Today, we went to the Rocky Mountain Air Show in Broomfield, Colorado. It was Junior and my first air show, and it did not disappoint. Junior was severely overwhelmed at the start of the day, with a lot of people and a lot of big helicopters and airplanes…two of his favorite things. He would say he wanted to get close to and sit in the aircraft, but when we got in to them, he would start to cry and say that he did not wan’t to be in them. But then, he is two. When the air show started, he was glued to the skies. We both were. There as an amazing aerobatic display, some beautiful, vintage aircraft, a skydiver, and a number of jets. Junior started the day with “big helicopter” and “big airplane” or “big avion“, but we ended the with “big jet” and some fancy jet engine sound effects.

If you haven’t been, I highly recommend it. We’ll be there next year, for sure!

Being a father is truly one of the best experiences of my life. It certainly helps that our son is amazing and special in so many ways. It also helps that my wife is such an amazing partner and mother. But even in his sub-two years in our lives so far, my son has taught me a lot of things about myself that I probably never would have discovered without him.

So, I figure I kind of owe him…

On Saturday, we picked up his early birthday present from Grandma, his very own play set, and started to piece it together. The process was slowed because of some passing showers, dinner, and having put the slide together as part of Step 1 and then holding it up so Junior could take a few practice runs. After we put him down to bed, the Mrs. and I went back out to try to finish the job. By about 8:30, we broke out the flood lights, and we continued working until around 11. While we didn’t finish until the next afternoon because of…let’s call them inconsistencies between my assembly and the instructions in the manual, we finished it early enough on Sunday for him to get a few good runs in.

He’s not even two yet, but Junior has mastered navigation on the iPhone and iPad. While he has pages on each of our devices for his games, one of his favorite things to do is to explore the Sesame Street videos on YouTube. Specifically, he loves to watch videos with Elmo, and videos that have music. Having not really watched Sesame Street in a number of years (at least that I’ll admit to), it’s amazing in both the talent that Sesame Street is able to bring on to the show and how clever they are crafting popular songs in to lessons for children. Here are Junior’s current favorites…

Musical Guest: Jason Mraz

Lyrics: Open up your door and then breathe free. Look at all the beauty and you’ll find that the earth and the sky is yours.

The Lesson: Turn off the TV, put down the video game controller, and go outside. I’m blessed that one of the words that Junior is proficient with is “outside”, and we have spent a lot of our time this summer outside.

Musical Guest: Will.I.Am

Lyrics: There’s nothing I can’t achieve, because in myself I believe.

The Lesson: Know that you are wonderful, beautiful, and special, and you can do anything you want to do.