"Go, Daddy, Go! Fast!"

Some of you may believe we go to Utah every year to throw Madeleine a birthday party. Not the case. No... Long, long ago in a life so very far away I made an agreement. Once Dan was a dad, I would start going along with him to the race he goes to over Father's Day every year. The first year was a little blown for that given she was born that week, while he was there. But after that, I've kept my end of the bargain and each June we'll get on a plane and spend hours and hours in a car driving to Steamboat, CO.

I have to admit, I was pretty terrified this year. She couldn't walk last year so it was easy to strap her in a stroller and tell her tough cookies. Not so easy now that she goes everywhere and anywhere and does not listen to a thing I say. So a toddler, at a race track, zooming cars, lots of people - a little bit of panic going on here.

She loved it. She was so excited about the cars. About three cars in she started screaming, "GO!" Through the day, it morphed in to "Go, car, go!" Then when her Daddy was racing, yep - "Go, Daddy, go!" She got the "Fast!" part down with the first car. Normally loud car noises scare the crap out of her. Luckily, there was only one racing car that was so loud it scared her and there were only a few times she was next to a car in the crowd while it started. And only a couple of those actually scared her. Aside from that, she had a blast. She cheered for the cars, she played with her cousins, she stripped off her shirt at the end and refused to put it back on (yeah. that's MY kid), even wore herself out so much she slept all through lunch - on my shoulder.

I may have to go out on a limb here and say the race was actually fun this year. But more because she had fun than anything.