Author: Family Friendly Daddy Blog

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Fun Summer Activity: Playing With Wet Toilet Paper

July 11, 2013 at 9:55 pm , by 

2 years, 7 months.

Dear Jack,

Our family believes in being classy. Therefore, toilet paper is a toy.

Hey, it was your idea, not mine.

Last Sunday, the weather was a bit overcast and you wanted to play outside in the water, but didn’t really want to get wet.

So I just let you figure out for yourself what that even meant once you got outside.

It so happened that your nose started running once you got out there so I grabbed you some toilet paper real quick, leaving the extra sheets in my pocket.

As you dunked your plastic tiger souvenir from the Louisville Zoo into your Little Tikes water table, you saw the extra toilet paper hanging out of my front pocket:

“Daddy, I have that? Toilet paper… please?”

With me being in “whatever works” mode having survived the road trip from [Louisville] the day before, I didn’t hesitate to grant your wish.

I stepped away for a minute to pour a glass of water and returned to your explaining to me what was going on in your world:

“Look Daddy, the tiger has a mane!”

That confirmed that our Louisville Zoo trip was actually educational… sort of.

You then proceeded to use one of Mommy’s measuring cups to wash the tiger’s mane off.

I also learned from you that wet toilet paper serves as great “cement” for your toy trucks.

Admittedly, I was hoping yesterday’s thunderstorm would magically wash away the debris.

Turns out, wet toilet paper that has been dried by the sun does not necessarily turn mushy again by heavy rain… and then just “disappear” after that.

I guess I know what I’ll be doing this weekend.

 

Love,

Daddy

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All Kids Go Through An “I’m A Lizard” Phase, Right?

July 9, 2013 at 10:58 pm , by 

2 years, 7 months.

Dear Jack,

I imagine that throughout your childhood, you will encounter various phases, which I look forward to the privilege of witnessing.

This one you’re in now, though… well, it’s pretty weird. In fact, I figure I might as well document it now before it’s gone.

You love pretending to be a lizard; especially when you see people you know.

My friend Jason was flying in from Houston and we were texting about seeing each other over the weekend.

I texted him: “Jack will like it if you make a lizard face when you see him- that’s his new thing these days.”

He replied: “I’m going to need a sample pic so I know what to do.”

I answered him: “Basically just pretend you’re slowly licking peanut butter off your upper lip.”

You were impressed.

The thing is, I’m not sure where this lizard phase of yours is coming from.

I wanted to tag it on your best friend Sophie, but I could just as easily see you being the one to introduce “lizardry” to her.

Here’s a clip of you two pretending to be lizards in the wagon:

What’s really interesting is, for a few months now, you’ve owned a headless dragon t-shirt that you’ve never worn until this week. Once I saw you in it for the first time, it was almost prophetic.

After all, a little boy who is now greeting people with his lizard impression should definitely be wearing a t-shirt that makes it look like his head belongs to the body of a dragon… which is sort of like a lizard.

In fact, you like this shirt so much now, that after you wore it to school on Monday, then slept in it that night, you asked to wear it again both Tuesday and Wednesday.

So, yeah.

I’m assuming all kids go through an “I’m a lizard” phrase, right?

Probably not.

 

Love,

Daddy

 

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The Need For Discipline… Or Just Sleep?

July 9, 2013 at 9:14 pm , by 

2 years, 7 months.

Dear Jack,

It’s done. I just uploaded the pictures from our weekend Louisville trip onto my Facebook page.

(See the album “Louisville Zoo Road Trip Summer 2013.”)

I love looking through those pictures, seeing how happy our family was.

And the way you smiled in most of them, it’s as if to say, “Yeah, I know I’m a sneaky rascal!”

The thing is, the happiness captured in those pictures came with a steep price- the total of 6 hours drive time to make those good memories possible.

It was rough…

We chose to drive there after work Friday night, hoping you’d sleep in the car.

You didn’t.

Not to mention, we were in the middle of heavy rain the whole time.

I did laugh, however, when you woke up in confusion as we were carrying you upstairs to our hotel room at midnight,  and you simply reacted by asking, “Wwwwwwhhhhhhyyyyyyyyy?…”.

By that point, I was so ready for rest, I didn’t mind taking the fold-out couch and letting you sleep in the real bed with Mommy.

But whereas I was actually asleep when I hit the “couch,” you stayed up until 2 AM with fidgety legs keeping both yourself and Mommy awake in the next room.

Fortunately, the splendor of the Louisville Zoo kept you entertained and in good spirits the entire 6 hours we were there.

That changed the moment we got back in the car for the 3 hour ride home.

You were extremely needy, you kicked the backs of our seats, you kept dropping your toys then screaming for them, you whined, you cried… and no seating arrangements between the three of us seemed to help.

Nothing we did or said would break your will.

(I’ve noticed that when people talk about their own temper, they attribute it to whatever ethnicity they are most aware of… I feel like it often tends to be an Irish reference. I’m not Irish, so I guess this is where I’m supposed to blame it on my Italian or Mexican heritage…)

I couldn’t take it anymore, I remember reaching behind my seat and grabbing the pink elephant squirt toy that the hotel gave you and throwing it in the floor, shouting something to the effect of “I told you to be quiet! I’m tired of you not listening to me! And I’m tired of you telling me ‘no’ when I’m talking to you!”

Mommy immediately advised to me to take the next exit so she could switch to the driver’s seat.

For the rest of the trip back to Nashville, Mommy and I tried something new:

We stopped answering you, looking at you, or responding to you in any way. Plus, we rolled down the windows to help drown out your screaming.

It took a challenging 45 minutes, but you finally shut down and fell into the deep sleep you needed so badly.

You’re a good kid. Sure, you’re iron willed, but so am I.

I will always make sure you get the discipline you need, when you need it.

But as Mommy reminded me, in her subtle and gentle way, this wasn’t a case of you needing discipline as much as it was you needing sleep.

Once we got home, we were both cool again.

The next time you act like a maniac, the first thing I’m going to do is ask myself whether or not your nap time or bed time was compromised. That way I won’t turn into the Incredible Hulk, even if you do.

 

Love,

Daddy

 

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No More Monkeys Jumpin’ On The Bed!

July 7, 2013 at 9:56 pm , by 

2 years, 7 months.

Dear Jack,

You have now officially been to the Midwest!

While visiting the zoo in Louisville, Kentucky, our hotel was actually right across the Ohio River, in Jeffersonville, Indiana.

Of course, technically, Louisville is, in my opinion, half Southern and half Midwestern, as the confusing pronunciation of its name exemplifies.

It’s either the most northern Southern city or the most southern Northern city of America… I don’t think anyone really knows for sure.

Either way, I love the whole Louisville area (including the Indiana side) because it all reminds me so much of Nashville.

So I had mentioned a few days ago how Mommy and I had been hyping you up for the exciting fold-out couch you would be sleeping on in the hotel.

Your “big boy bed,” as I kept referring to it.

Yeah, well, guess who ended up sleeping in your big boy bed…

That’s right; the biggest boy in our family of three… Daddy.

All I remember is you laying down with me on the fold-out couch watching a horse race on TV, then waking up 7 hours later to find out you and Mommy got to sleep in the real bed without me.

I didn’t mind…

Hey, I got 7 hours of sound sleep; that’s a pretty big deal for me, especially after driving 3 hours at night in the rain with you refusing to fall asleep in the car.

As you can see from these pictures, which sort of remind me of a 1990′s mosh pit at a grunge concert, you had a good time jumping on the bed, like those monkeys we sing about sometimes.

Fortunately, despite all your contorting, you never fell off and bumped your head or injured yourself in anyway.

This was not only your first Midwestern road trip, but it was also your first hotel experience.I had hoped you’d like the fun fold-out couch, but I’ll settle for getting a full night’s rest out of it myself, as well as getting to watch you the next morning go crazy jumping around on the bed that I was supposed to get to sleep on.

 

Love,

Daddy

 

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The Health-Conscious Road Trip: An Oxymoron?

July 7, 2013 at 8:47 pm , by 

2 years, 7 months.

Dear Jack,

I can barely remember it, but for the first five months of our marriage, Mommy and I didn’t have any dietary restrictions.

Whenever we took a road trip, we didn’t have to consider where or what we could eat; just where and what we didn’t want to eat.

Then we went kosher in November 2008, and vegetarian in December 2011, then I went vegan in March 2013; as you and Mommy are pretty much there with me too by now.

With that being said, gone are the days of not having to carefully plan out in advance every single meal and snack over the course of a road trip.

As you know, this past weekend for our 5 year wedding anniversary, Mommy and I decided to take you along for a mini-road trip; a 2 and a half hour drive to Louisville, Kentucky.

Using hotel points we had earned last year, we made it an overnight trip and visited the magnificent Louisville Zoo.

Just as we had to plan out in advance which hotel we’d be staying in, making sure we could not only redeem our points there but also that it was closest to the zoo, we additionally had to find out its proximity to the nearest Whole Foods Market.

Basically, we packed half the food we would need, including plenty of water and snacks; then bought the other half of the food at Whole Foods the next morning.

We dined on veggie wraps, fruit snacks, and bottled water in the parking lot. It was like a picnic in our car; fortunately, it was the perfect weather for it… not too hot or wet.

Plus, I knew from previous visits to Loiusville that the city is laced with 14 different Heine Brothers’ Coffeeshops. Not only is their coffee perfect, which Mommy and I could definitely appreciate as a fun way to start the day, but they also have plenty of vegan options for snacks.

So was it difficult to make our road trip a health-conscious one? No, because we carefully planned for it.

But was the actual driving part of the road trip difficult because it threw off your sleep schedule? Absolutely!

(That’s a whole different story and I plan to tell it in the near future.)

Our mini-road trip served as necessary practice for the big one up ahead in a few weeks, when we will be taking our annual family vacation in Sacramento to see Mommy’s family.

It’s one thing to avoid eating at restaurants for 23 hours, but another thing when we’re staying at someone else’s house for over a week and trying not to become a burden because of our alternative lifestyle.

 

Love,

Daddy