He Caught the Bug

Being a parent of a healthy child is hard. Being the parent of a sick child is down right stressful. You just want them better NOW.

At least we made it through the holiday.

Our youngest has been running a fever of 100-102.5 for 2 days now. We've been piggy backing Tylenol and Advil to keep it down. Tylenol, we find, doesn't do much for fever. Advil on the other hand, brings it right now and helps him feel his usual spunky self. Unfortunately, he is miserable again before the recommended 6 hours is up between doses of Advil.

*Knock on wood* He hasn't been pukey. Though, he does like to keep his garbage can nearby. I did read one interesting tip when you have a sick child. She made the kid's bed with 2 sets of fitted sheets. However, she put a layer of plastic (garbage bags or something) between them. That way if the kid got sick in bed it was just a matter of taking off the top fitted sheet and the bags. Effectively eliminating the need to remake the bed in the middle of the night.

Cool baths work well, too. Of course, this is something I forgot about today. The added bonus is that he loves to play in the water.

I'm a bit selfish when it comes to our kids being sick. I love to snuggle them. Our youngest hollered to me in the kitchen from the living room, "Daddy, I need you"! I go in and he wants me to watch Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer with him. So I lay on the couch with me and pretty soon he's turned toward me, hugging my arm, holding my hand (just like we do at bedtime) and he falls asleep. He wakes just after I leave with a fever spiked at 102.5. We got his next dose of Tylenol into him and soon (but never soon enough) the fever starts to come down again. Here's to hoping for a good night's sleep and waking up feeling better!



Do you have any tricks for helping your sick kid feel better? Please feel free to share! I'd love to hear them.

My Alter Ego (Slightly Inflated)

For the past two Halloweens, I dressed as "Superdad". All night our seven and three year olds called me "Superdad" when they wanted my attention. My ego gained 10 pounds that night.

Things seem to be changing.
For the better.
I was provided the opportunity the past four months to be a stay home dad. I've loved every minute of it. Mind you, I equally miss being in the classroom teaching. Staying home as allowed me to play a part stereotypically given to women. I see this when I take our three year old to play group (and occasionally tumblebugs, when it wasn't cancelled). Moms. It was always moms at the playgroups. Except the past couple years another dad showed up at playgroup with his daughter. Then another dad brought his daughter to tumblebugs.

One day, there was only one mom at tumblebugs with THREE dads!

In just everyday life of getting groceries, running errands, the odd occasion eating out, I'm seeing more and more dads taking an active role. We're good for more than playing and disciplining. We cook, clean (in my case it's more like tidying), and herd the kids to bed. The teacher in me appreciates seeing other dads at parent/teacher night at school, too.

Anyway, what made me think of all this (besides seeing the other dad at playgroup) were the commercials on TV. I don't watch much TV, but when I do I notice the commercials are slightly different. Sure they're still advertising Tide and Cheerios. However, they're doing it slightly differently. The tide commercials now feature DADS! They're either with the mom or on their own, but they are showing doing or helping with the laundry. There's even one with two men (albeit, not dads) discussing the laundry. And there's Cheerios. 

My blog site is called "All in a Dad's Work" because it is how I dad.

How do you dad?
How does your dad dad?
How does your children's dad dad?

P.S. There would be no Superdad without a Supermom! XOXO

From Us to You

We're just two days away from Christmas morning. We have two very excited boys nearly bouncing off the walls. It's tough to not get carried away with them.

Woody and Elfis will make their final appearance of this Christmas season tomorrow. At bedtime on Christmas Eve the boys get to touch their elves. They hug them and kiss them good night and bid them farewell till next year. It makes me a bit sad to see them go, too. The boys love to see what antics the elves get up to. They squeal with laughter that is so fun to hear. Partly because it's so fun to hear their excitement and partly because it makes me sad to see them sad. Today, the two elves were zip lining across the kitchen and when we weren't looking, would move to a new spot or pose on the line. The boys were constantly checking and giving us update on their movement. I guess it could be equated to NORAD.

 
 Anyway, I hope you wake to freshly fallen snow. Put on the Christmas music. Gather your family round the tree with its ornaments dangling and its lights twinkling. Sip your hot chocolate/tea/coffee and bask in the excitement that opening gifts brings. Forget the mess. Forget your worries and your troubles and enjoy this magical day. Here's to you and your loved ones, from all of us. Merry Christmas and I hope the New Year brings, peace, love, joy, good health and lots of wealth!


P.S. For all you folks with kids, I pray your day won't start too too early!

Dad Hacks for Making Life With Kids a Little Easier

I saw this video the other day of the dad who has to do his daughter's hair. He came up with a very creative way to get'er done and done quickly (and still look nice and neat). He slipped a hair elastic on the end of a vacuum cleaner hose, sucked up the daughter's hair and slipped the elastic off the hose and onto her hair. Presto! Perfect ponytail in seconds.

I saw this other video of a dad who put his daughter's hair up in a bun. However, he did it while she was spinning. He simply gathered up all her hair and told her spin while he held her hair, then clipped it to keep it up. Brilliant!

Then I got to thinking.
Hey, I've got my own little hacks that help me survive a day with kids. I have two sons and they both have 1/4 inch hair. No worries there. But I've got other ways.

First: Because life with boys is noise with dirt, keeping clean is tough. It's similar to a running blender with no top. Two boys in the bathroom is no different. The toilet bowl is what, a foot wide? The kids are what, 6 inches from it? How the HELL do they miss? I swear they are in there dancing with their wee willies going off like super soakers. So what did I do? I put a target on the bottom of the bowl for them to aim at. At first, it was a Spiderman band-aid because it was closest sticky thing I could find. It didn't stick for long. Then I put a real sticker in there thinking that it was good and sticky. It lasted a day (damn Ninja Turtle just couldn't hang on). Then I found out that my idea wasn't original. Just Google "toilet targets". 

 Second: Here's my next secret:

It is to me what Batman's grappling hook is to him. It's my go to tool for nearly everything. Need cut pizza into bite size pieces? Perfect. Need to cut toast into triangles? Perfect. Need to cut a pancake? Perfect. Since it works by applying pressure, the edges usually aren't ridiculously sharp like on most knives so I'm not so worried about the kids hurting themselves if I leave it out. But the speed at which I get the cutting done with this bad boy resembles that of a Lamborghini! If you have any other uses for this, please let me know!

 
Third: I like to let my boys be as independent as they want to be, provided they clean up their mess afterward (though, who am I kidding, I do most of the cleaning up, not them). So a while back, we were playing bowling and my only job was to be the pin setter. Let me tell ya, it's not the greatest gig in the world. They knock 'em down, I set 'em up. Repeat a hundred more times. It gets old quick. Then I figured out that I could put tape on the floor where the pins should go and they can stand up their damn pins! Geez. Why did it take me so long to figure this out? Bonus: Sometimes they'll set them up for me to knock down! Do you have any hacks that allow kids to play independently? 

Fourth: This one is perhaps my favorite because it's so damn cute and so damn helpful.
Short back-story: In the past couple weeks our three year old has learned to LOVE pushing the shopping cart. He wants to be the driver and he wants to drive'r by himself. But shopping carts are so big he can barely see where he's going.

Unfortunately, I can't take credit for this one, as much as I would like to. Wifey, this one's yours. He has a shopping cart that came with his toy kitchen one Christmas. He loves loading it up and pushing it all over the house. One day recently, he went into the pantry cupboard and loaded his cart with all the canned food (he said it costs three dollars). That's when the idea landed and twice we've gone shopping and twice he's pushed his little cart. He gets so excited that he'll take his cart out and put it in the car while we're still getting ready to leave! It's enough to make me look forward to grocery shopping! Do you have any grocery store hacks to make the shopping a bit easier?

Where There's Family, There is Food

 My friend Tracey over at NoPageLeftBlank wrote about her Christmas Eve and Christmas day meals. Now I'm hungry. Well, not so much hungry as I am craving. My mouth is watering anticipating all the food I will consume during those two festive days. And since my running has been slack, I'm going to have up my New Year's resolutions.

Where there's family, there's food. And plenty of it.

I'm fortunate in the fact that the majority of the food I'll eat won't be prepared by me (or my dear Wifey, for that matter). We'll be spending Christmas Eve at Wifey's dad and step-mom's (aka Guppie and Nanny). I heard there will be pizza fingers. Pizza toppings in egg rolls and deep fried. I could eat my weight in them! Naturally, there will be the usual turkey supper. All the fixings will be included - stuffing, mashed potatoes, veggies and gravy over all of it. There's always dessert from the Cottage Bakery... peanut butter cookies, triple chocolate brownies, etc... I'll be sure wear pants with an elastic waistband. Don't want to be popping any buttons.

After supper we'll exchange gifts. The kids, already giddy with excitement they're ready to explode, become even more so when they find out they get open a few presents BEFORE Christmas morning. I get as excited as they do. I just don't bounce around the house like they do.

Anyway, back to food. Did I mention the pizza fingers? I did. Okay.

Then comes Christmas morning. We skip breakfast. Sort of. I make "Grands" cinnamon rolls first thing in the morning when the kids wake up (usually around 6 or 6:30). We snack on those until all the gifts are opened. Then comes the pancakes and bacon. Wifey makes the best bacon. The only problem is she won't let us touch it until she's cooked ALL of it. It boggles my mind how she can stockpile cooked bacon.

Later in the day we head over  to her mom's and step-dad's (aka Nanny and Pop) for another turkey supper. Again, fixings included- more stuffing, mashed potatoes, veggies and gravy over all of it. Dessert will probably be apple pie and ice cream. By this time I've become so fat and lazy I move like Jabba the Hutt.

If only my parents weren't 1,100 miles away (in Maryland) we could fit in a third Christmas supper! Back in the day, our family always gathered at "The Farm" (my grandparent's) for, you guessed it, turkey supper. Enough to feed 12-15 people with tons of leftovers! That always brings back memories of green bean casserole. I think I'll have to make it this year.

Eat. Drink. Be merry. Never a problem around here!

A Blank Page

 One day a little boy watched an artist sit and stare at massive stone.
The next week the little boy came back to see the block but saw a stone lion in its place.
He asked the artist, "How did you know that was in there"?

Woody and Elfis

 As I said earlier, our Elf gets his own post.

Three years ago an elf came to our house to watch over Rhylan and Cooper and report their behavior and attitudes to Santa.

 Well, this year I need say our ELVES. Yes, our faithful shelf elf Woody brought along a friend to help keep watch. His first night here, we didn't settle on a name. He was called Chuckles, Elfie, Elvis, and Elfis. His second day brought instruction to name him and he became Elfis. Now every time I see him all I can think of is "Blue Christmas".

 Now every time I wake up in the morning I get that panicked "Oh shit, did I move the elves"? Though, after 3 years it's becoming more of a habit to move them. Like Pavlov's dogs (and a good hubby) I've been trained (mostly).

Sometimes, they bring stuff back from Santa. Like letters. Or Christmas tree ornaments. Or a nice and naughty list (which only the elves have control over). Or, like a few mornings ago, pajamas to wear for their yearly Christmas picture (that'll be tomorrow's post). Things they were going to get anyway, merely made magical since they were delivered by their elf.

Of course, our elves are creative and enjoy a good Christmas prank now and then (this lands them on their own naughty list). It's fun to see Elf on the Shelf spoofs and all the fun others have with their elves. 

Some people think it's creepy. We think its entertaining to see our kids excitement and enjoy the "magic" of the elves because there will come a day when there is no more magic. Awe, who am I kidding... they'll believe in the magic forever because they know the consequences for not believing (like me)!