FATHER'S DAY 2012

Today was Father’s Day, a day to celebrate Dad’s. I miss my Dad a lot. I wish he were here to meet Ryder, to pinch his chubby cheeks, to read stories to him, to give him rides on his motorcycle and to say to him, “Eat every potato and “pee” on your plate!” I wish he could be here to camp with us, to teach Ryder to tear apart beaver damns, to put up tents, to fish, and to make popcorn on the camp stove.  I wish he were here so that Ryder could snuggle with him after his bath and so that Dad would know what it feels like to be called, Grampa. But he isn’t.

I know Ryder’s other Grandpa and Ryder’s own Dad will teach him all of these things and they will soak up all the cheek pinching and snuggling possible, but that doesn’t make me stop wishing…..

 We had a great Father’s Day today, just the three of us, but I couldn’t help but take time to reminisce about my own Daddy. The best one in the whole world!  Today, my top three happy memories of my Dad were:

-Racing across the pasture. He on his big fat old mare, Cinnamon and me on my Pony!  Mom wasn’t big on us “racing” so it was always a treat when Dad would take me out for a ride, just the two of us. I always knew that at one point on the ride, he would look over at me and say, “race ya?!”

-Riding his motorcycle with him and Aim and Nic. Yep all four of us at once. He would take us on loops all around the yard and for some reason, we’d all sing, “Yabadaba doo time in Bedrock City” as loud as we could, over and over again the whole ride!

- Him dumping home made glue on Nic's head. I know I've written about this before. I still don't know why we made home made glue, or why he dumped it on Nic's head. But to me it was really funny! Sorry, Nic.

Those were my top three happy memories of my Dad for today. My happy memories are many and my Top Ten list is hundreds of memories long!!

Today, hopefully, we made some happy memories for Ryder!

  

I thought it would be a fun tradition, to start taking pictures of Ryder in Marty's dress shirts every year on Father's Day. One day they will be the same size and who knows, maybe one day, Ryder will be bigger than Marty!!

 Right now, ofcorse, the shirt is waaay too big for Ryder James.  Hard for me to imagine him, as big as Marty!!

 

 They took off their shirts and put on sunglasses!! Soo cute!

 

My little cutie, rockin' his "sunnies."

 We went to Banff this afternoon for a Family hike. We decided to tackle Sulphur Mountain. There is a Gondola you can ride up. The top is quite spectacular and windy!!!  We hiked to the top and took the Gondola down. Marty carried Ryder in the pack the whole way!! We only gave Ryder his soother when he got fussy about an hour into the hike. After he was "plugged" he was happy as could be again!  Marty joked that no bears will ever come near us with all the chattering Ryder was doing!

 Check out the view, behind my little cuties!! You can hike up to the look out point once you reach this observation deck, but it was crazy windy and not long after we reached the top it began to rain. 

 Marty had to warm up Ryder's hands! I brought a tuque for him, but forgot mitts! It was chilly at the top!

 Eventually, we headed into the Gondola station to warm up before getting in line to ride down.  Scout had been the only dog on the mountain the whole afternoon and she drew a lot of attention, especially once inside!

 

Down we go!!

 Check out the awesome rainbow!! Dad was with us afterall!!! :)

 Ryder really wanted to stand up in the Gondola. He leaned on Scout for balance! Soo cute!

 This was the two of them on the way home. EXHAUSTED!!!!

 Ryder helped me make the salad for Father's Day dinner to go with our steaks.  I wanted Marty to get a picture of him helping. Just before snapping the picture, Marty handed him my Bacardi Breezer. Ofcorse Ryder used it to "stir" the salad. He's big into stirring these days. Marty thought it was funny. It wasn't the picture I was going for, but hey, it's Father's Day. I humored the "Father." LOL

What I was going for was the pic of Ryder on his chair, "helping." Lately, I've been pulling a chair over for him to stand on and help me with baking and cooking. Today, he went over all by himself, unprompted to the chair and started trying to pull it over to the counter. He couldn't move it ofcorse, our log chairs are crazy heavy. But I knew what he was trying to do and I thought it was awesome!! It is sooo cool seeing him learn and remember stuff right before my eyes!!!! I was sooo excited about this whole chair thing, that I forgot to have him wash his hands. It was only after he put all the cut up mushrooms, peppers and cucombers into the salad that I noticed the sand all over him!! Oooops!!!

Aside from the extra crunch in our salad, the entire day was perfect!!!! 

Happy Father's Day to all the Daddies out there!!!!!

Kiss your babies, count your blessings, and don’t forget to hug your Daddy today!!