Author: suburbandaddy

How It’s Different The Third Time

Suburban Daddy became a daddy for the third time! (which is why you haven’t heard from me in a while). The birth of #3 is different than the first, and I’ve made some observations along the way.

Compared to #1 and its associated worries (see previous post), the birth of #3 is almost non-eventful. That isn’t to say that the birth of a child is not a big deal. But the whole process is rather matter-of-fact. With the first, you have no idea what life will be like once baby arrives. The birth is the big event that consumes everyone’s attention. You don’t give much thought to the days and months following. With #3, the birth process is a little inconvenience you must get through before getting on with your life, like sitting in traffic on the way to work. This time, as we were heading to the hospital at 11am, I remember thinking Hopefully the baby will be born by dinner so I don’t have to eat hospital food again, and I can get to bed at a decent hour. (He wasn’t born until 11:16pm and I ate dinner from a vending machine).

When we left the hospital with #1, we had the brand new car seat (which we couldn’t figure out how to use), brand new “going home” baby outfit, and we took dozens of pictures with the nurses as my wife was wheeled out in a wheel chair. This time, on the way up the elevator, I dumped crumbs and dirt out of the car seat which had been stuck in the seat since #2 used it over a year ago. There was no time for pictures because I was chasing my other kids through the hospital, and they kept barging into other new moms’ rooms on the maternity floor, first time parents who had no idea what was in store for them.

The first week home is much different too. As a first time parent, the first week home was torture. Learning how to diaper, feed, dress, and bathe a newborn. The seemingly non-stop crying (mostly the baby’s). This third time, the first week home was almost a vacation. I had a week off from work. The older kids were in preschool all day. We could go anywhere with a newborn and he just slept. Nice restaurants, peaceful meals. I played my best round of golf in five years, and bought a new car.

Of course, it hasn’t been all roses. I haven’t had more than two continuous hours of sleep in weeks. Chasing after two preschoolers on weekends is even tougher with a newborn in hand. And I won’t even go into what happens when a kid needs to go potty NOW but you are busy feeding a newborn. But, to all those first timers out there, struggling to get through those first weeks and months, take heart, it will get better the next time.

My Son The Exhibitionist

Social norms and vanity are not developed yet in preschoolers. They’ll happily eat ice cream and get chocolate all over their face. Or talk to you with a booger hanging out of their nose, without being self conscious.

Yesterday, my son, being very independent, announced he was going upstairs to put on his pajamas. Great, I thought. It was a little early for bed, but it’ll save time later, right? After ten minutes I went to see what was taking so long because I didn’t hear any noise (quiet is usually a sure sign of trouble). There he was, playing quietly and reading a book. Oh, and he was buck naked. Very matter of fact, he just didn’t feel like wearing clothes. It turns out it isn’t easy to explain to a preschooler why he needs to wear clothes. Hopefully, I won’t have to explain it to the strangers at the mall when he decides to strip down there.

Parenting Myths #1 – Terrible Twos

Everyone knows about the supposed terrible twos. The stage of child development characterized by frequent mood swings, temper tantrums, and liberal use of the word NO. I’d like to dispel the popular myth known as the terrible twos.

I’ll be the first to concede that two year olds often have mood swings, tantrums, and love to say NO. Just tonight, I counted 17 “no’s” and 3 jekyll and hyde mood swings.

What makes the terrible twos a myth, however, is that there is nothing special about two year olds. The terrible twos actually begin as soon as a toddler can get around on his own and do his own thing, somewhere between 15 and 18 months. As far as how long it lasts, I can only speak with authority as far as 3 and a half years, and I can report that the terrible twos are still alive and well at that age, too.

Things Nobody Tells You About Being A Dad

Most dads and dads-to-be are aware of the usual duties expected of them. Changing diapers, getting up in the middle of the night, being a human jungle gym. But there are many more realities that are impossible to predict or understand until you’ve been at it a while.

  • You are always the last one to eat. First you need to make sure the kids have their food. Then, you need to sit at the table with them to make sure they stay in their seats. Only after they have turned the table into a mess do you get to make your own dinner. And by then, you’ve finished off their cold hotdogs and mac & cheese so you aren’t hungry anymore.
  • If you want to eat adult food, you’d better 1) eat quickly and 2) hide. I eat Rice Krispies in the morning huddled over the sink so the kids can’t see what I’m doing. If I ate at the table, they would immediately stop eating their breakfast and demand to eat Rice Krispies “just like Daddy”. As cute as that sounds, it isn’t so cute when they only get a few in their mouth and the rest go on the floor to be stepped on and ground into the carpet.
  • Forget about watching sports while the kids are awake. It’s a well established fact that kids are not interested in something until you are. They will be very happy playing in the playroom, that is, until I turn on the TV to check the score. At that instant, they immediately stop playing with toys and want to watch Wiggles. I can’t wait until they get older and actually want to watch the game, at which point I will turn off the TV and say Time for homework!. Let’s see how that like that.

Potty Trained For Good This Time?

The potty training roller coaster finally reached the top of the track again. After a seeming low point last weekend, when my son pooped on the floor, just 4 feet from the toilet (I don’t know why I did it, Daddy), we have had 5 accident free days in a row! I credit a new incentive program where he got a star sticker every day, and once he had five stickers, he got a toy guitar. We talked up the guitar all week, and today was the big day. So far, so good. But, I don’t think he’s pooped in two days, and it’s awfully quite upstairs right now…

Getting a preschooler to finish their dinner

I have written about using bribes (uh, incentives) to get my kids to do what I want. Here’s a twist on conventional wisdom that I’m eager to try out. Usually, we use dessert as the incentive for eating their dinner. “Finish your vegetables and you can have a cookie”. This worked for a time, but now it seems, to a preschooler, that the work involved to finish all the vegetables isn’t worth the wait for a cookie.

So, throwing convention on its head, I’m ready to offer the dessert up front to get it out of the way. Then, as long as he’s hungry, he’ll eat the vegetables anyway. It’s just twisted enough to work, especially in the mind preschoolers, who are so honest and trusting.? After all, who else would admit to stealing their brother’s toy if I just ask?

Superhuman Parents

We’ve all heard the stories where parents perform amazing physical feats, bordering on the superhuman, when their child is in need. For instance, the mother who lifts a car to get her baby out. I had my own superhuman experience this weekend, and while maybe not as impressive as lifting a car, it was still extraordinary by Suburban Daddy standards.

Suburban Mommy and I took took the boys (a.k.a. Thing 1 and Thing 2) to the park to fly kites. We bought them months ago and were waiting for some warm weather to try them out. Thing 1, never having flown a kite before, instantly took to it and before long had his Spiderman kite at full height.

After a while, the inevitable happened. He lost hold of the string and the kite took off on its own. It began drifting away in the steady breeze, drifting over a baseball field. It was well into the outfield when I realized it was headed over the home run fence, which, if it reached, the kite would be lost forever. I had to catch that kite!!!

At that point, Suburban Daddy took on almost superhuman powers. Seeing that the gate to the baseball field was locked, I scaled the huge, four foot fence in a split second, and made an all out sprint for the dangling string, hovering just off the ground and headed over the home run wall. I knew I would get just one chance to make a diving grab at the string. I ran as fast as I could (running itself is a superhuman feat these days for me), but it wasn’t enough, and the kite went over the fence.

Luckily, the string got caught on the fence, so all I had to do was walk over and pull it off. All the superhuman climbing and running was unnecessary. In my son’s eyes, Daddy saved the day. In the eyes of any bystanders (hopefully there weren’t any), I was the idiot who climbed a fence and ran across a field to save a $1.99 toy.