Thursday, September 04, 2014

Daddy-Daughter Day

It was the last Saturday of August. The last weekend of summer vacation. And it was perfect.

I started out the day with a sunrise round of golf at Silverwing, which is so close to the airport's new runway that you have to factor in the jetwash from incoming planes when playing your wedges. It reminded me of our house in Castleridge, where conversations at the dinner table would pause in mid sentence to let the planes rumble past, and my brother J would keep notes of the numbers painted on the underside of aircraft from the window in the upstairs bedroom that we shared. This was only my second round of golf for the season, and the familiar roar of turbines really improved my game compared to the session back in June.

The plan for the afternoon was to see "How To Train Your Dragon 2". However, Katie was not at all interested in a show that might feature a villain or some tense music, so we decided that R would take Scott on their own. That left Katie and me to do whatever we wanted. I suggested that we go for a bike ride. She thought that sounded nice. I expanded on the plan and suggested we put the bikes in the truck and drive to a place where we could also get some ice cream. She thought that sounded really nice. I told her to go get ready and she put on purple flip-flops.

I asked her, "Are those good shoes to ride your bike?"
She said, "I thought we were just going to ride in the truck and get ice cream."
"You don't want to ride your bike anymore?"
"No. I just want to ride in the truck."
"Okay. That works for me. Let's go"

The kids love the truck because they can ride up front (no airbags, and the seatbelts are better in front) and see out all the windows. Katie and I drove all the over the place, just doing whatever we felt like doing -- after we got the ice cream, of course. For that we hit Menchie's, which was Katie's choice. Self-serve frozen yogurt and a ridiculous amount of sugary topping options. She mixed chocolate and green apple flavours, with smarties, marshmallows and chocolate sauce on top. I get as much chocolate and peanut butter into my cup as I can.

After that we hit up my favourite oil change spot near SAIT, where they always give the kids a sucker. She quite liked that, and she remembered that we weren't in the same service bay as we had been the previous time. Good memory for detail.



We were heading back towards the NW and we passed the Canmore Park splash pad, which I have never been to. There was no one there so we pulled in to check it out. Katie protested that she didn't have her swimming suit on. She didn't even have shorts. I just folded her pantlegs up and we started to explore. At first she was tentative about getting wet, but by the end she was drenched. Her particular favourite was this little pole that sprayed out in every direction to create a smooth umbrella of water. When you poked your finger into it, the umbrella would split apart. When you poked your whole leg into it, you got really wet.

I happened to have a towel in the back seat from when we were hot-tubbing/watersliding/ALS-IceBucketing at Grandma's earlier in the week, so I wrapped her up in that to head home. The only other thing on our list of things to do had been a car wash, since the truck was filthy from Fathers and Kids camp 2 weeks before. Katie squealed with delight when the automatic arms started blasting water at her window. She is so cute.

Perhaps when she grows up the roar of car washes will remind her of our day in the truck. Or maybe green apple mixed with chocolate will make her nostalgic for her childhood. We all have something.

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