Daddy Day

Greetings friends and family,

Easton and Layla's preschool invited all fathers to participate in a morning of excitement.  I gladly took a vacation day from work to participate.  The day was well spent and we were successful by any standard. Each day after school I talk to the twins about their day.  I can't believe they are already programmed to say, "fine." when I ask them how it went.  Talk about a lack of detail...  I pry and probe by asking specific questions about what letter they learned or what friends they played with.  Because of this I at least knew the names of a few of their school pals.  One in particular for Layla is named Lulu.  As soon as we walked in the door she greeted Lulu with a big hug and celebration.  

Then they dove right in and played barbies.  One disadvantage of having twins (there are only a couple so far) is that I had to split my time between Easton and Layla while the other dads focused on their solo child.  During play time I switched back and forth between playing dolls and puzzles with Layla to playing cars and marbles with Easton.  Luckily the other dads watched whoever was not my point of focus at the time.

We had a huge day of excitement and one of the biggest events was "vehicle day".  As a part of the dad's day we loaded up into a bus and drove slowly across the parking lot to a section where many vehicles were parked and available to see.  The twins were ecstatic about the bus ride because that was their first time on a school bus.

One of the vehicles was an emergency city veterinary truck.  There were cages built into the truck bed where Easton and Layla were able to pretend to be kitties in need.  

The police motorcycle was a big hit for both of them.  Layla was most interested in the fuzzy, comfortable seat.  go figure?

Easton threw out his Lightening McQueen line like a boss while sitting atop the metal horse, "I am speed!"

The construction equipment was overwhelming.  They were somewhat perplexed by the enormity of the tires and scale of the parts bolted to these beasts.  

The smile on Easton's face was priceless.  He sat up there for a few minutes pretending to pull the levers while making earth moving sounds.  

Then came the bravery test.  A hot air balloon was parked in the adjacent field for show.  The guy inside the basket had to periodically pull the lever to add more hot air.  That was accompanied by fire and a loud blower noise, which neither of the twins liked at all.  After some coaxing by the balloon owner Layla bravely sat on the basket clinging to the post while I snapped a picture.

Easton took several steps back until I assured him he didn't have to sit on the balloon basket.  For the previous week he keeps asking me, "why does hot air rise and cold air go down?"  The question is a result of the weather and earth science books we are reading from the library.  The balloon provided the perfect learning opportunity to see it in action.  He hasn't asked the question since then...

Another high light was the police k-9 unit.  The officer brought his attack do and a guy pretended to be an unruly villain.  As the twins sat on each knee Layla leaned over and with a worried face said, "Why is the dog attacking the man?"  Easton quickly responded, "bad consequences."  Layla nodded her head.  I grinned like a possum because even though many teenagers don't get the concept of good and bad consequences, my three-year-olds do.

I ushered the twins over to the nice police man and well trained dog to teach Easton and Layla how to respect authority and be friendly to the police...  and his dog.  They gently pet the dog and gave him a good hug for his performance.

I was offered an extremely generous deal on my buddy's Power Wheel's Jeep, which I gladly accepted.  Easton and Layla need to learn how to drive sometime, right?  The jeep has a steering wheel, gas pedal, revers, big tires, an over-sized battery, and TWO seats.  perfect.

Their skills out of the driveway were a bit shaky, but after an hour or so of stick time they are both quite proficient at 4 wheeling.  We didn't get to parallel parking yet, but there's always tomorrow.  

Kendra is gone to Los Angeles for four days and boy do I have a surprise and lots of stories...

See you soon!