Cal's New Best Friend

Sorry Ella and Wyatt, you guys have been replaced as favorite friends by...Dawg! (just joking!)

For several months now, Callen has been watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse while I shower and get ready in the morning. (This has drastically cut down on the amount of makeup I have had to replace since he is mesmerized by the show and won't bother the drawers in the bathroom anymore!) A few weeks ago, Doug and I were in the attic doing some cleaning out. I came across a bin of mine that had stuffed animals in it. I found a Pluto dog from my Disney days, and decided to give it to Cal to see what he would do with it. Much to our surprise, he instantly took to it. 

'Dawg' (pronounced with a southern twang) is actually named 'Hot' (like Hot Dog!) but is mostly called dawg. If you ask Cal dawg's name, he will tell you it's Hot. When you ask Cal who his best friend is, he will tell you dawg! Dawg goes for lots of car rides, but never into stores, and does everything Cal does around the house. He drinks water, gets his teeth brushed, wears PJs...you name it, dawg has probably done it. Each night when it is time to read to Cal, he grabs dawg and puts him in his lap so dawg can enjoy the story as well. We have to tuck dawg into bed...blanket over his body and either his ears or an old hunting hat of Doug's to cover his face. Dawg is the first thing Cal wants in the morning. If Cal is working on a project with Doug, he has dawg take a turn with the hammer, drill, or whatever they are working with. Dawg always has to have a turn.

Enjoying hanging from the fort just like Cal did

Along for the ride

Watching the construction trucks

Hard hat (thanks to some kind people at Fluor) and dawg!

Piggy back rides

Just giving dawg a big hug

Reading all about trucks

It is soooo cute to see Cal love on dawg so much. He is genuinely so excited when he sees the stuffed animal. I am amazed at 1) how long Cal has had this fascination with dawg and 2) that he has taken to a stuffed animal and treated it like a family member!

The UCI World Cycling Championships

After our stop in Greensboro, NC, we headed to Richmond, VA, for the World Cycling Championships. While watching the Tour de France in July, we learned that the world cycling championships were going to be held in Richmond September 19-27. We immediately started looking at the schedule of events and the Clemson football schedule to see if it was feasible to make it there for a few days. The championships have only been in the United States one other time, spending the other years at different locations in Europe. The UCI has decided that every 5 years the championships will be held outside of Europe. Several other cities around the world were vying for the chance to have the event this year, but Richmond won out. After learning more about this, we knew we wanted to go and experience it! It looks like it's something we won't have the opportunity to do too many times unless the championships find their way to the East Coast again! Because of Doug's work schedule, Clemson football schedule, and the line up of races, we opted to go to Richmond at the start of the event in order to watch the team time trial. We originally wanted to watch the men's championships (which was the final event on the last day), but we had both seen elite men racing when the US Pro Cycling Championships were held in Greenville. We both enjoy watching the team trial event during the Tour de France so figured this would be a neat race to see in person.

We left Greensboro around Cal's naptime so he would sleep in the car...no such luck! He decided he needed to be awake and take in everything around him on this trip. Thank goodness for the Welcome Center rest stop in Virginia; they had a playground! This allowed us to all get out and run around and keep us from going crazy in the car. Plus, it wore Cal out enough that he fell asleep shortly after getting back in the car (2 hours after we originally thought he would nap!). 

After arriving in Richmond, we drove through downtown to get an idea of where we wanted to be the next day. We found a nice park (Libby Hill) and let Cal play with his digger trucks while we sat and enjoyed the beautiful weather. That evening we met up with one of Doug's childhood friends and his family. They have 3 kids, with the youngest (Harper) being almost four. Age didn't bother Cal at all! He and Harper were instant friends and they chased each other all over the place. They made forts with the oldest kid (Cal thought that was so much fun and talked about forts anytime we mentioned their names!) and had the best time. It was so nice to hang out with friends and let the kids play together (especially since our other option was to sit in the hotel room!). 

The next day we made our way downtown for team time trial event. We parked in Libby Hill and were a little ways away from the bulk of the action, but we had our bikes with us so we easily made it to the spectator areas downtown. We knew we were going to eventually make our way back towards that park to watch some of the racing plus avoid traffic when leaving! The women raced first so we used this time to walk around the spectator areas and then into the Convention Center for the Fan Fest. As the women finished their racing, the top three teams would hang out in the Fan Fest area until they were bumped from their position. They would take pictures and talk to reporters. This was fun to see even though we knew none of the woman racers! The fan fest allowed us a break from the sun and heat. They had a great kid's area set up with little balance bikes and obstacle course for the kids, a small bounce house, and an arts and crafts table manned by the Children's Museum of Richmond. 
After a lunch break in the Fan Fest, we headed out to watch the men racing. Wow! These guys are fast! We watched them from several different areas. We started out watching them on a turn after a small uphill climb. From there we moved down to an area that had two passings of racers...one downhill and the other uphill. We were able to see the men FLYING down the hill on the far side of the road, and then slowly making their way back up the hill on the near side of the road. Many times a team had dropped a rider or two along the way so we would see the stragglers making their way towards the finish line. After hanging out in this spot for a while, we made our way towards Libby Hill and parked ourselves along the road to watch the last of the teams pass by us. We knew the big names on each team that were there and looked for them to come by, but they were all moving too fast to even realize who you were looking for! We say we saw certain riders, but really we saw them and their teams flying past us!!

Hanging out by the BMC support vehicles

 

In the Fan Fest with the 1st place women's team in the background

At the finish line

Stopping for a nack

Watching for the racers...this boy was so tired but would not slow down. Anytime he would lay his head on my shoulder, he would pop it up as soon as he heard people cheering and cow bells ringing. He did not want to miss any action!

He finally passed out on the bike ride down to this area!

Relaxing and watching the race while Cal sleeps!