For Christmas this past year, I asked for a Hartford Whalers hat. I've been a Whalers fan for much of my life. They are the very first professional sports team I ever truly loved. I cried when they moved to Carolina and ceased to exist.

You know you’ve got an easygoing kid when this convo happens...

So what was Nathan’s big deal Christmas gift this year? A Nintendo Switch. Yeah, we finally are letting Nathan move into the modern era of gaming. 

Nathan called me out today. In grand fashion. 

I think English is an absolutely ridiculous language. Nonsensical rules, multiple ways to spell effectively the same word, indecisiveness on punctuation... and so much more wrong with it.

And then, for every disappointment that Nathan throws at me, he counters with a gem. 

I’m gonna put it out there right now, I really love the Lil Nas X song “Old Town Road.” Both the original and the remix.

I’ve always loved the attitude that Nathan us on full display in this photo from three years ago today wearing the wig that would become part of his Halloween costume later in the month.

To help celebrate one of his cousin’s birthdays today, Nathan went ice skating for the first time. It was, um, interesting. 

Damn, son. 

He’s seven! Freaking seven! How in the heck did that happen??

Yes, this conversation actually happened between Nathan and me...

"Daddy, I want to make my own rocket boots."

I was picking up some groceries on my way home when Katie called me and said, “Your son loves The Cure.”

For some weird reason, Nathan has become an art junkie in the last month. He’s always participated in art projects in the past that are assigned to him. But now he’s doing it on his own in lieu of playing with toys. 

Today, a month and a day ahead of the actual date, we held Nathan’s seventh birthday party. All three of us got to creative with the theme Nathan chose and everyone had a great time. 

Okay, it’s not a very far Throwback — more like a bit of a Tossback — as these photos are only from last Thursday and a family trip we took to Medieval Times in Schaumburg, IL. 

Foodstagrammer - (noun) A person who compulsively posts pictures of their food to Instagram. 

I learned something interesting from Nathan today... The Beatles, at least according to him, are not a rock ‘n’ roll band. Nope, not rock at all. 

We went to the pool tonight to celebrate Christmas in July. Yes, they had a Santa and elves and reindeer and games and Christmas music and all that jazz. 

Seeing as how tomorrow is his last day as a Kindergartener, it seemed appropriate to spend this Throwback Thursday wishing this year didn’t go by so quickly.

I had a whole Tu(n)esday post set to go tonight. Then, as I wrote it, I decided I hated it. And summarily deleted it.

I am such a terrible dad. Super duper terrible.

"It's a major award!"

--The Old Man, The Christmas Story

It was always so cute to hear what Nathan would call Katie and I as he, first, developed speech and then aged and developed his speech. 

I had my laptop out today after getting a little work done when Nathan came over to ask me to look something up for him. So I fired up my browser and ran a Google Image Search for what he wanted.

Overheard in our house tonight...

Happy Valentines Day from everyone’s favorite li’l heartbreaker. 

I was heading home from the theater — Katie sent me out to see Bohemian Rhapsody before it leaves the big screen — and I called to see if I needed to pick up anything before I got there.

Nathan found Photo Booth on his iPad. Oh yes, he found it alright. And I see every last one on my iPhone. 

We got the news at 1:30 this morning. Well, actually, we were asleep when the email came in and the social media posts went live... Nathan’s school district was officially on strike. 

Oh how this sight makes my heart swoon.

Guess what McDonald’s has now in their Happy Meals...

Oh. My. God. This is too much for me to handle right now. 

So today is only October 27 and, yet, Nathan has now gone trick-or-treating twice already. The difference is that today, all three of us got in on the action.

It’s kinda becoming habit for me to start work on a video before the subject matter is done. As a result, I’ve been working on this video for a couple months now.