Part of being so patient requires getting less angry at things. Besides, when you have kids, you just don’t have the time. Tons of things used to tick me off, but then I realized that I was just wasting time and energy on things that would never make a difference to me anyway. Kids with low pants? Who cares. Long lines? That’s what smartphones are for nowadays. Internet trolls? Just ignore them. Politics & religion? Let’s agree to disagree. Screaming kids? As long as they’re not mine…

Yes, I can tolerate lots of worldly issues that no longer bother me. On the other hand, yes, there are a few “items” that still make me angry. Very angry. Things that make me forget being patient altogether, because I’m just too mad… dad or not.

1.) Litterers. I teach my kids to use garbage cans. It’s the simplest of concepts. People who toss trash out of their car window or just throw things on the ground instead of walking twenty feet are lazy. I do, on the other hand, like to show my kids that it’s okay to throw away a stray piece of trash in the park or on the way to the dumpster.

2.) I’ve gotten over single people who use the family restroom, I really have. They might have made this list a year ago, but I don’t have kids with diapers anymore, and it’s sometimes just as easy to take my children into the men’s room. The jerks who need to be vilified, though, are the piggies who can’t wipe the toilet seat after themselves. There may have been a time where I believed that men were the only pee-petrators here, but back up to the “family restroom” thing. I have seen the kind of messes that women can leave. Good luck out there, ladies. *shudder*

3.) People who tailgate / People who speed through neighborhoods / people who don’t give “thank you” waves. We could go on and on about the type of drivers that tick me off, but as a parent, these are the ones that really stick. The tailgaters got worse as soon as we stuck a baby-on-board magnet on the back of the car – evil. People who speed through neighborhoods where kids are playing, biking, running and being children – pure evil. And the people I let in front of me even though they bypassed everyone else, but can’t raise a damned hand to say “thanks?” – pure, unadulterated evil.

4.) Auto repeat. Autoconcrete. Otto the street. Autocomplete.

5.) People who don’t keep their word. I don’t mind delayed promises, cancellations because of sick children, or other times that people give their word and back out. When people say they are going to do something and never do it, then we have a problem. I love the word “no.” I use it all the time. It can mean “Sorry, I can’t fulfill your request. You can find a different way to get what you need done.” It’s okay to say “no, I can’t do that for you” instead of “yes, I can” and then never doing it or letting me know why you can’t. Just be honest.

6.) Public Fighting. It sucks to have to watch to people fight in public and it sucks to be one of them. It sucks to have to break up your kids who are going at it in the middle of the store, and it sucks to have to argue with some idiot because he thinks it’s okay to swear like a Quentin Tarantino film in a children’s play area. It sucks to watch someone spank her kid in public for no greater offense than just being a kid. It sucks to have one of those days with your spouse and everyone around you knows it. Can’t we all just get along?

7.) Parking Space Stalkers. Drivers that see you walking to your hot car with a stroller, two kids, a shopping cart full of groceries and more, and then feel the need to wait for your mediocre spot. In all fairness, these people don’t make me angry as much as they make me slow. Very. Slo-o-o-ow.

8.) Line jumpers. These self-righteous, entitled, narcissistic and impatient dregs of humanity are scum. And villainy.

9.) People who don’t say anything back when you greet them. Have you ever wasted a perfectly acceptable “good morning” or simple “hello” on someone who responds by glaring at you like you’re the devil? As a kid, I always thought, at the very least, that grown-ups were going to be civil with one another. Reality is a bitch, isn’t it? What an awful and nasty thing to do to another human being who is only guilty of one thing: being friendly. And I’m sorry, but for adults, and especially those with kids, being “shy” is not an excuse for this reprehensible behavior. You know why? I’m extremely shy, and an introvert**, and sometimes it takes every shred of my existence to go out of my way and to be polite to other people in the world. If someone greets you, you’re supposed to greet them back. It’s the law.***

10.) Lists with less than ten things on them.

* So are you. Fact.

** Shocking, right?

*** Embellishment.

Mother’s Day is May 13, a short time away. That must mean all the fathers have their Mother’s Day gifts wrapped up, bowed, and ready to go. Alright, most fathers. Some dads? Anyone?

Well, if you need last minute ideas that are going to blow the mother of your children’s mind, you honestly came to the wrong place. These ideas are intended to supplement the gifts you are going to buy on May 12.

In a worst case scenario, like thinking that buying an electric mixer was a good idea*, some of these may be good for damage control. In a best case scenario, however, these are some ideas that you can (and should) be doing for your kid’s mom (much) more than once a year.

1.) Set up a Mom’s Night Out – Or let her set one up. Date nights are awesome, sure, but Mom’s Nights are fun and vent-tastic.

2.) Leave the house with the kids on a Saturday morning and don’t come back until after it’s dark. Alone time is quiet time, and quiet time means peace. What can she do? Whatever she wants.

3.) Stay at the house with the kids on a Saturday morning, tell mom to leave, do whatever she wants and come back when she pleases. Just like (2) but with more shopping. And shoes.

4.) Set aside a space for her in the house with no toys, bottles, drawings or anything kid-related. A womancave, if you will.**

5.) If you don’t already hand out back massages on demand, then get with the program, man.

6.) Tell mom to recall something from before parent-life, and even before relationship-life that she used to enjoy doing. Something she wouldn’t mind doing again. Make it happen.

7.) Give the gift of communication. Talk to her, or more importantly listen to her. Set aside some time to simply have a normal, back-and-forth conversation. Believe it or not, this is even sometimes possible with kids in the room. Unlikely… but possible!

8.) Go see a doctor, already, man! No not her, stupid – you! Either she cares about you enough to see you healthy or she wants her kid’s child-support payments to last until they aren’t kids anymore. Either way, stop being a stereotype, man up, and go let a doctor tell you how to live a more healthy life… do it for your family, man!

9.) On a less prostatic note, have your children make some Mother’s Day arts and crafts. Smaller children are super excited to do these things, and both tiny and older kids will need some help, but you need to make sure that mom gets some homemade love. Need ideas? You have an internets! Use it!

10.) Go traditional. Alright, then, lazy dad. I tried to help you out, but there’s nothing wrong with all of the old fallback gift ideas. Get her flowers, chocolate, a massage coupon, an apologetic Mother’s day card and call it a day. Keep in mind, though, that in return, for Father’s Day, you’ll probably be getting a tie.

* Appliance names have been changed to protect the inept.

** Velvet Ryan Gosling portaits optional.

In the short time since I wrote our LEGO Friends post, things have changed considerably. We are now owners of LEGO Friends.

…and they are awesome.

It was purely my girls’ decision to add them to our collection. Alright, perhaps purely is not the correct term here, since these “infamous” toys are right there in their very own section at the store. For whatever reason, maybe all the pink, or perhaps by merely overhearing Daddy’s rants, LEGO Friends suddenly became a “gotta have” toy. I didn’t just rush out and purchase them, either. The kids had some Christmas gift cards to spend, and this was their choice for what to spend it on.

Now, about four of the smaller sets have now been integrated into our collection. I can really say at this point that the concept, design and playability of the Friends line is right on par with all of the other LEGOs. Without going into too much detail, the sets have enough “standard” pieces to add to any collection, while they also contain enough unique pieces that won’t get completely lost in the mix of a big collection.

I found the sets themselves to be way less “sexist” than most Barbie sets of toys. One of the characters is even (impressively) a scientist. As for the rest… you know what? Who cares? Anyone who knows the “true spirit” of LEGOs knows that it’s all about using your imagination. The pre-made sets are great for teaching kids the different ways that pieces can interact with one another, but the fun (and learning) really comes from dumping a big box of miscellaneous pieces on the floor and going to town.

I could go on, but the mere mention of “going to town” reminded me of my daughters’ LEGO town that they have proudly put on display for the past week.

Pictures:

Lesson: The next time a big toy controversy sweeps across the internet, it’s just not as big of a deal as people make of it. Simply raise your children to be who they are. Piece by piece.

Disclaimer: Opinions are mine, and this was not a paid post. If someone from the LEGO Company wants to send us a nice fat check, on the other hand…

Really, it’s the best advice I could ever give to parents in a lot of situations: at restaurants (like where I am writing this with my 5yo right now*); in church; at the mall; in movie theaters. The list goes on.

Let me stress that I don’t mean that it’s okay to take kids to places where children don’t belong. If the restaurant you are at doesn’t serve any entree for under $50 (and none of the options are “chicken fingers”) don’t be surprised when the waiter disappears for long streaks at a time. But if you are in the mall food court and you are getting crooked glances from the table next door because your newborn is hungry and noisy, then the very best option is to simply pretend the neighbors (and their glares) don’t exist.

Take a cue from the parents who let their kids misbehave everywhere. They don’t care about other people, because that’s the kind of moms and dads they are. These parents really don’t mind one bit that they are ruining the day of those around them. They are the ones who bring their children to age-inappropriate movies and restaurants, or spank their crying kids in line at the grocery store, usually making the situation worse. I have found that the best way to handle them is to just ignore them. Dirty looks, advice, or actually saying something to them will all have the same negative result.

I am not suggesting for you to be this type of parent, of course. You and I are the types of parents who want our kids to behave in public, and actually try to not bother the people around us. What I’ve found, however is that people will be ticked off at you regardless of how hard you are trying to get your children to behave. If lousy parents can ignore the people they are upsetting, then good parents who are attempting to discipline kids should have that exact same right.

The first time I realized this approach was on vacation at a restaurant. My kids were behaving rather well, and not being any louder than any grown-up, when I noticed a glare from another table. I was getting the evil eye from a man whose breakfast was obviously being ruined just because we were there.

What I did next changed my whole outlook. I smiled at the man. I gave him a nice big grin to let him know that I was aware of his l gaze and that we were having a great time. Did he really think his disapproval mattered to a family that hardly ever got out for a long time? How did he respond? He looked away. There was nothing else he could do, and we went on, enjoying our time out with our children.

Before that event, I really did care about other people. “Oh no, I’m ruining their time,” I would think to myself. But now I have a new way of thinking. I have every right to be out with my kids, and if people without kids disagree, then I don’t care. Last time I checked, kids are people, and they are just as entitled to be just about anywhere as you and I do.

I’m tired of hearing adults whine, cry, moan and complain that a child or two made a tiny bit of their day miserable. Wah. It’s worse than kids whining and complaining, because adults are supposed to act like grown-ups. Someone else has to take the kids home. Forgive me** for not caring that a childless person who doesn’t have to listen to kids cry on a daily basis had to put up with it for ten whole minutes.

That leads me back to the advice for the airplane-bound mom. It is difficult enough worrying about flying a long distance with a baby as it is. Do your best and take care of your family the best you can. You and your child have as much right to be on the plane as everyone else. So when someone two seats up feels the need to crane his head back to let you know that you shouldn’t have brought your kid on the plane because your ruining his flight, then do the best thing for everyone: take care of your little person the best you know how. And pretend that the person you’re pissing off simply doesn’t exist.

* Incidentally, there is a man sitting next to us on his laptop who is talking to himself and fidgeting like he’s on his sixth cup of coffee. Am I really supposed to care if we are bothering him?

** Or not

1.)Allow me to reiterate: it ain’t all pretty and you’ve been warned. One day, and you won’t see it coming, you’ll be given a choice that you must make on the spur of the moment.  Like when your sick child throws up and you will have to ask: do I get puke on the furniture, or do I get it on myself? It’s a decision John had to make, and as evidenced by the above artwork, he truly loves his kids.

2.) You will constantly be exhausted. Having kids is a little bit like a train that never stops. I know that you already know this, but you just have no idea how tiring it all is until you’ve lived it. Kids are constantly growing, changing and challenging you in new and different ways. Once you get past one phase, like diapers, you enter a new and more complex phase, like preschool and social issues.

3.) You get to become a poop expert. A poopologist, if you will. Sure, everyone knows that kids poop a lot, and all the time. And it’s stinky, and you are in charge of it all. Along the way, you will become acutely aware of the subtle nuanced differences between all the different styles of poop. Texture, smell, wipability, color: mix them together and the combinations are endless.

4.) Nonstop negotiations. Over candy. Kids don’t stop about candy. Ever. If I could go back and do it again, I would shield my kids from the stuff and pretend that it doesn’t exist. Ridiculous fantasies aside, they really never stop. If your kids are within a 50-foot radius from any type of sweet, they will be trying to get it. Since you, the parent, are smart, you easily put it out of their reach. But since a child will simply not accept being outsmarted, he will pull out the one trick he knows best: incessant, whiny begging. As long as there is candy in the universe, this will never end.

5.) Watching kids eat boogers, and other disgusting, questionable things. Maybe I’m onto something here… what do kids eat when they don’t have candy? Nose candy, of course! It doesn’t matter how many tissues you have around the house, or how many times you tell them no. Kids will still defiantly dig in right in front of you, then put it directly in the next nearest hole on their face. Seriously, though, don’t let your guard down on this one. Kids love to put disgusting, and sometimes dangerous, things in their mouths. Constant vigilance… and know how to give the Heimlich maneuver to a child.

6.) Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Kids don’t learn everything right away. As a matter of fact, they don’t really learn anything right away. If you want to teach her to read, for example, you’ll have to read every single day. Then, she’ll invariably pick the exact same books, over, and over and over again. Repetition. Same with tying shoes. Same with potty training. Same with… well, you get the picture. When you see a smart kid who is really good at something, just be assured that they have parents who are either bored a lot, or accustomed to being bored a lot. And repeat.

7.) You will tell lies to your children. Isn’t it wonderful the first time you hold your little brand new bundle of joy in your arms, look into his eyes, and tell him a nice, big fat lie? Of course that doesn’t happen, but it will. Think I’m wrong? Think Santa Clause. The Easter Bunny. Governmental bipartisanship. The list goes on, and on.

8.) You will become a medical expert. You will also be scared to death when you hold your first child. Scared that you will not know what to do in a medical emergency. Be assured, however, that one day, you will. Just remember that you will never regret taking your child straight to the pediatrician or calling 911 when an emergency arises, but you might regret it if you don’t. Eventually, after all the trips to the doctor, you will realize that you have become pretty darned good at diagnosing and treating non-emergency medical issues with your kids.

This is a good time to remind you that, while yes, you will never be able to know everything about raising children from books and the internet, all the resources that you have at your fingertips these days are a decent start. And yes, those are the same fingertips that you may use one day to keep your child’s throw-up from getting on your child.

Spring has sprung, and it’s time to get back out with the kids! Round ‘em up, hop in the car, and drive over to… the local bounce house? The mall play area? Someone else’s house? Really?

Have we lost the sense of adventure that drove our very own childhoods? Of course not! Unleash your inner Daniel Boone, and take your kids somewhere more outdoorsy for a change. The playground is a good start, but if you’re like me, you’ve probably seen way too many playgrounds by now. Playgrounds have politics, people, man-made thingies, and rules. Take it a step further and get out somewhere a little more wild.

It is wonderful that we can sit in our air-controlled living rooms nowadays and “travel” anywhere in the world on big giant panoramic televisions. But when did “larger than life” on the TV really become “larger than life?” The truth is that it hasn’t. I’m here to remind you of a few of the fantastic things that exist out there that you should have to show your kids.

Here’s a short list of some of the things that no child is too young to learn about*:

Trees, wildlife, flowers, beaches, sunrises, sunsets, bugs, animals, clouds, stars, planets, water, conservation, pollution, life, religion, people, history, the sun, the moon, time, space…

…and so much more

Where, then, can you take them? Obviously, age must be a factor when considering where to go. For starters, go outdoors. Chances are you live pretty close to a State or National Park. If you don’t, try venturing beyond your own backyard. A path through the woods can lead to tons of discoveries. Bring a camera, or don’t. The most important thing is that you engage your child and talk about about her surroundings.

This leads me to the most wonderful thing about the great outdoors: the adventure of it all. If you do it right, you’ll have no idea what you might see. The other day on a relatively short walk, my 5yo daughter and I discussed at least twelve** of the things from the list above. And most of the questions originated from her.

When did we reach a turning point where we have to challenge ourselves to go outside with our children? This should be the norm, and not sitting inside watching the Discovery Channel. And the best part? It’s still free to go outside.

* Think a newborn is too small to teach these things to? Think again. Talking to an infant about what she sees establishes a rapport. Through this parent-child connection, you can feel confident teaching her later in life, when she understands. Tell yourself that she is learning, because that’s exactly what she is doing.

** Plus something she likes to call “Bugamania.” Her own words.

Parenting always requires a certain degree of sarcasm. Take this saying that you probably hear more often than you realize from moms and dads: “or not.”

Some people have good listening skills, and some don’t. Kids generally don’t. This is where this gem of a saying comes in.

Say your son is walking by and you ask him to help with something. Here’s how the conversation goes:

Parent: “Son, can you come and clean up the mess you made in the living room?”

Son: *walks away, seemingly oblivious to the question.*

Parent: “Oooor not.”

You hear it at the mall, in classrooms, in churches. “Or not” is a parent’s way of saying “Yep, not listening to me again. Sigh.”

Another method is taking the child’s arm, stopping him and asking the question again. This can be effective, but comes with a higher chance of frustration, especially if the situation escalates to flat-out refusal. Then that frustration can turn into anger, or sadness, that the child is not the robot that he was supposed to be. I guess robot kids just aren’t feasible yet.

Oh well. Real kids are still better than robot kids anyway, even if they’re messier, cry more and you can’t shut them down whenever you want. And when they don’t act the way we want, at least we can fall back on “or not”-style parental sarcasm. It’s okay to just let it go once in a while.

Now all you need to do is pass this post on to ten friends…

…or not.

This parental equation became truth today, especially (and a bit ironically) since my kids are now pretty good at lying to me. We call it “telling stories.”

Here are a few gems from today, all of which made me chuckle:

“Mommy, Daddy, your wedding picture fell off the wall!”

“Daddy, there’s a nightmare in our room!”

“We pushed each other off the bed!”

“There’s red ants on the bed!”

“My sister hit me!”

“My chapter book has food in it!”

and the coup de grâce

“Daddy, I don’t want to go to ballet class any more.”

…that last one… it got me. Next year, I’ve got to up. My. Game.

_Phil

We push too many adult concepts on our kids at too early of an age. Promises are one of them, and the best part is that we have a pretty miserable track record of keeping them ourselves.

The other day, my wife and I promised our children that they could have ice cream when we got home from dinner. This wasn’t a bribe – we were just happy to be together and wanted to give them a special treat.* When we arrived home, however, it was already 9pm. If we held up our promise, our kids would be going to sleep at some questionable hour, if at all. So we had to go back on our promise. This is also known as “breaking your promise,” “reneging,” or “tearing your children’s hearts out,” depending on your point of view.

Stuff like this happens all the time. A toy is promised that can’t be found, someone gets sick and things don’t go as planned, and circumstances fall on our heads that we never could have possibly seen coming.**

This is only half of the equation, though. What has become more of a bad habit with us is trying to get our young kids to make promises with us.

• “If I give you this toy, do you promise you will not cry when we take you to school?”
• “If I give you a snack now, do you promise you’ll be good in church?”
• “If we let you finish your movie, do you promise you’ll go right to bed?”
• “If I let you keep playing with your LEGOs, do you promise you’ll do your homework?”
• “If we do the best we can as parents, do you promise you’ll get good grades in school, stay off drugs, not get pregnant, go to college, get a well-paying job, and always love Mom and Dad without question?”

Warning – Parental Admission of Failure Ahead:

Insisting that your children make and keep promises is one of those habits that spawns from out of nowhere, and then grows into a monster by the time you realize you are doing it. I never forced my kids to swear they would go to college, of course, but I have been guilty of having them make some of the other above promises. Some they kept, most they did not, and there are countless others that have gone either way.

The “parenting failure” of insisting that your kids make and keep promises occurs after the children break their promises. What do you tell them? Things like, “you made me a promise and you broke it” or “see, this is why I shouldn’t make you promise me anything.” It was the latter statement that made me realize that parents should, in fact, not expect their kids to uphold their promises all the time.

I’m not saying that we shouldn’t have our kids make promises. They can be a great character-building skill. Instead, they should be kept small and realizable. Most importantly, no one should ever expect a 5-year-old to hold up their end on a promise to the point where they are made to feel like they “failed” simply because they didn’t hold their end up.

I hereby vow to push less promises on my children.*** A few are okay here and there, just so they can better understand the concept. I want to give them the opportunity to walk up to me someday when they are older and propose their promises from their own heart. And when a promise gets broken, as they do sometimes, maybe we can go out and talk about it over some ice cream.

* Can be read as “wanted to look like awesome parents to them that day.”

** Like promising a trip to the park, and walking outside and realizing that it just started raining. D’oh.

*** I’m also going to start making sure that I can keep my own promises. I promise.