering new things with Finley, these days. It’s just that it’s not as fresh and exciting as it seemed to be at the start.

But then we rented a movie a few weeks ago called “Julie and Julia.” It’s about this would-be writer (Julie) who wanted to blog about something and decided to cook her way through Julia Childs’ first book, “"Mastering the Art of French Cooking." It takes her a year to go through all 500-plus recipes and she ruminates about each one. And as entertaining as it was to see her fight, fuss, and fawn over her culinary creations, it certainly wasn’t parenthood. Not that I’m comparing my blog with hers, but she stopped after a year. Who knows how long I can go?

My point being that a blog – especially this one – evolves. But Julie’s blog had a start and an end and could only evolve so much. Mine is limitless. I’m bound by one thing… my muse… my Finley.

And here we are, just days away from the Little Miss’ third birthday. What an amazing three years it has been. Each year seemed to be marked with some sort of advancement on the human evolutionary scale. From birth to one year she became mobile and was walking before that first birthday. One to two was the introduction of words and two to three was putting it all together into cohesive sentences and three million questions. Add a little sass, a few drops of attitude, and you have a three-year old.

But there’s something else that strikes me as interesting about Finley as I watch her make her way through this giant world. She is a very sweet and inquisitive girl. She doesn’t do “mean” things and if she hits or has a mini tantrum – mostly related to frustration – she immediately apologizes. She is learning right from wrong and is actually pretty good at choosing the right path.

Sure, she likes to test us, but that’s what we’re here for. We’re the crash test dummies of her life. Through us, she finds out what is and isn’t acceptable in the outside world. And as tiring as that can be at times, it’s good to see she’s learning from it.

So some how, magically, my daughter is three. She’s on the back end of toddlerhood and is about to head into the land of the pre-schooler. I expect there to be a lot more in the way of questions and probably some more head butting in the fight for independence (Guess which country King Daddy represents?).

But more importantly, I expect to see some major advancement in learning. We’re on the cusp of reading and the concept of time. We’re also real close to getting a small bike with training wheels. I see a clock and scraped knees in my future.

And as all these things come to pass, I also hope to see more in the way of affection. I’m already seeing small signs of this. She’ll occasionally cuddle up with me on the couch and she doesn’t want me to leave daycare without a kiss, a hug and a wave goodbye out the window.

Three certainly is a magic number. I hope that someday, when she’s older and reads these silly posts from her silly Dad, she realizes just how magical she is. …and way better than a blog about deboning a duck.

Sleepy Beauty

So, last week we had just purchased and constructed

a new toddler bed for Finley. The first few nights were as expected. The freedom that came with being out of a crib found her exploring her room when she was supposed to be sleeping and peeking and reaching under her door to see what grown ups do after her bedtime.

The rest of the week was pretty much more of the same, but instead of falling asleep next to the bed, more often than not we found her snoozing away in her bed, when we went in to check on her. This was nice while it lasted, of course.

It’s probably the fact she’s been fighting a cold (which means we’ve all been fighting a cold) more than the new bed, but a couple of nights this week, she’s woken up in the middle of the night, crying.

Last night – or should I say, this morning – around 3am, Heather went in to console the little miss. It wasn’t long before Heather returned to bed, with a little someone in tow. It turns out that Finley is starting a new habit that we’re realizing we need to stop fairly quickly. She is always asking to sleep in our bed with us. Not so much that she wants to actually sleep, but because she thinks it’s fun and exciting. As much as watching her dad snore is exciting, that is.

And on nights when she’s been sick or awoken from a nightmare, we usually concede and let her snuggle with us. The last few times this has happened, I’ve voluntarily moved to the couch, because I know Finley will not want to sleep, but try to play and/or talk a lot.

But last night I was too tired to move, so I figured the two of us could get her to calm down enough to sleep. The good news is we did. The bad news is that my daughter is a bed hog. Heather and I both found ourselves clinging to the edges of the bed, trying to sleep, while the Princess took up the rest of the space. At least she was asleep.

This, of course, made for a very early morning and a long day with little sleep for us. And I know a happy family is a family that gets enough rest. We’re not as happy as we should be… well, one of us got some rest and is happy.

Ultimately, it’s nice to know she feels safe around us… Not that there was any argument about that. But, when she has a bad dream or is sick, she’s going to want to be in the safest place she can think of. And that’s next to Momma and Poppa.

We have to be firm about when she can jump in with us. Right now, it’s only those two main factors. But that doesn’t stop her from asking to jump in with us, all the time.

I have to admit I like hearing her little breaths and light snores right next to me. There’s a comfort about snuggling with the ones you love. Now if I can just get her to give me some space on MY bed.

Big Girl Bed

As we started seeing Finley’s third birthday coming into view,

we began to realize that the days of the crib were just about over. Finley actually began asking us if she could have a big girl bed and we said we’d get her one for her birthday. She was getting too big for the crib, anyway.

At first we looked at skipping the whole toddler bed thing and going straight to the twin bed. But, at this point – with a possible move in the near future – a toddler bed just made more sense. Especially since it would use the crib mattress.

So, we came home with a big pink box with a pink princess bed, complete with canopy. It took me a couple of hours to figure out the instructions and put it together, but after I was done and Finley got used to it, it was time for her first bed time on it. We weren’t sure how she would do. If she would even go to sleep or get up and play with her toys or read her books.

The first ten minutes or so after we closed her door, we could hear her running around her room, checking things out. She didn’t bang on her door or call out for us too much, but we DID see something a little funny. Apparently she was pressing her face against the bottom of the door to try and see us in the outside world. We could hear her breathing under the door and every once in a while, some very small fingers would pop out, searching.

Then after another ten minutes we heard nothing. As we tiptoed over to her door, we could hear her light snoring, again coming from under the door. And those little fingers were still there, clutching the bottom of the door. Finley had fallen asleep on the floor on the other side of the door!

Heather had to reach under and lightly tickle Finley to get her to move her hand. I pushed the door open enough to reach my arm in and turn her legs so the rest of her would roll away from the door. That allowed us to open the door just enough to let Heather through and she picked up the sleeping girl and put her into bed.

She slept the rest of the night in her new bed and, at this point, has been going to sleep quicker than when she was in the crib. It’s obviously a new thing, so we’ll see how long that lasts. But for now, it looks like things are going in the right direction.

And in all of this newness there was also a bit of sadness. As I sat down and was putting the new bed together, I started to realize that I would need to take the crib apart.

My brother, Dan, and I (well, mainly my brother) built Finley’s crib from scratch. It turned out great – if I do say so, myself. And it’s definitely something that will be a family heirloom. I guess I always knew she wouldn’t be in it forever, but to actually break it down and replace it with a pre-formed Disney bed was a bit depressing.

Other than a few weeks in the cradle next to our bed (also built by Dan) she’s spent that last three years in that crib. As she’s gotten bigger, we’ve lowered the mattress and raised the gate. We eventually added a crib tent to keep her in and now, it’s sitting in sections ready to be taken to storage. When we decide to have a second kid, it will be resurrected, of course. But her room seems a bit emptier without it.

This won’t be the last bed I put together for Finley. There may be a day in the not-so distant future where I put together a full-sized bed in a dorm room or a new apartment. At that time, it won’t be constructing a bed that will make me feel a little sad. There will probably be a few more things leaving her room along with her. And at that time, it won’t just be her room that will seem a bit emptier. I’m sure the house will be much bigger without her, too. For now, I’ll just kiss her good night and tuck her in while I still can.