Let me start off by stating that I HATE THE DENTIST! There I said it! If you’re a dentist reading this blog, I’m sorry, but we could never be friends (don’t stop reading the blog though, lol). Dentists perform hate crimes against humanity and I refuse to subject myself willingly to their torture. I took the stance that I would never subject my kids to the demented hands of a dentist either; luckily I have a level headed wife who vetoed my ruling. Yesterday was Tre’s first visit to the dentist and it appears that he’ll be following in his Daddy’s footsteps. He wasn’t too pleased, and surely let it be known during his visit.
Happy Halloween!!! Oh wait, I guess I’m a little late huh? Well, I’m just like “The Simpsons”, remember how they always aired their Halloween special on the Sunday after Halloween? Okay so here we go. First off, I’m writing this post from the hotel room in Clemson, S.C. so I’m away from my normal blogging locating and it feels a little weird. I’m out here on a business trip (which will probably end up being a blog post of its own) but I didn’t want to leave you guys without some delightful eye candy (get it? halloween, candy, eye candy, lol) to get you through your Monday!
Ever since Tre was born, people have been telling us that he needs to be a baby model; and as soon as they spend 5 mins around Ty, we hear “he was born to be on TV”. At first, I just figured people were being kind, you know those are the type of things you’re supposed to say about kids. After hearing it time and time again, I reconsidered the validity of what friends, family, and complete strangers were saying and thought, maybe so. I went on a personal crusade to find a legit, reputable, modeling agency to represent the boys and needless to say, I came up empty on more than one occasion. But yesterday, I thought we hit gold with the American Mall Model Search; sadly, in the end, it turned out to be just another rip off (in my opinion). But this time, it wasn’t just Fefe & I who wasted our time and energy and got our hopes up for nothing; the kids were involved and lead to believe that they could be “stars”, and that pisses me off. When I started this search about a year ago, I did tons of research that allowed me to determine that something just wasn’t quite right with the American Mall Model Search and I’m thankful that I was able to spot it out and not waste any money or additional time. At the end of this post I’ll share some of the top things I’ve learned about the “industry” with you future Mommy & Daddy managers out there to hopefully save you some time & trouble.
No, this post isn’t going to be about some newly discovered venereal disease that I contracted during a recent trip to Tijuana. I haven’t been to Tijuana in years, so that would be old news (I kid). Instead, this post is about turning even the smallest event into an educational opportunity that can be used to teach kids something new and exciting. These chances pop up every so often and if you’re not careful you can definitely miss them. So keep your creativity hats on at all times; because to the untrained eye, bodily fluids may not seem like the best tool to use for teaching a pre-schooler, but by putting a little spin on it, they can learn something new and have fun doing it.
Tre is 21 months old and surprises me every day with something new that he’s learned. The kid is like a sponge, just soaking up anything that comes his way and I couldn’t be happier. For the past month or so, he has been working on mastering his ABC’s and numbers (up to 10) and he has them down pact, recently he learned his colors and can pick out any color block or crayon that you ask him to and tell you what that color is. A few days ago when I came home, he read me a book. This was a shocker, because for once I didn’t have to read the same book 20 million times in a row. Instead he brought the book to me and said “readabook”, as I began reading he turned around, put his finger to his mouth and shhh’d me. I was baffled so I just shut up & to my surprise, he took over. Picking out a few words from each page and then saying the associated animal sound. I was impressed to say the least, but his most recent educational endeavor is just down right scary.
Are you wondering why my kid is in the middle of the woods with a large Tupperware container? It’s because he had just concluded his first geocaching excursion & was proudly basking in victorious glory. What is geocaching you may be asking? Well I’ll tell ya, it’s basically a treasure hunt using a gps device and it’s totally freaking awesome! Well, now that I’ve actually found something, it’s awesome. I’m kidding, that’s not true; it took me a while to pop my cherry, but even when we weren’t able to locate the “cache” (official word for treasure) we still had a good time just being in the great outdoors and spending family time together. I have to send a thank you to my buddy over at The Life of a Father of Five, the post that I’ve linked you to is the very reason that our family has now become involved in geocaching. I foresee our family participating in the sport for a long time to come, the kids love going treasure hunting and it’s also pretty good exercise. If you’d like to learn more check out the official geocaching site here.
Today our oldest boy turns 5 years old; well actually as far as he’s concerned, he’s been 5 for the past 3 days already. Ty was having a tad bit of difficulty grasping the concept that the day we were celebrating his birthday, wasn’t his actual birthday. After going through a few mental exercises to drive this point home to him, we finally conceded and decided that it’d be best to just let the kid think his birthday was on Saturday; the day of his party. It worked out pretty well, until yesterday that is, when he went to his “Kindereadiness” class.
How many of you enjoy watching cartoons? I’m not talking the “Family Guy” or “South Park” variety either. I’m talking full fledged kiddie cartoons. So come on, be honest, we’re all friends here; do you still enjoy them now that you’re in your older years? Well I sure do & I’m not afraid to admit it either. As a kid, I was a cartoon fanatic; and now that I have kids, the little fanatic inside of me can safely come out of hiding and rejoice in the fact that cartoons are back in my life on a regular basis. Only problem is, today’s cartoons suck!
As a Dad, I get the pleasure of witnessing the unique views of the world that children have. I’m constantly trying to understand the mechanics of their thought process and how certain conclusions are formulated. I honestly have to say that it’s one of the best parts of being a Daddy. Observing their often misconstrued, but always amusing world outlook, can bring a smile to my face any day. Last week was one of those times; I got to see first hand how this society works, from a kid’s perspective. Apparently, in the eyes of a 4 year old, bribery can be used as the key to success for all of your troubles.
Now, we’re not talking about the “just got pulled over, offer the cops a few dollars” type of bribery; instead, we’re talking about bribery at its sweetest and purest form. Although, now that I think about it, if Ty has mastered the art of bribery at this age, then maybe he’s going to grow up to be the greatest politician this country has ever seen, lol. As a matter of fact, I know that he will. Unlike most kids who try their hand at bribery, Ty didn’t stick to the small fries, he didn’t try to bribe Mommy & Daddy, nope he had his sights set high and took a stab at bribing my boss. Hey, if you’re gonna do something, you might as well go for gold right?
Yesterday was the release date of “The Beatles: Rock Band”, so naturally I was super siked to get home and play it. I’m not a huge fan of The Beatles, can’t say that I know more than a handful of their songs (I know, sad isn’t it?); but I am a huge fan of the game Rock Band. The Rock Band series has been in our lives for the past 2 years now, and I’m truly thankful for the fun and excitement that it has brought to our family. We first got acquainted with the series when Tre was only a few weeks old, and little did we know, it was actually going to be the thing that held us together during those tough tough times of early infancy.
