Remember dressing up as a knight?

Sir Kieran, a brave Knight of Ni.

A year ago today we got in touch with our Medieval selves at the Escondido (Calif.) Renaissance Festival.

I dressed you up in knights costume I found at Target and let you carry around a stiff cloth sword we purchased a year before at another Renaissance festival that you used mainly as a light saber!

We had lots of fun at the Escondido festival. We played games and on the playground (including a relaly cool tire swing), watched a huge battle, and found a great cloth pirate set to play with. All fo the Renaissance Festival participants thought you looked so cool being all dressed up!

Here are some pictures from the festival.

The first place I remember living

I suspect the first place you remember living in is the "green house" (as you called it) in Lancaster, Calif. Well, the first place I remember  living as a little boy was a farmhouse in rural Plum City, Wis. The picture at right is of me as a four-year-old in the living room of that farmhouse at Easter 1970.

All of my toys fit in a cardboard box and were kept in the living room, where I spent most of my day playing. My bedroom was upstairs on the second floor.

I had a dog named Scotty when I lived in the farmhouse. We went on lots of adventures together! But winter in the Midwest is long, so I only got to go outdoors for maybe five months during the year!

The house is still standing, though the garage, small barn and various trees that were there when I was a little boy are gone. When we are together again, I will show you the place!

My email sent to you on Nov. 3, 2012

Here's a copy of the email I sent to you on Nov. 3, 2012, just in case you don't receive it:

Hi Kieran,

It is wonderful to hear from you! I hope you are doing well. I love you and miss you very much!

I am very glad Mom has got the email all worked out.

Freeze tag is a very fun game to play! I played it in school, too! We also played dodgeball and kickball a lot. I bet you are very good at freeze tag!

The guinea pig sounds like a fun classroom pet. What does the guinea pig eat? What color is it?

I used to go to the Como Park Zoo, too, when I was your age. They didn’t have a Minnesota Zoo back then! I always liked to see the chimpanzees and the giant tortoises. I heard that the carnival rides have been remodeled and are now open again. They have penguins, now? Cool!

I bet the Halloween party at school was fun. Which costume did you decide on?

Skippy Jon Jones books are the best. His group of imaginary Chihuahua friends is very humorous. Speaking of a book about presidents, there is a big election Tuesday! Who do you think will win?

That is all for now. Write back soon!

Love,

Dad

 

 

Watching splashdowns on television

One of my favorite things to watch when a little boy your age was the return of the astronauts from space. We were sending people to the moon during those days, so when they returned from their expedition, it was big news and on TV!

The astronauts would come back to Earth in a capsule that sort of looked like a cone. They would "land" in the ocean - which is why it was called a splashdown - where a helicopter would pick them up and take them to an aircraft carrier.

As the capsule descended toward the ocean, three parachutes would hope up to slow its descent. Once the capsule hit the water, the astronauts would bail out and then grab a life preserver attached to a rope and be pulled up into the helicopter. It was quite exciting to watch!

The importance of 'self-development'

Every once in a while in these entries, I like to discuss with you some important "values" to possess. Values are a sort of "rule" or guideline that you try to follow and live by so that you can lead a meaningful, happy life. A couple of values I've already mentioned are honesty and persistence. Another important is self-development.

A person never should think of himself as "finished," meaning that they've learned all that they need to know. The world is constantly changing, and we always meet new people. Because of that, we have to personally evolve or we will find ourselves isolated and left behind.

There are a lot of ways we can "self-develop" or "grow." For example, we should always keep learning about the world. We should always keep mastering new skills. We should always keep trying to understand ourselves and others (rather than limit ourselves to just being with a few people who we've known for a long time).

I know this is a heavy topic for a five year old! But I'm also writing these entries in case something ever should happen to me and we're unable to talk. When you're older, hopefully they will be useful guides and reminisces.

In what ways will you try to grow and evolve today and in the months ahead?

Halloween costumes you've worn

Halloween 2009

Do you remember all of the Halloween costumes you've worn through the years? I've made a list of them for you:
>2007 (8 months old) - Pumpkin
>2008 (1 year old) - Elmo
>2009 (2 years old) - Doctor
>2010 (3 years old) - Luke Skywalker
>2011 (4 years old) - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle
>2012 (5 years old) - Fireman

Sometimes you wore different costumes in a year as we attended different Halloween celebrations during October. What's listed above is what you wore on Halloween itself while going trick or treating.

One year ago today: S.D. Safari Park

A year ago today we visited the San Diego Safari Park. It's a second "zoo" near San Diego, where they keep all of their large animals that there isn't enough space for at the main zoo in the city's heart.

I remember that you didn't want to go to the safari park, but once we arrived and walked through the cool main gates and you saw the park was landscaped like a lush semi-tropical African village, you went "Oooh!" and started having a good time.

Probably the two things you had the most fun doing was the pond we walked around in which you could feed the ducks (We spent a bundle on pellets!) and then feeding the lorikeets (We spent a bundle on lorikeet nectar!), which landed on your arm as they drank from your cup.

We also each had one really giant ice cream cone in a waffle cone that left us both super full!

Here are a bunch of photos from our time at the safari park.