Author: Family Friendly Daddy Blog

Leave a comment Posted on Nostalgia, parenting

5 Quirky Valentine’s Day Movies To Watch With Your Spouse

February 10, 2012 at 10:39 pm , by 

14 months.

It’s time to put the kids to bed and watch a movie that doesn’t feature a wise-cracking rodent. That’s hard to imagine, actually…

I feel like every time I see a list on a blog that tells the top 5 romantic comedies, it always includes Pretty Woman and When Harry Met Sally. So today I have compiled a list of fun movies to watch with your Valentine; only there’s a good chance you haven’t seen all of these or really heard too much about them.

More importantly, none of these are mushy at all. So even for people who aren’t big fans of V-Day, you will still easily be able to stomach the story lines here.

Something these all have in common is that they’re romantic “dramedies,” fusing together both drama and comedy. They’re not “cute” nor “lighthearted.”

Call me weird, but these are my top 5 favorite Valentine’s Day movies:

1. Garden State. What happens when at 26, you stop taking a cocktail of anti-depressants prescribed by your psychiatrist/dad, which you’ve been taking since you were a child? Then you accidentally become friends with and develop a crush on a well-meaning pathological liar? Not to mention, the soundtrack alone is so good that Zach Braff won a Grammy for compiling it.

2. Elizabethtown. This movie was marketed as a typical romantic comedy, but it was far from it. When a (previously) successful young businessman travels from Oregon to Kentucky to bury his father, he meets a free-spirited flight attendant on the way to Nashville. In the meantime, he has to learn to say goodbye to a father he’s not sure he really actually knew.

3. 500 Days of Summer. In the very opening line of the movie, you learn that they break up in the end. And somehow, it makes things that much more interesting and intriguing. Most importantly, this (un)romantic comedy helps remind you how truly grateful you are to have found the one you actually belong with.

4. About A Boy. Okay, I realize that throwing this movie in with a list of romantic movies may be a bit of a stretch, but I still think it’s a great Valentine’s Day movie. It makes for a perfect “cuddle up on the couch and watch an unexpectedly hilarious and non-annoyingly British movie that was never popular in America” kind of date night.

5. Love Actually. This movie deconstructs the fairy tale version of love and translates it into modern day life stories featuring a network of characters. What takes place after the fluffy romantic comedy starring Katherine Heigl ends? What is love, actually?

What movies would you put on your Top 5 Valentine’s Day Movie List? Did you agree with any of mine?

Leave a comment Posted on parenting, People

Is It A Bad Idea To Drive Your Kid Around For Nap Time?

February 9, 2012 at 9:27 pm , by 

14 months.

Up until last weekend, I wasn’t okay with the idea of Jack becoming dependent on my driving him around in the car in order to get him to sleep.

Though I trained him to sleep through the night at 7 months, he has continued to put up a fight when it comes to daytime naps.

Given that I’m pretty sure I’ve developed a bit of Carpal Tunnel in my left hand from toting him around, I realize the need to give my wrist a rest whenever I can.

So I’m not one of those dads, like this guy I work with, Greg, who will spend hours at a time rocking his son to sleep and keeping him asleep.

Maybe I’m French or something, but I don’t want my son to become physically dependent on me for his naps.

So I figured if I have to choose between him being dependent on me doing something in order to sleep, I’d rather it be of me driving him around the neighborhood. It’s a win-win-win situation.

Jack fell asleep within 10 minutes of riding in his car seat as I listened to the jazz station on the radio. Then, once I heard him snoring, I pulled the car into a parking spot, turned off the engine and kept the radio on.

That’s when I pulled out the current book I was reading. It was Jon Acuff’s Quitter; which between the 4 naps on Saturday and Sunday, allowed me to basically finish the thing cover to cover.

Meanwhile, my wife was able to get some housework done and eventually got some chill-out time; which she spent watching House Hunters on her laptop.

So to answer the question I asked in the title of this… no. Not only is it notbad, it’s good. Really good.

Jack gets a nap. I get to read a book while listening to jazz. My wife gets time to catch up on things, including rest.

I always appreciate our time together as a family. But it’s also important that we all have time to do our own things separately. Win-win-win.

 

Leave a comment Posted on Nostalgia, parenting

5 Ways Super Mario Bros. Symbolizes Fatherhood

February 8, 2012 at 9:39 pm , by 

Leave a comment Posted on Health, parenting

5 Ways Your Family Can Avoid Processed Foods

February 8, 2012 at 6:26 am , by 

14 months.

I have to admit. Part of me is trying to figure out if I’m some kind of prophet or something…

On January 15th I published an article here about why I despise red food dye. Then a week later, on the 21st, I did one questioning where chicken nuggets come from, referencing that now infamous “pink slime” picture we all recognize and attribute to McDonald’s.

Turns out, last week on February 1st, Yahoo News published a very popular article entitled, “McDonald’s confirms that it’s no longer using ‘pink slime’ chemical in hamburgers.” The author, Eric Pfeiffer, covered the topic of the mystery of processed meat and even mentioned red food dye, just as I did in my articles.

What does this mean? It means we as Americans, and we as parents of children, are officially questioning where our food comes from. We care now. The Eighties are over, sadly.

But it’s not just about questioning where our meat and food dye comes from. It’s about where all of our food comes from. And the real reason we’re having to ask this question to begin with is because, according to the documentary Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead, over 60% of the average American’s diet consists of processed foods.

In other words, the majority of the food we eat has been… messed with. And it only makes sense that the more processed a food becomes, the less nutritional value it can have.

So while it’s important to ask what’s in our food, it’s even more crucial to find out how to avoid processed foods as much as possible.

Fortunately, this “food prophet” is willing to part the red sea of processed foods (receiving its color thanks to Red 40 and Crimson Lake) which maintains its perfect consistency thanks to sodium lauryl sulfate.

Today I bring to you the 5 commandments of avoiding processed foods:

1. Nix fast food. Fast food is nothing but processed food. From mysterious meats to white bread buns to soda to wash it down, fast food restaurants are the epitome of what processed food is.

2. Only eat foods with 7 ingredients or less. The higher the number of ingredients it takes to make a food, the better chance you’re going to see ingredients you can’t pronounce; meaning you have no idea what they are. Should we really be eating something with mysterious ingredients? The FDA doesn’t care, but I do.

3. Recognize high fructose corn syrup as the most obvious dead-giveaway. When genetically modified corn is turned into sweetener for ketchup, hot dogs, and the buns we put them on, we begin to question whether or not our meal really needs to be that sweet and so likely to give us Diabetes.

4. Avoid buying any food that comes with “microwave instructions.” I think subconsciously, we realize that cooking food alongside radiation is something we should avoid. So what does it say about a food that was designed to be prepared this way? Probably not something to make a habit of.

5. Prepare as much of each meal as possible yourself. The idea is to use the freshest ingredients possible. After all, the healthiest foods you can eat don’t even have a nutritional label on them at all; nor are they as convenient as the canned, microwavable version.

Image: An opened can of bite sized sausage, via Shutterstock.

 

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What We Can Learn (and Disregard) From French Parents

February 7, 2012 at 9:30 pm , by 

14 months.

There is a lot of buzz going on right now about a book called Bringing Up Bebe, by Pamela Druckerman, insinuating that the French are better than us Americans at being parents.

My question isn’t whether or not the French are better at raising kids, because not only is “better” a relative term, but it is also pretty generic.

So instead, I’m willing to learn, in what ways the French are perceived as better than we are at parenting. On the flip side, how are Americans better at it?

To educate myself on the subject, I read a blog post written by Paige Bradley Frost, an American woman raising her children in Paris. She shares:

“We therefore define ‘good parenting’ in vastly different ways. A ‘good mother’ in the U.S. (a virtually unattainable state of grace) is, by definition, a deeply involved and engaged mother. A sit-on-the-floor, clap your hands, dig in the sandbox, finger painting kind of gal.”

She goes on to explain that our self-sacrificing, American version of parenting is considered to be “absurd” by the French, who are more structured and less hands-on in raising their children.

From what I am gathering, it appears we as Americans would view the French as cold, militant parents whose children are well-behaved yet practically unloved. Meanwhile, the French view American parents as overly involved to the point our kids don’t respect our authority as they should.

This excerpt is taken from the book description for Bringing Up Bebe:

“…The French children Druckerman knows sleep through the night at two or three months old while those of her American friends take a year or more. French kids eat well-rounded meals that are more likely to include braised leeks than chicken nuggets. And while her American friends spend their visits resolving spats between their kids, her French friends sip coffee while the kids play.”

Based on my experience as an American dad who is extremely observant of what other parents say on Facebook and in parenting blog comments, I would say that most American parents truly desire a balance between the two stereotypes.

We don’t want to be “that parent” who lets their kid run around crazy inside a TJ Maxx, tossing out empty threats of discipline but never following through.

Nor do we want to be uninvolved and apathetic in our children’s personal interests, forcing them to take piano lessons and making all their decisions for them.

I don’t want to be a stereotypical parent, whether it’s French or American. But I do want the best of both worlds in parenting: structured and disciplined yet affectionate and open to my child’s individuality.

As a stereotypical young American who believes I can do anything I put my heart in, I believe I can live in this mythical middle ground.