... and remembering how fun it is to be nine years old...

(Wow, has it been that long since I... sigh... oh well...)

Nine years old. No responsibilities. Period. Well, that is if you don't count getting out of bed, feeding her fish and watching whatever she has recorded on our DVR this week. Hmmm... do I watch the SpongeBob movie again, for the 100th time? Or that episode of Hannah Montana that I missed this week because I was swimming at the pool with my friends. Like I said, no responsibilities. Whatsoever. There's my youngest daughter's week last week... (the adjacent picture is just so representative of the young one...)

I remember being nine. It was 1972. I awoke to each morning with new ideas of how my friends and I could play with our G.I. Joes. Or what trail we were going to race our bikes (yes, complete with banana seats!) in the open spaces near our outlying subdivision (basically the center of town now). What fun. I didn't watch much TV; I was outside until dark everyday during that summer. The two "most-fun" times though were going on vacation to the North and fishing with my dad (always a great memory), and being with my 20 year old brother who lived at home while at college. Seeing his ever-changing facial hair; hanging out with him playing pinball at the arcade. No video games yet, just old-school pinball. He was the pinball master. Still has one in his basement at age 54!

OK, to the point: This next week marks a week that my nine year old has looked forward to since last year when we did the same thing. Older brother and sister and Mom are going to Mexico on a mission trip with our youth group. That leaves nine year old with dad for nine days. Don't get me wrong, this is fun for me too! This year, she has a list. A list of things to do. I won't share them with you. You can only imagine...

I had to make one suggestion when she was coming up with the list: there had to be some free (or relatively inexpensive) things on this to balance out the others. She asked for examples, I gave her a few and then she came up with some on her own. I'll let you all in on some of our excursions after next week. Should be fun, though. It's supposed to hot enough for us to go swimming in our neighborhood pool and not freeze like last year. That may be the only thing we do if it gets too hot! It's just fun being with a nine year old. Especially one that likes being with her old dad. At least that's what I think she's thinking and what I am going to go on believing!