Experiencing the Trials and Tribulations of being a Single Father One Day at a Time
Now that the girls have been back for a month, we are finally getting back to our usual activities. Pajama Night at Cochise Theater on Fridays. Arts & Crafts on Saturdays. And Bowling and errands on Sundays. Last week the girls wanted to drop by the Fort Huachuca Arts & Crafts Center to paint some more ceramics. Given that it is still a fun, cheap, and safe activity that provides hours of enjoyment, peace, and quiet, you know I was in.
The girls “recently” started school at Colonel Johnston Elementary School on Fort Huachuca. By “recently,” I mean that they started class almost a month ago, which just shows you how far behind I am with writing. Life continues to be extremely busy for the Calkins Family (not hectic, just busy), with schoolwork and activities keeping all three of us extremely occupied. Elaina and Gabriella were still very excited about school and look forward to the coming year.
After a productive yet semi-depressing Summer, Elaina, Gabriella, and I are finally back together. It was difficult for all three of us being away, but now they are home and we are ready to tackle the rest of 2021. First and Second Grade? Too easy. Delta variant? Bring it on. New job? Child’s play. Everything is easy if we do it together as a family.
So the girls are famous now, at least across Fort Huachuca. Based on some brainstorming in the Public Affairs Office about April’s Month of the Military Child, my First Sergeant and I’s families were selected for an article in the Sierra Vista Herald about the wonder and difficulties of being a military child. Of course, I jumped at this opportunity and was very eager to support the initiative. The girls were pretty excited too at the prospect of being in the newspaper. When the crew arrived, Gabriella went shy and stayed in her room most of the time, while Elaina opened up as soon as the first question was asked of her. And just like that, the girls were a household name (within a five-mile radius).
Elaina’s favorite meal is lasagna. She loves it so much in fact, that she has consumed an entire large size microwave lasagna in a single sitting on multiple occasions. But since I am lukewarm on the dish and it seems a little difficult to make, I have never cooked it in my life. One of Elaina’s homework assignments this month was to cook a meal with her parents. She chose lasagna, which put me in quite the quandary: Cook a meal with her that I have been putting off since I was able to pick up a wooden spoon or try to convince her to do something easier (with the possibility of disappointing her)? Spoiler alert: It was a pretty easy choice.
Since about March of 2020, the girls have been begging me to go up to Phoenix to visit the zoo, the aquarium, and/or Great Wolf Lodge. Until recently though, I just have not felt comfortable enough to spend time in major metropolitan areas. Even when we go to Tucson, we are hitting no more than two stores and staying quite the distance away from everyone. It has been a year though and the girls are doing very well with wearing their masks and staying away from crowds, so I figured it was time to take the plunge and head up to Phoenix for the weekend. And since the Great Wolf Lodge cost/benefit analysis did not come up positive, we were headed to the Phoenix Zoo and the OdySea Aquarium.
This was another fun yet busy weekend for Team Calkins (last weekend we spent in Phoenix, which I will post about later). As much as I talk about needing to take a step back and relax, it is just not something that we do. To quote Russell from Up, “Adventure is out there!;” we are not going to find it sitting at home, especially in the time of COVID (who’s impact we continue to manage very well). So the girls had a sleepover at their friend’s house while I ran a marathon. Sounds like a pretty good time for them.
As every parent knows, most of the time it is us taking care of our children. Whether it is cooking meals, drawing them a bath, or getting another Band-Aid for that minor (possibly invisible) scrape, a vast majority of our lives involves taking care of our kids. Every now and then though, they might have to return the favor. This has pretty much been the case for the last month, as I have been either broken or tired, and the girls have stepped up when I needed it most. Here is to the girls taking care of Dad.
It has been almost a month since I last posted and for good reason: Team Calkins has been very busy. Ever since the girls got back to Arizona after New Year’s, our weeknight and weekend schedules have been full of activities. As I have stated before, when it comes to prioritizing whether I spend more time with the girls or write about what we have done, I am always going to choose the former. So needless to say, I am pretty far behind right now with what I want to write about. Hopefully, this post catches you all up to what the Calkins Family has been up to for the past month, even though almost each topic could warrant their own post.
I love cookbooks and can never have enough of them. Particularly themed cookbooks. But I never use them as much as I should. That changed about five years ago when I went through them all, recipe by recipe, and wrote down every entrée, side, dessert, or drink that I was interested in trying. While knocking out new recipes got a little sidetracked a few years ago, we are finally getting back to it, adding new cookbooks, jotting down new recipes, and trying new things (as you could have guessed, The Disney Princess Cookbook got used the most this year).
