pumpkin

4 Comments Posted on funny, parenting, Uncategorized

Dear Jack: Part Of My Job Is To Scare You

3 years, 10 months.

2015 Buick LaCrosse Asheville,NC

Dear Jack,

I think I’ve said before, but as your Daddy, Halloween is one my favorite times of the year. Getting to see you dress up and have fun “seeing monsters” is really cool for me to get to experience with you.

Part of my job and my role as your Daddy is to reinforce the fact that I’m here to protect you. So even when I lead you to a situation where you are afraid, you know that I’m right there to keep you safe.

Granted, I would never scare you to the point of you authentically crying and having nightmares. Instead, I carefully gage your response to the situation…

This past weekend on our fall road trip from Nashville to Asheville, as we reviewed the 4G capabilities of the 2015 Buick LaCrosse, we visited avery foggy (!) apple orchard near Asheville, NC.

I carried you most of the time, and as we walked through the misty orchard, I kept pretending to be the voice of an “apple monster” who was angry that you were there to “take my apples.”

With your hood up on your hoodie, I whispered into your ear, “Jaaaaaaaack… don’t take my apples… go back to the hotel, Jack. I’m the Apple Monster.”

Looking back on this short video of the event, I can see your childlike faith causing you to wonder if you truly were hearing an Apple Monster.

The paradox is that at the same time, you knew it was just me; especially for the fact I was holding you.

Another illustration of this is the fact you kept asking to play “Hide and Seek” in the hotel room.

father and son Asheville, NC

You would stand on the air conditioning unit while looking out the window as you counted; meanwhile, I would hide on the other end of the suite.

I love your adventurous spirit, as you can see in this video, how you so joyfully run to go find me, knowing I’m just going to literally jump out and scare you! (I was standing on top of the couch.)

Yes, I scare you. But I know you love it. You indeed crave that from me. So I give you these “bravery lessons” accordingly.

Love,

Daddy

P.S. “Turn the page” by clicking on Our Visit To The Ghost And Skeleton Museum to read the sequel to this story…

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Leave a comment Posted on Nostalgia, parenting

The Obligatory Facebook Picture Of Your Kid With A Pumpkin

October 11, 2012 at 12:05 am , by 

22 months.

Explaining to your toddler why you’ve taken him to go pick out a pumpkin is like trying to rationalize why the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz dissolves when you throw a bucket of water on her.

(After all, what about humidity in the air? What does she drink? It bothers me that no one questions this!)

In other words, if you could rationalize it, then it would just be boring.

This past weekend we took our son Jack to Lucky Ladd Farms, a glorified pumpkin patch about a 30 minute drive from Nashville, along with my parents, Sophie’s family and Henry’s family.

I loved observing Jack and his pals as they pondered why we, the parents, were leading them to a bunch of weird orange balls with handles, encouraging them to pick their favorite to take home.

Jack picked one out, swinging it by its convenient handle, and there it flew, straight into a tree.

In that moment, the 1990s grunge band The Smashing Pumpkins suddenly seemed to have less of a random name than ever before.

Fortunately, the pumpkin stayed intact and I was able to take several taken pictures of my son with it for my obligatory facebook picture.

I’m assuming I don’t need to explain the inevitable autumn trend, as parents will be uploading a picture of their kid standing in a pumpkin patch or holding a pumpkin.

It’s kind of like a status symbol as a parent.

And unless we end up actually carving the pumpkin, or at least painting it, which I have a feeling we won’t, the pumpkin will end up eventually slowly rotting on Jack’s bathroom counter.

Have you posted your obligatory Facebook picture of your kid with a pumpkin? If not, you better give in to the pressure and head on over to a pumpkin patch this weekend!

If you would like to see more pictures of Jack and his friends at the pumpkin patch, I cordially invite you to visit The Dadabase’s Facebook page.

While there, you can check out the picture folder named Lucky Ladd Farms Pumpkin Patch, where you can catch a sneak peak of potential Dadabasematerial I am sure to write about in the near future.

 

Leave a comment Posted on Nostalgia, parenting

Do the Halloween Hustle (Free Pumpkin Carving App!)

October 26, 2011 at 12:03 am , by 

Eleven months.

As if Halloween wasn’t already a cool enough “holiday,” with all the free candy and the part about getting to dress up as whatever you want and get away with it, there is yet another really good reason to love Halloween:

You don’t have to feel guilty for not celebrating it for the “right reasons!”

It’s not like with Christmas, where people preach to each other about the cliche of “getting so caught up in the hustle and bustle of Christmas that you forget the real meaning of it all.”

And while I would love to enjoy my Peeps with a clear mind, I admit how easy it is to get distracted by the delicious pastel commercialism of Easter; instead of being reminded of how and why Jesus Christ was raised from the dead for the sake of mankind.

Heck, I can’t even have a guilt-free conscious on Columbus Day, because it’s basically just celebrating when a Spanish-sponsored Italian explorer “discovered” a continent of natives who would ultimately be conquered by Europeans for their land. I guess that’s how the history of the world goes- dividing and defeating; not that I’m okay with that.

But with Halloween, all you have to really do is just have a good time. It gives parents a reason to have just as much fun as their kids.

Now, I guess technically, Halloween is based on a pagan holiday where people celebrate their dead ancestors coming back to life or something like that. I don’t really care.

Because Halloween has become so commercialized in modern day America that all it’s about is pretending to be someone you’re not and getting free candy for it. I won’t argue with that.

To help celebrate the upcoming sugar rush, I personally invite you to download Parents magazine’s free Carve-a-Pumpkin app:

Carve-a-Pumpkin from Parents® magazine is the easiest — and safest (no knives involved!) — way to make jack-o-lanterns with your family this Halloween.

Choose from five different pumpkin styles, then either “carve” a design of your own, or pick from our library of wacky eyes, noses, and mouths.

Add a message and you’re ready to share your creation with all your friends! This easy-to-navigate, take-anywhere tool is perfect for families on the go. Products from Parents magazine help moms and dads celebrate the joys of parenthood and raise kids in a healthy, safe, and loving environment.

Leave a comment Posted on Health, Uncategorized

Marketing Ads that Try to Convince You They are Selling Healthier Foods, Like Natural Cut Fries with Sea Salt

I am thoroughly amused by advertisements designed for morons. The “healthy” snack franchise Smoothie King wins a special prize in my book. Every morning as I’m driving to work I have to look at their lame sign with a weekly message for passers-by. Every year during the first week of May their marquee reads, “Slim down for summer with a healthy smoothie for dinner”.

Yes, because drinking a smoothie with more sugar than two sodas is going to help the situation. Like having a syrup-based smoothie instead of balanced dinner is going to magically melt the pounds away. Simply hilarious.

But this week’s sign literally made me laugh at loud in the car, looking like a crazy man when seen by the cars next to me at the red light: “Flu season? Not this year! -Immunity Boost”.

Are you Efron kiddin’ me? While Smoothie King’s Echinacea-based “immunity boost” in their smoothies has to do some good, it’s asinine to trust that this $2 shot of an herbal supplement in itself will prevent the flu. So lame.

I’m of the old school of belief that says to let nature just run its course. The more I am exposed to what’s out there, the more immunity my body builds.

While I do catch something more serious every five years like strep throat, in which I have no choice but to visit a doctor and get a prescription to fight it off, I’ve learned in my 28 ½ years that pretty much every week of October 14th, March 28th, and sometimes January 15th, I suffer from major allergic reactions. To the air, I guess. And usually when that happens, it turns into a mild form of sinusitis.

I have encountered this so many times that it’s just a part of life to me now. Being that I get around five sick days a year from my employer, I use them for the days of the year I have the most severe symptoms: migraines, toothaches, oversensitive skin, body aches, depression, lack of appetite, inability to focus, foggy short-term memory.

Since I have dealt with allergy and sinus issues most of my life, I know that what many people call being “sick”, I simply call a “bad allergy and sinus week”. Unless I have a lasting fever or am unable to swallow food and keep it down, I am not sick. And I’m definitely not wasting my time and money to go pay a doctor to give me a prescription to weaken my own body’s ability to fight off what I can become stronger by suffering through.

If I’m gonna be “sick”, I might as well enjoy three straight days of Netflix online streaming without the interruption of a doctor visit.