Wrestling - A Lesson Learned

Gavin,

Today you had to go to wrestling without me. It is always a chore to send you alone because you cry and get all worked up about it. Today you toughed it out and didn't cry at all. When mommy told me that you also cut open one of the sores on your knee and you didn't cry about the blood I was teary eyed with pride. Not because I had done anything for you, but because you acheived it without me.

"I think that the greatest benefit from wrestling is learning to face challenges and to demand the most from yourself.  You learn to fight when you think there is no more fight left within you.  You learn to get up after you’ve fallen, time and time again.  You learn about sacrifice and about pain.  You learn to endure and to overcome.  This is what I want for you, not because I wrestled, but because these lessons are the true gifts of this sport."
-Allen Takata.

This is what I want for you and today you took a giant step in that direction. You were on your own.

I Love You,
Daddy

New Baby Coming!

We just found out the new baby is going to be a boy! Logan is super excited and sings to the baby and talks to mommies tummy every day. He is so excited to be a big brother finally he asks when mommy is gonna get the baby out everytime Lori has a doctors appointment. Gavin really wanted it to be a girl so he was a little disappointed when he heard it was a boy.

Gavin is wrestling now and had his first tournament today! He was very brave and went out there and gave it his all, but he ended up losing 3 times and got 4th place out of 4. I was very proud of him for working hard. He learned that we never give up no matter what.

Little Jokester

The other day we were driving in the car and Gavin was telling some nonsensical knock knock jokes and we were trying to explain why they weren't funny and why other jokes were funny. While Gavin is mulling over the concept Logan pipes up.

Logan: "Knock knock"

Mommy: "Who's there"

Logan: "Poopie"

Mommy: "Poopie who?"

Logan: "Poopie YOU!"

Needless to say we started cracking up. Gavin was not pleased at how hard we laughed at that joke so an explanation was required. We explained that since he was 2 we did not expect him to construct his own joke and that made it funny. We did not get into the finer points of that fact that the joke was constructed such that it made the recipient of the joke the butt of the joke. Logans comedic timing is still pretty darn good for 2 years old despite the fact that it was likely an accidental success.

Love

"Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being "in love" which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Your mother and I had it, we had roots that grew towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossom had fallen from our branches we found that we were one tree and not two."

-St. Augustine