'Trading Spaces' tops dad's list

Every year at this time we all start acting like David Letterman.

We see the end of the year approaching and we want to come up with a Top 10 list of our own.

In the news business, we recount all the important events of the year. That generally boils down to bad weather and bad people unless we're talking ESPN highlights.

But my brain has been on overload ever since I became a dad. So I don't recall all the really big news except that Dick Clark hasn't aged in about 50 years. I do, however, have my own Top 10 list of major events in the Bliss household this year.

Coming in at number 10 is the fact that we have a puppy, a Sheltie named Cassie who gives new meaning to puppy love.

Bailey's bedtime zoo comes in at number 9. Our 7-year-old went to bed most nights with enough stuffed animals to open her own petting zoo. Of course, now she often spends the night in the room of her 10-year-old sister, Becca, who, thanks to Santa, now has a decorative green canopy hanging over her bed.

Number 8 has to be the cheerleading class that the kids took last winter. It was truly something to shout about and they knew it.

Getting a cell phone comes in at number 7. I never realized how important it is to have a phone glued to your ear or hooked onto your belt like a modern-day gunslinger.

At number 6: The whole family spent countless nights this year looking for Bailey's Buddy Bear, her frayed bedtime companion who seemingly got lost and found every night right before bedtime.

Shopping has to be number 5. Joni and the girls spent a lot of time doing just that this year. Becca has become somewhat of a shopping guru even in fifth grade. She's better at grocery shopping than I am and tells me so.

Going to Disney World comes in at number 4 if for no other reason than it depleted our checking account. A trip to Disney World could bankrupt a Third World country.

Fortunately, we aren't a Third World country and we had a great time although I did manage to lose a bag of luggage at the Orlando airport as we prepared to fly back to St. Louis. Miraculously, airport security located the bag and didn't blow it up. As a result, I actually got back my bag and everything in it.

At number 3: Bailey spent one weekend looking to break a world's record in her monkey pajamas. That didn't happen, but it's the thought that counts.

At number 2: Becca spent a brief time on crutches in March after tripping over a doorstop at school. Her sprained knee has long since healed, but she and her sister like to hobble around with the crutches at home from time to time.

But the top story in our home this year clearly has been the fact that we are all hooked on "Trading Spaces," a television show that allows neighbors, aided by designers and a carpenter, to redecorate a room in each other's home over the space of 48 hours and do so with a $1,000 budget.

Becca and Bailey do better than that. They redecorate their rooms without spending a dime as they conduct their own "Trading Spaces." They're better at rearranging furniture than picking up their clothes. But it's nice to know that a doll bunk bed can double as a coffee table and a moon-shaped accent rug can find a new home atop Bailey's desk.

So far, we haven't let them paint a thing. But that's always something we can brush up on next year.

Mark Bliss is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.