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Dear Holly: Your 1st Visit to the Louisville Zoo

1 year, 1 month.

Dear Holly,

As part of our 9th wedding anniversary celebration, Mommy and I took you and your brother to Louisville, Kentucky in the outstanding 2017 Toyota 4Runner.

While this made your brother’s 3rd time to this zoo, it was your first time to experience it.

The highlight this time ended up being when we got to see the bear taking a fun swim. It was like he was just showing off; like a cartoon bear! The exhibit was built around a 2 story tall tank.

We started out seeing the bear from the bottom floor of the tank. As you can see, you and Mommy marveled at the sight!

Your brother asked, “What if this tank burst open and we had to swim with the bear?”

After a few minutes of taking it all in, we went upstairs and saw the swimming bear from a higher perspective. It was almost like he was smiling at us as he swam!

Being that your current animal obsession is birds, you obviously loved pointed each one out to me, whether it was an owl or a parrot.

When it came time to see the gorillas, I’m not sure you were convinced it was even an animal! After all, you’re used to me sometimes dressing up in my Chewbacca pajama onesie as a joke.

So yeah, you may not have been impressed by the gorilla for that reason, but at least your brother was.

Speaking of the gorillas, perhaps one of my personal favorites parts of our visit to the Louisville Zoo was when we all individually got our pictures taken in front of the “How do you measure up to a full-grown gorilla?”

Your picture is hilarious, as you’ve obviously so small and cute compared to the outline of a gorilla! Meanwhile, I was the best match to the gorilla- which I guess is a good thing?

Love,

Daddy

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Louisville, Kentucky is Definitely a Vegan Friendly City: Officially Endorsed by The Manly Vegan (That’s Me, Obviously!)

Fact #1: I am the manliest (and most humble) vegan on the Internet- and the entire world refuses to refute my claims.

Fact #2: Your family will have no issues finding plant-based, cholesterol-free food in Louisville, Kentucky.

Just a little over a month ago I proclaimed that Destin, Florida is still not a vegan-friendly town; after my 2nd visit there in 2 years. But being the emotionally intelligent man I am, and being a man who understands how the free market works, I quickly acknowledged that it’s not Destin’s fault they don’t cater to vegans:

There is simply not a demand in Destin for vegan food. Destin instead attracts a lot of families with young kids who are okay with feeding their families fast food.

Louisville, Kentucky is the complete opposite. It attracts enough crazy people like me; people who depend on veggies, fruit, beans, grains, nuts, and seeds for their nutrition; as opposed to animal products.

I was extremely impressed by Louisville’s Whole Foods. One of the best I’ve seen, actually! Not only was it conveniently close to the Louisville Zoo where my family was visiting, as we ventured in the ever-manly 2017 Toyota 4Runner, but the Louisville Whole Foods had the most impressive array of vegan baked goods; including vegan donuts, which I have found are rare beyond the West Coast.

By the way, my wife and kids are vegetarians; not vegan.

Something peculiar, in a good way, that I noticed about the Louisville Whole Foods was this:

There were are lot of older people shopping there. I have never seen so many healthy, fit senior citizens in one place.

It was such a delight. Because that will be me in 20 years. I will be the healthy, fit 56 year-old vegan jogging man. Forget migrating to Florida when I retire! I just need to find my way back to Louisville!

My only regret is that I didn’t get a chance to try the alluring vegan jerky of Stan Chase’s Louisville Vegan Jerky Co.

I did, however, manage to quickly snap pictures of his vegan jerky options for future reference. By the way: Stan, if you’re reading this, and want to send me some samples, I would be honored to do a special blog post, and YouTube video, featuring your product…

After all, I am the manliest vegan on the Internet, as we’ve already well established. I am clearly the perfect demographic fit for your jerky.

So yes, fellow vegans of America… go to Louisville, Kentucky.. You belong there.

There are plenty of options of places you can eat, like Chuy’s, where I enjoyed the veggie fajitas; which I ordered without sour cream or cheese.

Ah, I am just so happy. So happy to know that despite my major disappointment in Destin, the ying to the yang exists in Louisville.

Fact #3: Louisville, Kentucky is man enough for the Manly Vegan.

Fact #4: Destin, Florida is not.

Fact #5: I am very curious about vegan jerky now.

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This is 36: We Celebrated Our 9 Year Wedding Anniversary by Taking Our Kids on a Road Trip to Louisville, Kentucky

Yes, it was indeed nine years ago today that my wife and I were married at Brenthaven Cumberland Presbyterian Church. We purposely got married right next to a holiday (July 4th) so that we’d sort of always have a built-in day off for whatever we ended up doing for our anniversary.

For our 9th anniversary this year, we decided there was no better way to celebrate, than the load up our 6 and a half year-old son and our 1 year-old daughter and take a random road trip to one of my favorite cities in America:

Louisville, Kentucky.

Perhaps a more normal couple would have ventured there without the kids- and checked out some venues that are little more anniversary-ish and perhaps not so focused on catering to the attention spans of children.

Nah. Not us.

If we’re going to spend the money on a road trip, even just a 3 hour one across the state line, we might as well make it a family affair.

Being the world’s most famous vegan family friendly daddy blogger, Toyota helped us out by sending a 2017 4Runner; which proved to be ideal for our laid-back adventure to the Blue Grass State.

Because we’ve got our annual family zoo pass from Nashville, we were able to get in the Louisville Zoo for half off.

And because we’re cool adventurous people, we even took an unplanned stop at Dinosaur World in Cave City, Kentucky on the way back home to Tennessee.

Thanks to some points we’d earned, my wife was able to cash in a free stay at the Marriott Courtyard Louisville East, just a few miles from the zoo.

I must say we were quite entertained by the “New Japan Pro-Wrestling” tournament that happen to be on, while we enjoyed our dessert treats from Whole Foods Louisville; which was also just a few miles away too.

Two queen size beds between the four of us…

You can imagine how it must have been getting our daughter to sleep too; in the pack-and-play bed next to ours.

It was around 10:30 PM by the time both our kids were asleep. To ensure we didn’t disturb them, we laid out a towel on the bathroom floor in front of the sink, and enjoyed our gourmet vegan cupcakes from Whole Foods.

This is 36.

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Dear Jack: The Giant Slingshot at Your Cousin’s 6th Birthday Party

6 years, 7 months.

Dear Jack,

Last weekend, our family traveled to Fort Payne, Alabama; which is 2 hours and 40 minutes away. It would be a slightly longer drive, but we make no pit stops since Mommy and I refuse to stop along the way once both you and your sister are asleep.

It was your cousin Calla’s 6th birthday party… and it was a big one!

Your Uncle Andrew and Aunt Dana got a huge “jumpy house” for the backyard. I’ve never seen one that big for a private birthday party. It even had a slide!

But at least for you, the main attraction was the humongous slingshot that Papa and Uncle Andrew had built to launch water balloons.

Apparently, the object was to land the water balloon into the small plastic wading pool on the other side of the yard.

However, you were the only boy at the party. So it only makes sense that it didn’t take too long for a new goal to present itself…

You decided to make yourself a human target for the launching.

That’s right: Who can hit Jack with a water balloon, using this giant slingshot?

It was that event that made it obvious you were the only boy there at the party. Granted, you had no issues feeling out of place. I’m not sure that you even noticed you were the only boy.

But once you made yourself the human target on there for the giant slingshot, it was almost the equivalent of someone bringing a puppy to the party.

It was sort of like having a Labrador retriever running around the party. As if someone should have said, “Hey, why is that dog running around here?!”

My guess is, those little girls didn’t mind the opportunity to try to blast a boy their own age with a water balloon, with the help of a giant sling shot.

Yeah, it’s so obvious you’re a boy.

Love,

Daddy

1 Comment Posted on fatherhood, Health, parenting, People, Storytelling, Uncategorized, vegan

Dear Holly: Sharing Spinach Snacks with Your Brother’s Dinosaur? Or Simply Making Them Disappear Another Way?…

1 year, 2 months.

Dear Holly,

Tuesday when I came home from work, the first thing you and Mommy and your brother did was check out our new ride for this week, the 2017 Toyota 4Runner. Twenty minutes later, we finally made our way back into the kitchen.

While Mommy made pizza, and your brother made fossils from his dinosaur toys and Play-Doh, I helped feed you a new bar that Mommy picked up last weekend at Kroger: Happy Tot Organics Fiber & Protein Soft-Baked Oat Bar, Apples and Spinach flavor.

I told Mommy, “Wow, look at Holly! She really likes this apple and spinach snack bar. We need to keep buying these!”

As I was pinching off little clusters for you so that could easily consume them, I noticed you were really intrigued by what your brother was doing with his dinosaurs.

So I borrowed one that had an open mouth, and stuffed one of the clusters in it. You loved the challenge of using your little fingers to remove the green food from the Triceratops’ mouth. To heighten the theatrics of the event, I made low-pitch growling sounds, in an effort to convince you that he dinosaur was wrestling you for the food.

You growled back and you ate the bar, cluster by cluster.

Finally, the bar was gone and I had to open a 2nd one for you!

A few clusters into it though, you finally had your fill. At that point, I took you out of your high chair and we played on the carpet with your toys until dinner was ready.

Fast forward to about an hour and a half later, after you and your brother were asleep, and Mommy and I were finishing up cleaning the kitchen.

As Mommy was wiping down your high chair, she commented, “Either Holly dropped a lot of these bits from that bar… or she was hiding them down here the whole time!”

Hmmm…

Holly, you may have done an excellent job of successfully convincing me you were actually eating those apple and spinach bars. Perhaps I was so caught up in playing dinosaur with you, that you were secretly just dropping the clusters beside you without me ever realizing it.

If so, nicely done!

Love,

Daddy