tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15754838883075124832024-03-12T16:26:34.511-07:00My S.A.H.D. Existence Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.comBlogger16125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-84807186944966794852019-01-22T16:57:00.002-08:002019-01-22T16:57:49.428-08:00The Indoor Snowball Fight<br />
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For the most part, our kids are great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I know everyone says that about their kids
and they would probably be right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There's definitely something special about our kids though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thing 1 and Thing 2 have an amazing bond with
each other that I pray never goes away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Even at 6 (and 1/3!) and 4 and a half, they still don't fight or even get
on each others' nerves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These kids can
entertain themselves for hours on end down in the basement without so much as
the TV on.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And this is how today's story begins.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Just after Christmas this year, the four of us spent a few
days in Niagara Falls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was a
remarkably mild and snow-less December, so we lucked out with the weather and
managed to walk around Clifton Hill and the boardwalk with relative ease.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Two full days in a hotel room with your kids, no matter how
pleasant they are, is still a very long time.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is why, when we returned home after the trip at 11:30
am, we sent the kids downstairs to play with their new toys and hid upstairs
for a few hours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> A</span>nd by a few, I mean
five.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now we made dinner early and
yelled down that it was on the counter if they were hungry, so as to not feel
entirely neglectful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Otherwise, they
were on their own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And their they stayed
and played until 5:00 in the evening when I heard Thing 2 crying.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I ventured downstairs to see what happened and noticed both
kids were in the bathroom with the door mostly shut.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Upon entering, I discovered why the kids had
been downstairs for so long.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They were having a snowball fight. With spitballs.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The bathroom was a war zone of wet toilet paper balls
plastering the walls and floors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
toilet and sink were backed up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wet rolls of half used up toilet paper
littered the floor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God I wish I would
have taken a picture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thing 2 had
stopped crying by this point, but now they pair of them were scared.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The realization that they were in trouble had
just hit the pair of them.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After making them help clean it all up (which took all of
five minutes) , repercussions had to be handed out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thing 2 was sent to bed at 5:30 for her part
in the TP massacre.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She's a tough one to
punish as she cares not if you take away toys or cartoons.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She slept until 8 the next morning.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thing 1 on the other hand cares deeply for his Lego and his
Beyblades.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The mere threat of removal of
either can motivate him to do just about anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So his punishment was the dismantling of one
of the Lego vehicles he had received for Christmas and had promptly built
Christmas morning. He was utterly devastated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But really, if that's all the trouble they can muster up in over
5 hours left to their own devices, I'll take it.</span></div>
<br />Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-41982036412001536772018-10-24T17:16:00.000-07:002018-10-24T17:16:06.021-07:00The Threshold of Hell (or, Flying with Kids)<br />
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I don't know why we do it.</span><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I don't know why any parent with young kids does.</span><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It never turns out great in the end, but we
all try it at least once:</span><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Family
Trip.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Our kids are generally pretty good.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They can eat at restaurants without making a
scene or forcing us to bust out tablets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They can ride in cars without much complaining or frequent needing <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>pit stops.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In light of this, we
decided plane travel would be fun.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If
you've never had the pleasure or flying with kids, I urge you to keep it that
way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It's not, and never will be, a good
idea.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They really should just ban kids under 10 from non-emergency
plane travel altogether.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nobody wants to
be around your kids on a plane.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They
fidget.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They whine and cry. They require
frequent trips to that tiny, disgusting airplane bathroom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you've never had to help a kid with their
pants or wipe their ass in a vertical coffin before, trust me, you aren't
missing a thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Travelling with two
kids?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Double the fun.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Think flying in the middle of the night makes sense because
they'll just sleep the whole time?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dead
f-ing wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact it's about a
million times worse because they're overtired and you're tired and no one gets
any rest of sleep.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>New colouring books
last about 3 minutes on a five hour flight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The in-flight movie is almost never worthy of a 5 year old's
attention.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Especially if you're on a
crappy Sunwing flight where the tiny screen flops down every 3 rows and the one
in front of your seats is out of order. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In summary, the flight makes you need the impending vacation
more than anything else in the world.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oh, and if you kids happen to have a dairy allergy, bring
enough snacks for a three week trek through the jungle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everything on a plane but the saltine
crackers has bloody cheese in it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For our trip, we landed at about 8pm in Punta Cana.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was raining.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was another hour to the resort via
shuttle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The kids thought it was a riot
to fly down the highway in only big person seatbelts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It scared the living shit out of me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Fun fact: When you get to a resort after 9pm, there's no
welcome cocktail.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">God I needed that cocktail.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They somehow lost a wheel<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>on our stroller while in transit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If you have never tried pushing a 30 pound kid in a stroller with a
missing wheel,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don't recommend adding
it to you bucket list.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We thought we booked a 5 star hotel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This hotel was actually a 4 on the sign.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wouldn't have given it a 3.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our room smelled like pee pee.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The beds were at least as old as me and had
definite bows to them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The room faced
the bar area where the party was happening.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We were all miserable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
starving.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Food options at a shitty resort at 10pm?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cold french fries and cheese pizza.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fries it was.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After a fitful night of "sleep" in our oh-so-comfy
beds and soothing bass-thump, I headed down to the front desk<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the next morning and moved us the hell out of
there and to the five-star next door.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Adios amigos.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After that the trip was pretty great. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">By the way, if you do ever happen to want to take a voyage
into hell's half acre with your kids, use the covered airport parking lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Best $200 bucks we ever spent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When you get back into Toronto in the middle
of January at 2am, you want that minivan of awesomeness close by and not buried
in snow in some park 'n' fly lot you have to take a shuttle to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Trust me on that one.</span></div>
<br />Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-89416569495705040202018-09-12T11:28:00.002-07:002018-09-12T11:29:37.943-07:00The Rafting Trip<br />
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Here's the tale of our family's fabled rafting trip down the
Grand River.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">One day this summer, we decided to purchase an inflatable
raft from Canadian Tire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was on sale
and looked like it would make for at least one fun family afternoon.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">We were wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well,
not entirely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It did end up being pretty
funny, just not for the reason we thought.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">It was a very hot and humid summer here in Southern Ontario,
and nothing beats the summer heat like being around the water. We picked a particularly
clear and hot Saturday to try out the new raft.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We parked the Van of Awesomeness (for details on said van, see: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> <a href="http://mysahdexistence.blogspot.com/2016/08/the-minivan-of-awesomeness.html">http://mysahdexistence.blogspot.com/2016/08/the-minivan-of-awesomeness.html</a></span> ) about 9 km down the river, and drove the car back to town. A lofty goal
indeed, but it's a pretty free-flowing stretch of water, so I thought it was
doable. A two hour trip or so. That was <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Mistake
#1</b>.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">We parked the car near a canoe put-in and unboxed the
raft.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That's right, we never checked to
see if we'd actually all fit in this thing. That was <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Mistake #2</b>. We blew it up and discovered that, despite having a
weight limit of like 450 lbs., this thing could barely fit me, let alone my
wife and the two kids as well. Crap.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Speaking of crap.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
have inadvertently taught my six year old the word crap.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I must have described dollar store Lego as
crap one time, because now every time he sees building blocks in stores without
the Lego logo on it, he loudly and proudly proclaims to his sister that it's Crap
Lego.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oops.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At least he has the right context.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But I digress.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Despite the size of the wee raft, we decided that since we
were there, we all just go out on the water for a few minutes, just to say we
did, then head back to shore and drive back to get the Van.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We squeezed in, me at the
stern with Thing 1 sitting on my legs, facing Thing 2 with mommy sitting not at
the bow, but on the inflated bow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Man, I
wish we had a camera on us that day.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">With much effort, we pushed out, my ass dragging along the
rocky shore until we got to deeper water.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Deeper as in about a foot and a half deep.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Being the hot summer that it was, we failed
to realize that the water level would be extremely low.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Mistake
#3</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The current was moving despite
the shallow water and we started drifting, rather slowly, downstream.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So we went with it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Mistake
#4</b>.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Maybe a kilometer or so down the river, it happened.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My ass dragged across a jagged rock and pop!
went the middle of the three air chambers. The raft could no longer handle the
weight of us all and we started taking in water, much to Thing 1's absolute
horror. My wife hopped off the front<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>into
the calf deep water and he started freaking out, yelling something that sounded
remarkably like, "SHIT, SHIT, SHIT, SHIT".<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I'll blame my wife for that word.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">It was then my turn to get out, having to throw one leg over
top of the panicking child and more or less roll into the water.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Another missed photo opportunity I'm sure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Between my gracefulness and his sheer terror,
my wife is now laughing so hard she has tears rolling down her cheeks. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Luckily, the raft has a tow rope on the front and enough air
left in it for the kids to stay in and not have to walk all the way back to the
car.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #ffd966; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">They got ice cream on the way home for that one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<br />Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-64161497935353819782018-09-06T07:38:00.001-07:002018-09-06T11:19:19.209-07:00Back to school..and blogging<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><br /></span>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">So, it's been a while.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I can give you any numbers of excuses as to why I haven't been blogging,
but they'd all be pretty lame.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Truth is,
life just got in the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But anyway,
I'm back to entertain you for five minutes each week or so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How lucky you are!</span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">I've actually had a number of people come up to me in the
past year or so asking why I don't post anymore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><img alt="Image result for the mask you like me gif" height="125" src="https://i1.wp.com/www.nerdspeaker.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/the-mask-meme-nerd-speaker.jpg?fit=500%2C314&ssl=1" width="200" /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">So here goes <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>my
attempt to reclaim my former blogger glory. And by glory, I mean the 60 to 80
blog views I used to get.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">The reason I have all this free time to write again is
because Thing 2 has started junior kindergarten!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I stood there this morning watching her
walk in the front door with the rest of the JK's, I of course uttered the words
"FREEDOM!".<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I looked
around though, I seemed to be the only one not bawling my eyes out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What kind of father am I?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not even a little sad to see his youngest
leave him for good.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I'll tell you what
kind of father I am: A proud one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She
walked through those gates like she owned the place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not even a moment's hesitation or mournful
look back to me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She was ready.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Truth is, she's been ready for at least two
years.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">Do you want to know what I hate about back to school
though?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not the endless facebook posts
from all my friends of their kids back to school photos, because they're all so
damn cute. It's those stupid signs each kid is holding.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not only that, but the fact that I have to do
it too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Last year I wrote it on white paper
with black marker. Simple and to the point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But oh the shitstorm I took for that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You got Pinterest giving all these parents stupid ideas with elaborate
signs all decked out with f-ing tassles and glitter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hell, even the craft store Michael's had a sign
making workshop that I didn't sign up for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I got hell from my wife too for that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">So a mom friend of mine graciously gave my some extra
premade signs that they were giving out at the grocery store.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The problem?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They're printed over a forest green background to make it look like an
old chalkboard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Forest f-ing green.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Do you know what you can use to write on shiny
forest green paper?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sweet nothing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I tried white crayons, killed two gel pens
and even tried chalk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nothing worked
well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By the second kid's sign, I was
literally scratching through the green to get to the write underneath.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2tj0q-7SQjqOuhejiZg1ggL-OymNrqrE3cL6XErtKGNY60fvmuErkNEyYNp25EOaSkZEnEDBhrBc95-QoeJ-cJbtnXMZ4wyE5jRTL0G6Alqf6wfT1wLaKzCJGEbOZEw8Ji8gZiuY47z4/s1600/Back+to+school+sign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><img border="0" data-original-height="299" data-original-width="532" height="179" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2tj0q-7SQjqOuhejiZg1ggL-OymNrqrE3cL6XErtKGNY60fvmuErkNEyYNp25EOaSkZEnEDBhrBc95-QoeJ-cJbtnXMZ4wyE5jRTL0G6Alqf6wfT1wLaKzCJGEbOZEw8Ji8gZiuY47z4/s320/Back+to+school+sign.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">Didn't think that through too much, did you Loblaws?</span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">Until next time, folks! Now, I just have to remember how to publish the blog...</span></div>
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<span style="color: #f1c232; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><br /></span></div>
<br />Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-37762588345668929182017-03-02T16:00:00.000-08:002017-03-02T16:00:17.009-08:00Do You Believe In Ghosts?<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thing 2 is a character.
At just over two and a half years, she blows my mind every day with something
she says or does. Just the other day she
informed me that a wooden puzzle piece she found on the floor in our bedroom
"belongs downstairs". Belongs?
Where did she pick that up from. I'd
expect something more along the lines of "this goes downstairs", but "belongs"?
She slays me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, did you ever have an imaginary friend growing up? I
never did, so I don't know if kids actually see something that others can't. But what if those friends aren't
imaginary? What if some kids are simply clairvoyant
and are talking and playing with a ghost of some sort? It is widely believed, by those who believe in
the paranormal, that kids are more sensitive to such things.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now I'm not really here to get into a big conversation about
the existence of ghosts, it's just a thought. It's also a segue into Thing 2's friend Charlie.
Now Charlie, according to my daughter, is a ghost. She sees lots of ghosts, but Charlie is the
mainstay.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi_Myj1UCJWByAFpOKpaIDyM-1jlIXZJBXbw9bfWUogGcFXWDxMeyBhvSkrlijfxpaSvwvC5Oo1kX6YuI8XpLzfazz0ES0Z0knQvptOwamPIs91oiAWYOsLwgZ7Mkeb6RYnQvIp2j4ymk/s1600/I+see+dead+people.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi_Myj1UCJWByAFpOKpaIDyM-1jlIXZJBXbw9bfWUogGcFXWDxMeyBhvSkrlijfxpaSvwvC5Oo1kX6YuI8XpLzfazz0ES0Z0knQvptOwamPIs91oiAWYOsLwgZ7Mkeb6RYnQvIp2j4ymk/s1600/I+see+dead+people.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">None of these ghosts are malevolent, mind you. It's usually just Charlie who hangs around in
her closet most of the time. But every
night, we have to tell Charlie (and sometimes others) to go home before she goes to bed. We have to ask her where he is in her room
and speak to him directly saying, "Charlie, time to go home to your mommy. It's time for supper. See you tomorrow!".
After which, she goes promptly to sleep.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the morning, usually 13 to 14 hours later, she will come
down and announce that she had a "big, big nap" and "No bad
dreams". </span><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now if we forget to show Charlie the door, Thing 2 always
seems to have bad dreams.</span><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Coincidence? </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I think not.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So last week, Charlie
accompanied us all on a hike in the woods.
The terrain was muddy because of the big snow melt and still a bit icy
in places. Thing 2 was holding my hand
as Thing 1 held my wife's. Thing 2's other hand held Charlie's. When we came to
a spot where we had to step over a fallen tree, she informed me that she couldn't hold my hand
because she had to hold Charlie in her arms to help him over... </span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They didn't make it and they fell face-first into a pile of
mud.</span></div>
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<br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thanks a lot, Charlie.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hey look at that, I didn't make up a word today. Good for me.</span></div>
Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-9639064914416727222017-01-10T07:58:00.000-08:002017-01-10T07:58:28.034-08:00The Holidays<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ah the holidays. A time where you get to spend more time as
a family, a time when routines get messed with, and a time where at least
someone in the house gets sick. This
year, it was me first and my wife second.
The kids? They managed to stay remarkably
healthy. That's right, the walking
cesspools of germs that they are skate away from the holiday season unscathed
while I spend three days of the week leading up to Christmas alternating
between chills and sweats and my wife, bless her, spends all of Christmas Day
barfing every hour, on the hour, beginning at midnight.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Other than that though, Christmas was awesome.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Remember the old stories of your dad staying up all night
Christmas Eve putting together some toy of yours that had 1000 some-odd pieces?
Well I have my wife to thank for saving me from this fate. Thing 2's four foot tall doll house took a
full three hours to put together. Luckily, she pressured me to do that a couple
days before the big day. I almost wanted
to wait just so I could have such a story to pass on, like some fatherly rite
of passage. I have dumb ideas
sometimes. I probably could have put the
damn thing together faster had a had a proper screwdriver. The good one was in
a drawer no less than 5 feet from the spot I was labouring on with one of those
useless quick-change screwdrivers with all the stupid bits inside. I found the proper screwdriver days later as
we were de-Christmasing the house.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ever notice that I make up a word in pretty much every one
of these posts?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So every year I seem to have a moment where I become a
classic Christmas movie dad. There was the time I fell off the roof messing
with the Christmas lights à la Clark Griswold.
This year it was George Bailey. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiI0jtoQd2hdrh1e-0L10HszXGbCZxgkz4qSzW4aGkgQf4ACmlyJIHCWTn6WjM8xBHQfrMyX9ehhyLj8pGdWvB-6MqD5yObVnDVGcFM77ucHbvt36lj4X628HJC5xopM-lwkTxOmZgeYQo/s1600/george-bailey-on-the-phone.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiI0jtoQd2hdrh1e-0L10HszXGbCZxgkz4qSzW4aGkgQf4ACmlyJIHCWTn6WjM8xBHQfrMyX9ehhyLj8pGdWvB-6MqD5yObVnDVGcFM77ucHbvt36lj4X628HJC5xopM-lwkTxOmZgeYQo/s1600/george-bailey-on-the-phone.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If you've seen It's A Wonderful Life, (which if you haven't, what the
hell is wrong with you?), you'll know the scene where George calls the teacher
and gives her shit after Zuzu gets sick when she walks home without her coat
done up. Well I kind of pulled a similar
overreaction when I gave the caregivers crap when I picked up Thing 2 from
preschool and found her playing outside without a toque on when it was -10
Celsius. Turned out that was the night I
got sick. Coincidence? </span></div>
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<br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And a final thought: At what point did a Christmas pageant become a winter
concert? When I was in kindergarten in
public school circa 1988, we did the full nativity scene (a shepherd à la
Linus). Fast forward to Thing 1's
kindergarten winter concert in 2016 and
the word Christmas can't even be uttered.
Instead they performed the Olaf song from Frozen with altered
lyrics. Still cute as hell mind
you. Especially cute since Thing 1 is at
least 4 inches shorter than each of the other 63 kindergarten kids and they
stuck him dead centre in the front row.
Priceless.</span></div>
Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-39970538363197249632016-10-20T19:42:00.000-07:002016-10-20T19:42:02.196-07:00Well That's Shitty<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Disclaimer: The following is all about poo. You've been warned.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I deal with a lot of shit in my line of work. Not in the traditional sense, as in, my boss
is a jerk and impossible deadlines and stuff like that, but in the literal
sense. Cleaning up poo is a
multiple-time-a-day undertaking for me. </span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thing 2 poops about four times a day still. Probably due to
the amount of fruit and veg she eats.
Thankfully Thing 1 is toilet-trained now, although he hasn't really
mastered the whole wiping thing yet, so that's still on my docket. We have two good-sized retrievers and one
small yard. This means daily stoop and scooping as nothing is worse than
scraping dog doo out of a tiny kids shoe tread. Not to mention Thing 2 would
probably pick it up if I let her. More
on that later. And lastly, the damn cat requires her majesty's sand throne be
cleaned on the daily or she threatens to find other elimination quarters. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In case you lost count, that's crap from five other beings,
not including my own. Good thing my wife
is self-sufficient in these matters.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So Thing 2 has developed a bizarre fascination with poo. If she finds one out in the yard, she crouches
down really close to inspect it. She'll pull
a stool up in front of you when you're on the can. And most disturbing of all,
she demands to see the contents of her poopy diaper after each change. How
weird is that? I sure hope that's a
passing phase.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So let me tell you about the shittiest afternoon I've ever
had. Back in January, three weeks into
Thing 1's potty-training, the kids and I
venture out to the library. Within 10
minutes of getting here, I notice Thing 2 smells a bit ripe. As I take her into the bathroom (which mercifully had a change table), I discover
that the diaper has not fulfilled its duty of holding in the contents* . I then
quickly discover that I have a total of 4 baby wipes remaining in the diaper
bag. This is at least a 6 wiper.
Efficiency is of the utmost importance.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thing 1 then drops a bombshell on me. The bomb being in his pants, in a mostly liquefied form, and it's running
down his leg. Thank the good people at
the library for having the facility well stocked with brown paper towel.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Outing over.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As we head in the front door to head up to the bath, we're
greeted by Dog #1 who apparently rolled in some other animal's shit undetected
before we left for the library. Not only
does he need a bath now as well, but I have to wash whatever he was laying on.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You'd have to clean Porta Potties for a living to top this afternoon.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So the next time you think you're having a figuratively
shitty day, just remember, I'm probably having a literal one.</span></div>
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<br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">*Check out my Cottage
post for a similar diaper-related mishap: <a href="http://mysahdexistence.blogspot.ca/2016/08/the-cottage.html">http://mysahdexistence.blogspot.ca/2016/08/the-cottage.html</a></span></div>
Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-26354963764362605622016-10-11T11:10:00.001-07:002016-12-15T06:32:50.687-08:00#52 traits: Positivity in a Negative World<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">The following is another of my articles in the #52traits series on GetConnectDAD.com.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;"><br /></span>https://getconnectdad.com/positivity-in-a-negative-world/</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">You can follow them at <a href="https://twitter.com/GetConnectDad">https://twitter.com/GetConnectDad</a> or <a href="https://www.facebook.com/GetConnectDAD/">https://www.facebook.com/GetConnectDAD/</a></span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Here's the article in its entirety:</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">My kids are too young to realize it yet, but we live in a pretty negative world. We, as adults, are pessimistic about everything these days. From the weather to politics, to the state of the economy, everything is going for a big steamy poop. Just about everything we consume, from our food and drink to our choice of TV show, is bad for us. Even the majority of music coming out these days is garbage. In short, everything sucks.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">So how the heck are we supposed to raise our kids to be positive?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I know what we’ll do: we can give everyone a medal for participation. That will keep everyone positive, right? Not so much. All that does is grow a generation of spoiled, entitled wussbags who don’t know how to deal with defeat.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">So what’s a parent to do?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">In my opinion, the best way to teach positivity is to teach failure. Now I’m not talking about breaking a kid’s spirit with a constant barrage of losing endeavours. I’m talking about teaching a kid that, even if you lose or don’t succeed at something, it doesn’t need change who you are and it doesn’t change your potential to succeed in the future.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Just think of old Charlie Brown. His team lost every baseball game they played. But the start of every game, he went in thinking “today was the day we finally win”. Positivity despite adversity. It’s the same idea as the old adage “Life goes on”. I don’t want my kids to put too much stock into losing a little league game. It’s just a game. As adults, we seem to put too much stock in kids sports these days. Every wants their kid to have that extra edge. I just want my kids to have fun and enjoy playing whatever it is they want to play.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Then there’s positive reinforcement. Now my four-year-old needs a push to try some things. Sometimes a big push. Getting him on a bike this year, even with training wheels, was a challenge. If it was up to him, he still never would have sat on that seat. We had to force him on to the seat. Once he was on it, we used an obnoxious amount of encouragement and positive reinforcement. He hated us for doing it, but once he saw that he could do it himself, it was hard to get him off the bike. It was the same thing with the pool. Swimming lessons were a nightmare. Who knew a three-year-old could scream bloody murder for 25 minutes straight, six weeks in a row? But I think he saw that we stayed positive about it, and about swimming in general. Now, it’s hard to get him out of the pool.So maybe that’s the other trick to raising a positive child. To lead by example. Kids are more observant than we like to think. If my kids see my wife coming home and talking about how she thinks she’s doing a terrible job at work, how is that going to affect their confidence when they go to school? They’re probably going to start thinking the same way about themselves. As I write about this, I’m thinking of more and more ways that I’m being negative about things around the house. It’s going to be a difficult mindset to change, but if I want my kids to be positive, I’m going to have to do the same.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">So here goes. Dinner will not suck tonight (even if it actually tastes like dog food).</span></div>
Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-35694385399306055462016-09-07T13:01:00.002-07:002016-12-15T06:33:28.595-08:00#52traits Eat Your Dang Vegetables<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">The following is my article in the #52traits series on GetConnectDAD.com.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">https://getconnectdad.com/eat-your-dang-vegetables/?utm_content=bufferec030</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">You can follow them at <a href="https://twitter.com/GetConnectDad">https://twitter.com/GetConnectDad</a> or <a href="https://www.facebook.com/GetConnectDAD/">https://www.facebook.com/GetConnectDAD/</a></span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Here's the article in its entirety:</span></div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 28px; margin-bottom: 20px;">
<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">We’re the family that people hate to host. The kids have a dairy allergy, my wife doesn’t eat anything that had legs, we don’t eat gluten by choice. People don’t get it. Our families think we’re just being difficult. I get it. It’s a pain in the ass. People don’t know what to make of us.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But our family’s health is really important to us. My wife and I each grew up as the fat kid despite being very active. Kids were mean and relentless and it affected each of us emotionally. We had very little self-esteem. We both hated our adolescence.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The reason we grew up that way? We ate like crap. I grew up drinking full-sugar Kool-aid and cases of pop. We ate no vegetables at all in my house, unless you consider potatoes a vegetable or the can of corn at Christmas dinner. We had very little fresh fruit, lots of white bread, unlimited chips and cookies, boxed meals, and sugar cereals.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">As a parent now, I shudder at the thought of feeding my kids that way.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Were my siblings and I picky eaters? Most likely. I can remember my mom making five different meals when I was a teenager.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">As a stay-at-home dad who makes almost everything from scratch, I don’t have time to make multiple meals. The rule is that we all eat whatever is made. If it’s a crappy meal, then we all share in the crappiness. If someone refuses to eat it, then they go to bed hungry. No exceptions. If one of the kids wants a snack before bed, they finish their dinner first.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But we never force them to eat. If they say their belly is full, we don’t do the old two-more-bites thing.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">My son was an incredibly picky eater around the time he was two. He would gag on things that don’t usually make people gag, like pasta. So we had to get creative at first. I made beet pancakes and spinach pancakes and zucchini waffles. Basically, if I told him it was a pancake or a cookie, he would eat it. We were persistent with vegetables being included in every meal. Gradually we introduced vegetables in their true form.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Now he loves everything raw.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">My wife and I feed our kids real food. I make almost everything from scratch. I check the ingredients on everything I buy. If the word “modified” appears on the list, I don’t buy it. If I can’t pronounce one of the words in the list, I don’t buy it. If it says glucose-fructose, I leave it on the shelf. It’s expensive to eat real food. Is it overkill and pretentious? Maybe. Does it make me feel better, that I know what’s going in our bodies? You bet your ass it does.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I want my kids to continue making good choices when they’re old enough to choose what food they want to eat. I had no idea that half the vegetables we eat now even existed when I was a kid. I get them to help me choose the produce at the market or the store. It excites them.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #783f04; color: white; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Now I’m not delusional. I know full well they’ll eat at McDonald’s with their friends when they’re older and I’m okay with that. At home though, they know they’ll get a healthy meal every time.</span></div>
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Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-53614637554712835542016-08-17T06:26:00.001-07:002016-08-17T06:26:31.354-07:00The Cottage<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The cottage. Our
family's first real vacation. We didn't
really know what to expect. That's kind
of the danger with renting something online.
Pictures can be deceiving. Just
look at a listing for a house in your town on a real estate website, then go to
an open house. It can be a big
difference. We lucked out in that the
cottage itself was pretty nice for a cottage.
Being first-timers in cottage rental we thought we did okay.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Then we looked at the state of the beach on this "beachfront"
cottage. Now I don't have a whole lot of
experience with Lake Erie, but the few times I've seen it, it was decent. This beach, however, was frigging
disgusting. There is a full 20 feet of
black sludge covered in a green icing . And it stunk. Not exactly the kind of place you want your
kids playing in all week.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGdKFnJRWQ4QOn8czstI0o39uzSzfX7KZapfWzMq8dS8suPtYnx_VMrna_fnZmnvHBXdyTCWKvh6E0ZWqmtGusdFK_nZLYMvSKl3mrYyn2HUEk5MdOqXaUll3NulPsBwxQ7Qw7RflQRow/s1600/IMG_5880.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGdKFnJRWQ4QOn8czstI0o39uzSzfX7KZapfWzMq8dS8suPtYnx_VMrna_fnZmnvHBXdyTCWKvh6E0ZWqmtGusdFK_nZLYMvSKl3mrYyn2HUEk5MdOqXaUll3NulPsBwxQ7Qw7RflQRow/s320/IMG_5880.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That's the "beach". If you tossed a rock in, it splashed up black sludge pudding.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So we had to find other arrangements. We were told about this provincial park by
one of the neighbours. We took a wrong
turn in the deserted park though by following the "This way to
swimming" sign. What we found was a
barren rock beach littered with the carcasses of dead fish. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mmmmm.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We ended up finding the good part later in the week, so all
was good.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the meantime though, we also found the neighbouring towns
had free pools. It was here that I
showed my boneheadedness in its full glory.
As I was in the pool a full 10 minutes before I noticed my cell phone in
my pocket. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Crap.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Three days in rice and I was able to turn it on and save all
the pictures. Thank goodness for that
life hack meme.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(Disclaimer: The next part is gross if you've never had
kids. If you have then, you'll see the
humour.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So the final evening we decide to go out for dinner. A few minutes in, we noticed Miss Thang Two
(formerly Thing Two) stunk. It was my
turn. Of course there's no change table
or counter in the men's washroom, but we make due. It was a minor deuce, a two wiper. No more than five minutes later, she reeked
again. Mama's turn. Thang Two comes back to the table in a diaper
only. The diaper did not hold in all the
contents. Shorts in trash. Happy girl.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here's the gross part. A woman walks by the table and
slips. Looks down and sees some
"food" on the floor and tells the maître d' about it. We look over and to our horror/hilarity, the
"food" had squirted right out the diaper. Gnarly.
I managed to clean it up with a bunch of wipes and dispose of it in the
loo before they showed up with a broom. Ah, parenting.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Should we have told them about the biohazard? Probably. Did we?
Heck no. We paid the bill and
high-tailed it out of there.</span></div>
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<br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But alas, the vacation, like all good things, came to an end. Both kids learned to doggie-paddle in the
pool and we had some laughs. All in all,
a successful first family vacation.</span></div>
Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-74478426565994380612016-08-08T17:17:00.001-07:002016-08-08T17:17:52.632-07:00The Minivan of Awesomeness<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There's quite a divide between those that minivan and those
who swear they never would, even it was given to them. When I started telling people how we were
getting a van after our second car went for a shit, the divide was pretty
impressive. Pretty much anyone who has
never owned a van is anti-van. Quite
simply, they're uncool and unsexy. Kinda like me. Vans are the
cargo pants of the vehicle world.
They're boxy, unflattering, and you can put all kinds of shit in them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Case in point: First trip to the cottage. Two adults,
two kids, two 70 lbs. dogs, two coolers, two giant totes, 3 suitcases, a laptop
bag and toys. Plus random bags of
groceries we couldn't fit in the coolers.
All in one unsexy minivan. That
trumps any shred of anti-van you can fire at me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="223" src="https://scontent-yyz1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/13668989_10157287751310341_5886950326984456463_n.jpg?oh=12004c5a228395e22ad2228563605100&oe=58110E86" width="400" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Vans are awesome.
They're the best thing to come along since sliced bread (the wheat kind,
not the gluten-free kind. That bread is
crap). </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My uncle-in-law bestowed the magical purple wonder on us
despite the fact that he has four grown boys, all of which appear to be anti-vanners. We've known about it for awhile now, but we
only came desperate for it when the old Sebring gave up the ghost a month
ago. Three weeks between vehicles when
you're home all day with two kids pretty much sucks. Luckily the weather was good enough to tow
the kids around in the bicycle trailer most places we needed to go. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We only had to use public transportation twice. Do you know why no one likes to use public
transportation? Because it takes
for-freaking-ever to get anywhere. Thing
1 had a doctor's appointment the day
after the car died. A whole 25 kilometres away. I thought it would be an adventure for the
kiddos to ride the bus, so I planned out the trip. Three buses and over two hours to come within
15 minutes walking distance of the doc's office. I also grossly underestimated how much snacks
would be required for a two hour bus voyage.
They pretty much ate everything in the first 10 minutes. Big fail on that one.</span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bring on the van, I say! And maybe some cargo pants</span>.</div>
Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-79619738385376719902016-07-05T09:44:00.000-07:002016-10-11T11:10:47.555-07:00#52traits: Because There's All Kinds of Jerks Out There<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">The following is my article in the #52traits series on GetConnectDAD.com. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<a href="https://getconnectdad.com/2016/07/05/be-forgiving-because-theres-all-kinds-of-jerks-out-there/"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">https://getconnectdad.com/2016/07/05/be-forgiving-because-theres-all-kinds-of-jerks-out-there/</span></a><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana"; font-size: x-small;">You can follow them at <a href="https://twitter.com/GetConnectDad">https://twitter.com/GetConnectDad</a> or <a href="https://www.facebook.com/GetConnectDAD/">https://www.facebook.com/GetConnectDAD/</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana"; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Here's the article in its entirety:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">We all do stupid things. We’re inherently selfish beings who, at times, do things without any regard for others. We hurt people. Sometimes physically, sometimes emotionally, sometimes mentally. Basically, we’re all jerks at some point in time. Some more than others, but you get the point. Not one person reading this is ever going to say they’ve never been an asshole. If you were a toddler, you’ve been an asshole at some point. My two kids are generally lovable little beings, but both do malicious things daily.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana"; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">As parents, we have lots to teach our kids, but when it comes down to it, our main job is to bring them up to be functioning members of society. We all may have different ideas of what that means, but it should all end up looking pretty dang similar.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana"; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">But alas, it doesn’t always work out. Some people are just jerks. Like the kid who insisted on kicking my kid’s train every two minutes at his kindergarten orientation, he then proceeded to shove a girl and pinch her when she was down. That kid may grow up to be a glorious asshole. To combat these types in the world, we need to teach our kids about forgiveness, in all its forms.</span><br />
<br />
<figure class="wp-caption alignleft" data-shortcode="caption" id="attachment_1712" style="width: 310px;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><img alt="Fist Bump" class="size-medium wp-image-1712" height="225" src="https://juliancaldwelldotco.files.wordpress.com/2016/07/fist-bump-933916.jpg?w=300&h=225" width="300" /></span><figcaption class="wp-caption-text"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Fist Bump</span></figcaption></figure><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Firstly, I want my kids to be able to forgive those the jerks they come across out in public. I want them to know that it’s usually not personal, and if it is, it may be because they’ve learned that behaviour from someone else doing it to them. Maybe the person being a jerk is just having a bad day. Whatever the reason, I want to teach my kids to put themselves in the other’s shoes and see if they can figure out why that person behaves that way. I want to make little anthropologists out of them. I want my kids to try and talk to the other and ask how they’re doing. See if they can help in some way. If it helps, great. They made a new friend, or at least gained some insight into how others think. If that kid still wants to be a jerk, then at least they’ve learned another important life lesson: some people are just plain assholes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana"; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">I also want my kids to have the strength to forgive a loved one who messes up. This is something I had to learn well into adulthood. Even people you love can do crappy things. The fact that love is involved makes it more difficult to make peace with the other’s mistake. I want them to know that holding on to the anger or hurt that the loved one caused is more detrimental to themselves, than to the other person. Even if no remorse is shown, it’s still better to forgive, for your own sake. I just hope it isn’t me they’re going to have to try to forgive.</span><br />
<a class="is-image" href="http://www.facebook.com/GetConnectDAD"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><img alt="Screen Shot 2016-07-05 at 9.53.28 AM" class=" wp-image-1721 alignright" height="253" src="https://juliancaldwelldotco.files.wordpress.com/2016/07/screen-shot-2016-07-05-at-9-53-28-am.png?w=270&h=253" width="270" /></span></a><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Which brings me to the one type of forgiveness I want my kids to learn the most: To forgive themselves. They’re going to screw up. They’re going to get bad grades, detentions, and maybe even suspensions at school. They’re going to burn things on the stove, blow things up in the microwave, overflow the bathtub, spill crap on the rug, crash my car. The list goes on and on. It’s all going to happen. I want to teach them to go easy on themselves. No pressure is worse than the pressure you can put on yourself. Life is full of bad decisions. The trick is to learn from the mistakes and move forward.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">“The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong”. – Mahatma Ghandi</span>Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-81550368267119274302016-06-13T14:55:00.002-07:002016-06-13T15:33:39.441-07:00Well this is awkward...<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Thing 2 loves to dance. If one of her jams comes on the radio,
she'll shake her car seat like it's the
'89 World Series in San Francisco. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A little while back we
took the kiddos to Ripley's Aquarium in Toronto and as we stood in line, Uptown Funk starts blaring out of the sound system. She stood there and shook her diapered ass
like no one was watching. Only hundreds
of people were. The grin on her face was
priceless. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I see a future full of recitals and expensive dance outfits.
Can't wait.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So anyway, because I love her so dearly, I signed her up for a
free session of this thing called Salsa Tots.
It sounded harmless enough. I envisioned
a room full of two and three year old kids and lots of salsa music. I could tolerate that for an hour no problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There was a problem though. Only two other kids capable of walking showed up. The rest of the dozen little ones were
strapped to their moms' chests. Odd, I'm sure it said this was for kids aged two and three. But we stuck around. How bad could it be, right?
Naturally, I was the only male over 3.
I'm used to that by now. My
presence was neither welcomed or acknowledged. I'm used to that by now too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Seeing the turnout, the instructor announces that the demo
class would now be half Salsa Tots, and half Salsa Babies. I assumed the Babies version might be slower beats or something like that. We dance for ten
minutes with the tots while the baby-toting moms do their best to look as
inconvenienced as possible. This is what you signed up for, ladies. The instructor, sensing she's beginning to lose
out on some subscribers decides it's time to switch demos.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Salsa Babies, as it turns out, is like a Zumba program for
moms wearing their babies. Why any one would want to exercise with a baby attached to them is beyond my comprehension, but to each their own. To me, it's weird. Now I tried to be a sport and hold all 25 pounds of Thing 2 to my chest and do some of these moves. I got some weird looks from the moms and Thing 2 alike. This was awkward. Clearly no one is comfortable in this situation. It was time for us to go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So we did one of these:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img src="https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/83/a9/6b/83a96bceb4cfba9bc9262a68731a2e54.jpg" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Once out of the room, I frantically searched for our shoes in the entrance way, jammed them on our feet as fast as humanly possible and got us the hell out of there. If she was upset about, thankfully she didn't show it. I think she knew Daddy needed to leave. For the good of everyone involved.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Oh the places we will go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-44885435058653205282016-06-04T19:16:00.003-07:002016-06-04T19:16:14.507-07:00The Art of Invisibility<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Sometimes everyone feels they're
invisible. For instance, I almost got smoked the other morning while
towing the kids in their bike trailer by a person backing out of their driveway
in a school zone. You would think someone living on the same street as a
primary level school would be extra careful when backing out of their driveway
at 8:45 in the morning. Not so much.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
But there's another way you can be invisible, and that's to be any dad out in
public. About a month back, I brought my two to toddler time at the
local indoor trampoline park. You think this would be the most fun place
you could bring your child. They get to jump around out springy floors
and throw big balls at each other. Well Thing 1 and 2 quickly grew bored
of this and discovered the mini lockers near the snack shop. You want to
talk about fun? Fun is watching two tiny kids squeeze themselves into
little tiny ground level lockers then pop out and say boo seconds later.
I thought it was as hilarious as they did. </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
Note: Please ignore the fact the my phone takes photos the same quality as a Polaroid
circa 1976. This was the best of the five pics I took.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="separator" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHK0CN4B6e_AyVGYazyWdEqyfXoNIeMEPHZQj7wgj-PC2IiNWIe5zoDXCce5x_SSI6GAo9PBVgL-_-vltJUXBck0sukgArYPP8Bl2FobHzcoj48pLhxgU7zPsrpytyHQ-UigHASyEl5IM/s1600/20160403_110846.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; text-decoration: none;"><!--[if gte vml 1]><v:shapetype
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEUGjSNKRqPaqqD99nSEpN1CVea4FALmDkZcAJdcodylaIpOmUF_lk5RmstzWOI4QJCA_2HGBUUGPutmpK8MpR_FucQ0fCmKOCj1S01fX59mJLUXKkWtXctnlhKIENbqFrsmdHTabFHgk/s1600/20160403_110846.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEUGjSNKRqPaqqD99nSEpN1CVea4FALmDkZcAJdcodylaIpOmUF_lk5RmstzWOI4QJCA_2HGBUUGPutmpK8MpR_FucQ0fCmKOCj1S01fX59mJLUXKkWtXctnlhKIENbqFrsmdHTabFHgk/s200/20160403_110846.jpg" width="150" /></a></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
<br />
Now I'm standing about 6 feet away, taking pics to send to my wife who had to
work. This other kid comes up and wants to play too, but his helicopter
mom quickly says no and tells him that he could suffocate in there because
there's no air holes. Are you f'ing kidding me? She then proceeds to physically
pull my kids out of the lockers and tell them it's not safe. I was
dumbfounded and just kind of stood there in shock. She appeared to be
heading for the exit, so I tried to let it go. She had good intentions
I'm sure, but the more I thought about it, the more it pissed me off. I
never thought for a second that any harm could come to either of them by
playing in the lockers.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
I saw the Safety Mom again about 20 minutes later, so I did the only thing I
thought would calm me down about it. I went over to her and asked her
what she thought gave her the right to parent my kids, let alone physically remove
them from the locker. Now it was her turn to be the dumbfounded one. She
stammered an apology and said she didn't see the kids' mom around. </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
Wow. I mean, it's not like I was the only dad in the place. It was
a Sunday after all.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
So maybe I am invisible. Maybe all dads are invisible in public places.
Or moms all over just assume we're incompetent and that they know better, even
if the kids aren't their own. Hopefully that mentality changes before my
kids grow up. Or else, it's going to be a long 16 or so more years of
being a SAHD.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
Anyway, I tell my wife the story later that day and she tells me about Mommy
Wars. You should Google it if you've never heard of it. I may have fallen
victim despite the lack of a uterus. My wife couldn't believe that I
confronted the woman. Apparently that's a Mommy Wars no-no. You're
just supposed go online and bitch about the other parent inferior way of
parenting. Now I know. So I got the satisfaction of confronting
her, and I got to bitch about here. Double-win. </span><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-38511217021806624002016-05-12T05:41:00.000-07:002016-05-12T05:41:03.978-07:00Why I hate PinterestDiet is important in our house. It's probably because my wife and I both grew up as "the fat kid". I think we're both a bit petrified that Thing 1 and/or Thing 2 might have to go through that growing up. We take it pretty seriously. We even fired Thing 1's first daycare provider for taking him to McDonald's without asking. Seriously.<br />
<br />
We also have a lot of dietary restrictions around here. The kids can't have dairy, the adults don't eat gluten, my wife doesn't eat meat. We don't use refined sugar or eat processed food. It means I pretty much have to make everything from scratch. It's a pain in the ass really, eating healthy and all that. It leads to spending way too much of my time in the kitchen. And just like I have no natural athletic ability, I also have no natural cooking ability. If I don't have a recipe, I'm up a creek without the proverbial paddle. <br />
<br />
Which brings me to Pinterest. Pinterest has every recipe imaginable, and a few you wish had never been thought of. And my wife loves the damn app. If I make the mistake of asking her what she wants for dinner this week, I wake up the next morning to 47 new pins with such meals as Vegan Chicken-less Tofu Noodle Soup and Vegan Moroccan "Meatballs". Some of which have 47 frigging ingredients. Who has time for that shit?? I've made cauliflower "popcorn" and vegan "bacon" out of portobello mushrooms. I kid you not. Just last week my wife read somewhere that the Flintstones chewable vitamins that we give to Thing 1 cause cancer, so I woke up to pin for homemade gummy vitamins. Did I make them? Of course I did. Luckily, the kids are still at the gullible stage when they'll eat anything if you tell them it's candy or a cookie or a pancake. Beet or spinach pancakes? More please, Daddy! We eat so healthy that if I ask Thing 2 if she wants a snack, she heads to the cupboard and hands me a can of chickpeas. Chip of the old block, that one. These kids are going to be really pissed off when they find out what real candy tastes like. <br />
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So just because someone took the time to post a recipe on there, it does not mean it actually tastes good. Even if the author puts "Amazing" or "Delicious" in the title. I've made countless dinners where not even the dogs came around for a taste. What happens to those dinners? They get put in those aluminum trays and frozen for a year until I finally throw them out blaming freezer burn and not the fact that it was crap to begin with.<br />
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In case you're not familiar, I'll give you a bit of a description on how a Pinterest recipe works. First, the person writes a long diatribe on how good and easy the recipe is, including about 47 pictures of the dish at different angles, then finally gets around to posting the damn recipe way down at the bottom. Oh and there's always a pop up ad as you're scrolling down that stops you midway asking you if you want to subscribe, of which you have to search for the little black X to close it. Now I'm perfectly aware of the irony of bitching about other peoples' long blog posts in my own blog, but you didn't come here to get a recipe as two kids are whining at your legs saying they were hungry, did you? <br />
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Also, never believe the prep time and cooking time calculations. If it says prep time is 15 minutes, it's at least triple that. Fifteen minutes if you employ a sous chef maybe or spent 47 minutes cutting everything up the night before. Oh and if the kids want to help make it? You may as well forget about everything else you had planned to do that afternoon.<br />
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It's 8:30 am, I better get cracking on dinner...<br />
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Today's post was brought to you by the number 47.Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1575483888307512483.post-92030533302565375312016-05-03T17:42:00.000-07:002016-05-03T18:06:52.418-07:00Intro to My SAHD Existence <div dir="ltr">
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Disclaimer: B</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">eing a Stay-at-home-Dad (SAHD for the purposes of this blog) is the best and most fulfilling</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> job I've ever had (Mind you I worked in accounting for 11 years, so the bar wasn't set very high). The hours are brutal and pay really sucks, but the benefits are pretty sweet. Having said this, my life is now filled with some pretty hilarious, ridiculous, and the downright bizarre moments. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">As this is my first post, I should give a little background. I quit my job to stay at home with our two kids back</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> in September 2014. At the time, my son (Thing 1) was barely 2 and my daughter (Thing 2) was 4 months. Not that I thought it would be a cakewalk, but I did think it would be less stressful than being a credit manager, of which my career had dead-ended at. Now, the most stressful thing I have to worry about is what the hell I'm going to feed everyone for dinner...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Before I began this endeavour a year and a half ago, I had read that more and more dads were choosing to do the same. I thought, great, I'll make the leap and easily find like-minded dads who've done the same. Well, not so much. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">So far, I've met one other guy on parental leave. The rest? All women. ALL OF THEM.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">For the most part , outings with the kids leave me with the feeling like I'm intruding on Uterus-only territory. If you've seen any meme's about stay-at-home-dads, I'm telling you now, no matter how ridiculous they seem, they're all freaking true. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Like this one:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">See the one there with the Predator at the park? That's me apparently. I've brought the kids to the park many a time where the moms/caregivers immediately start talking in hushed tones as soon as we arrive. Huddling closer to each other, glancing over their shoulders, making sure I'm at a safe distance from them and there kids. Look, I already have two kids under 4. Do you really think I'd want one of yours too? Also, I'm wearing a wedding ring. I have all the crazy I need in my life.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">So the other day, I took Thing 2 her little story and song group at the local library. It's for 2's and 3's and she loves it. So we were the first ones in the room and I took a spot along one of the walls and sat down on the floor. Now it's a small room and there's about 12 or so adults and a ton of kids. So not a lot of room to share. Did I mention I was the only male over the age of 3? Well, I am. So anyway, the next six women that come into the class with their kids cram themselves shoulder to shoulder as far away from me as possible as if I'm a ripe diaper. It's like junior high all over again I tell you. Eventually, the room fills up and some older caregiver ladies sit next to me and I feel a little less awkward in the room. At least my daughter enjoys herself.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Oh that's not all for this excursion. So then they brought out the big parachute in the open room next door after the class. You know the kind where everyone grabs a handle and makes it blow up and down while the kids run under giggling and screaming? Thing 2 was off playing and suddenly decides she wants to partake. So I go over and grab a handle. The lady next to me immediately moves away and grabs a different one. I seriously smelled a pit on one of the parachute upswings to see if I was a little rank or something. I wasn't.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Welcome to my SAHD existence.</span></div>
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Daddy@ Homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16332538904216963777noreply@blogger.com0