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I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright.
I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun more.
I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive.
I wish you enough pain so that the smallest joys in life appear much
bigger.
I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.
I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.
I wish enough “Hello’s” to get you through the final “Goodbye
A poem by Bob Perks
Until recently I had never applied fingernail polish…to anything. The other day, Sara came to me and said that mommy was busy and asked if could I put this (fingernail polish) on her. I’ve painted dozens of houses, how much different could fingers be? After painting most of the tips of her fingers and cuticles I figured out the answer to my question. My next lesson was about a great invention; fingernail polish remover.
With a little humility and perseverance Sara had beautifully painted nails. Little girls can take you places that you never imagined you’d go but the joy of success makes the ride worth it.
Last weekend a local bicycle store had their annual tent sale. The whole family was excited to go and see what treasures we could find. Sara tried out bikes of all sizes and styles, riding around the store with a huge smile on her face “Daddy look at me,” “Mommy, see what I can do!”
When she began to get tired, I found a new style of child attachment for an adult bike. So I had Sara sit in it as I pulled her around; she loved it. Unfortunately, the attachment wasn’t very stable and as my hands became sweaty and tired, the fun become a little dangerous and not fun for me. So I told Sara the ride was over. She really wanted to go for a little longer but I couldn’t; she proceeded to have a little melt down.
Trying to put Sara in her car seat – problems, when she got in her seat she messed with her sister.
Few things are more frustrating to me as a parent then realizing that words can have absolutely no effect on a child’s actions. Direct commands, threats, pleads, nothing will change the behavior of the child. As an adult we can’t be overly physical with them, so what do we do? This is really hard…but, we put them in a safe place, and take a minute alone.
We figured she was tired from all the fun or hungry. We got home and tried to relax and get some food, but Sara was still acting out.
After a while, Sara and I were alone in the kitchen and i was able to engage her in a conversation. I said “you had a rough time at the bike store today, what happened.” Without hesitation she said “I really wanted to keep riding in that bike seat.” So I asked her if that was why she was so upset in the car and at home, she said “yes.” So I explained to her why it wasn’t safe for daddy to keep doing it and why I had to stop.
She didn’t say much but it felt really good to be able to communicate with her and understand that Sara can have a hard time letting things go. When we were in the peace after the war, it would have been easy to say “Whew, we made it through and everything is good again.” But I believe that talking about the war during the peaceful time brings you closer together and helps me as a parent understand my child better.
As I’m reveling in my breakthrough and appreciating the new closeness to Sara, she decides to test me. I had to switch from buddies to disciplinarian in a split second. While it would have been easy to not make the switch and let it go, I believe that Sara was seeing if she had found a weak spot in daddy. The reason I could switch and not over react is because there was no residue from the initial incident.
Children can be persistent in their quest to wear-down their parents; residue from tribulations will build up unless it’s constructively released. During times of peace, talk about the war; release the residue for the next battle.
I just noticed that my wife has 24,944 emails in her inbox, I would hazard to guess that 70% of them are from groups like Moxie Moms, Boulder Rockin Moms and her various mommy groups. Clearly mommies need the companionship and support of each other; but do daddy’s need that as well?
My belief is that we do, but certainly not to the extent or in the same way as mommies. If I received an extra 20,000 emails, I would have to deactivate that account and get a new one. My wife is a stay at home mom and has that role pretty much 24/7. I, on the on the other hand, own a software business that I work 50 or so hours a week then come home to my second job as daddy. My days are split up more which gives me time to get away from one while I’m doing the other. But make no mistake, both jobs are equally important. It’s easy for me research and keep up with ERP software and technology for my weekday job but there is almost nothing to help with my evening/weekend job.
My charter for this blog is to chronicle my observations of being a daddy. Hopefully other daddy’s will read, enjoy, learn and participate.
My biggest fear of raising children was having to change poopey diapers. I figured I’d either throw up or pass out when faced with a 5-alarm diaper. As I talked to experienced dads about this subject I found that there was a wide variety of views; everything from “it’s not that bad, your baby’s poop doesn’t really smell”, to “that’s my wife’s job, I don’t do dirty diapers.”
Now as an experienced dad, I tend to lean toward the first view (except it really does smell bad). I feel that being close to your child means that you do some really uncomfortable stuff. The first few times that I changed a poopey diaper I got a little on my hand and nearly threw up. Once I started to get the the hang of it and got my system down, it was really wasn’t too bad.
Here’s my advice: Get everything laid out and ready before you attempt to change the diaper. Have the waste bag open, unfold the diaper, have plenty of wipes (and don’t be afraid to use them…lots of them if necessary) and put something under the baby incase you have leakage. Then get it done as fast and neatly as possible.
Don’t let a pre-conceived fear of failure stop you from caring for your child. Besides, when you are around your friends who have kids, you’ll be able to join in the conversation when the topic of poop comes up….and it always does.
There are so many awesome parts to being a daddy but I’d have to say one of my favorite is when I come home from work. When Sara hears me come in she runs at me, I lift her high in the air then she gives me a great big bear hug and kisses. When Sophia sees me, she gets the biggest smile and can hardly contain her excitement.
What an incredible feeling, every day.
Sara was my first real experience with a baby. I’d never babysat, changed a diaper (much less a poopey one) nor spent much time with a baby. I know it’s not very manly to read instruction manuals for anything but if there was one available, I would have given any amount of money for it.
Instead we men are forced to figure it out as we go. My first place to start was with a moral compass, a framework by which decisions could be made on what a daddy should do. Here’s what I came up with:
1) A daddy is to provide for his family
2) A daddy is to protect his family
3) A daddy is to be the spiritual leader of the family, from ghoulies and ghosties and long-legged beasties, and things that go bump in the night.
4) A daddy has to spend consistent and ample time with his family
5) A daddy who has only girls, has to have tea parties, play dress up with dollies and paint finger nails
6) A daddy also has to be boyish (tell off color jokes, be a little gross/socially unacceptable, tooting/burping then laughing about it is absolutely necessary.)
7) A daddy has to be a role model; work, play, patience, social interactions, discipline, etc.
8) A daddy has to change poopey diapers every once in a while- that’s right, we get the good as well as the bad (really bad)
9) A daddy has to be able to spend time alone with his girls – no mommy help/supervision.
10) A daddy has to say “I love you” to his girls every day (“love ya” doesn’t count)
It’s a work in progress but you have to start somewhere.
Every man has a lot in life; mine is to be surrounded by beautiful women. I’ve been blessed with a wonderful wife, Melissa and two beautiful daughters; Sara and Sophia.
Sara is 3.5 years and Sophia is 7 months. They (obviously) have the same parents but that’s where there similarities stop. Sara is fair skinned, blue-eyed and sandy-blonde hair. She is, for lack of a better word, intense. Naping is a waste of time, besides she might miss something exciting. She likes certain foods, other than that, everything else is “yucky.” In true salesman fashion, “no” simply means that mommy and daddy don’t truly understand what she is saying.
Sophia has brown eyes, brown hair and olive skin. She is mellow, loves to eat (everything) and takes lots of naps. If you look at her she is certain to flash you a big, dimply smile.
This blog is about my adventures of being a daddy with these wonderful little girls.
Welcome to this new blog about raising two little girls. I haven’t found many daddy blogs or websites so I hope this is useful to dads who are looking for a place to share experiences.
Daddy's Daze 
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