So, Do You Like ... Stuff?

Our oldest daughter made up a word, and it may in fact be the word she uses more often than any other word. I may be partly to blame. I have frequently enjoyed making up words just to see if I’ll get a response from these two knuckleheads we call our daughters. For example: Girls in unison : Daddy we want ice cream! Can we have ice cream? Pleeeease, daddy, pleeease can we have ice cream? Me : Well, we’re all out of ice cream, BUT … who wants sclompers? Girls in unison : I WANT SCLOMPERS! Yea, sclompers! We’re gonna have sclompers! Is this wrong of me? Possibly. Sure enough, our oldest daughter followed my lead and made up her own word: coo-kah. I spell it like that intentionally because there is another way to spell it which, it turns out, has terrible connotations in a language other than English. I assure you this word was borne of innocence, however, the mere sound of it does seem to straddle the line. It would probably be ideal for us to just have her, ya’ know, stop sa...

Before the holidays we took our daughter to see “Annie” at Arizona Broadway Theatre. It has been nothing but Annie ever since. It was my wife’s idea, and admittedly it seemed like a good one at the time. After all, “Annie” is a timeless story, and considering our daughter is adopted, we knew it would strike a chord with us as well. It got a little misty in there watching my daughter watch Annie find her forever home. Now I want to cry for different reasons. It was her first show and she barely made it through. It was a huge risk to take a 3-year-old to something that has an intermission, but she somehow pulled it off, even if she could barely keep her eyes open at the end. Because of that, we rushed out of the theater and inadvertently became the first patrons to meet the cast. Yes, immediately after the show our daughter met Annie herself. It was the best and worst thing that has ever happened. There is not enough Annie in the world to appease her. She knows all the songs and si...