Day 13: Rewarded Myself With A Movie

day13Good evening, I am sitting here in the dark with the hum of the laptop keeping the house from being totally silent. Yep, boys are in bed and it is time to reflect on another day of parental leave.

It has been over two weeks now and I am really getting into the routine. Thursday and Friday it is just Charlie, so it makes it easy to have a quiet and relaxed day. I mean, he does not say much (yet).

Today was pretty routine although the dog walk today involved a half trail with Charlie sitting in the stroller without the car seat. Sitting and looking forward. Yep, he loved it.

Once lunch was over, I did a few computer things and before I knew it, Charlie fell asleep on me. Wow, the fresh air did the trick. Not so fast mister. I had to wake him up for a bottle so he could have his long afternoon nap.

Once he was swinging away, I decided to do something I had not done in several weeks. I watched a movie. Forget chores or endless things I could do on the computer, I needed to just chill out. I presented it to myself as a reward for a busy two weeks.

Day 12: Think You Are Impatient? Find A 3-Year Old

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Good evening, pardon me if this post is brief as my brain is gassed. Today was not hard by any means, but Harrison ran my tank dry. Not that he did anything that bad, it was just his inability to be patient about anything that was very draining.

The ironic thing was, the cartoon we watched this morning called “Mike The Knight” was all about being patient. Guess Harry missed the moral of the story. Anyways, that was what we worked on today and it was trying at times.

The good news, Boys 2 Man (us) went to the mall and had a productive trip. Everything we set out to do, was taken care of. We also took over one of the couches for snack and bottle time. Again, like last time, I felt a lot of eyes on us like we were a zoo exhibit. Thankfully as we were nearing the end, we saw another dad with a stroller and kid. Nice to know I am not alone in this.

The Dollar Store is turning out to be a gold mine for kids. Today’s purchases were a spider-man car, plastic golf clubs and sidewalk chalk. All of which got used today.

Oh yah, there is a baby in all this. He was a piece of cake compared to Harry.

Day 11: Feeling A Calm Before An Impending Storm

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Good day fellow travelers, how goes the battles against monsters under the bed?

In wake of yesterday’s terrible news in Boston, there is really nothing to watch or listen to that is not about the fall out of the bombings. While tragic and deeply sad, I can’t take the 24-hour news machine. It makes it even worse that we get all the Boston stations. They are just saying the same thing over and over again, waiting for something to break so they can report it first.

Luckily I have a happy baby boy to take care of and play with.

Today has been another pretty easy day in the world of Charlie. It has been two weeks and I would have to say, I grabbed the routine my wife carved out and kept it going at full speed.

Charlie loves his structured day and you can tell when he gets off the rails a bit – because he gets LOUD.

Also on the play list of Charlie, is teeth coming in. We have seen at least a few and you can feel a few more. Ouchy.

But to be honest, he has been a trooper.

Top 5 Things Every New Dad Has To Know

Being a new dad can be stressful and confusing. No matter how many books you say you read or how many times to heard your wife tell you something, it does not become real until you see that little gooey head pop out.

Then, you wish you had prepared more, like making sure the DVR was properly tricked out with your show schedule.

I have been a new dad twice and yes the second time, is much easier but you still have a few things you need to remember from the things you needed to know the first time around.

I want to share some of those with all the guys out there who are about to become a new dad. Don’t roll you eyes or say to yourself, not in my house, because it is intel like this that will help you survive the many battles ahead.

This list only deals with the first month or so. I can’t even pretend to comment on what happens after the age of three.

Want to learn about that? There’s a dad for that.

So back to the list.

Top 5 Things Every New Dad Has To Know

Here are 5 things every new dad has to know, to not only be a good dad, but to not end up being road kill on the parenting superhighway.

Day 10: Dad Back On Track

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The toddler sampler. Fish sticks, crackers, cheese and apple slices.

Wow what a tiring weekend that was. If you read the post, you know exactly what I mean. But it was a lot of fun.

As I am writing this I am busy checking out the news out of Boston on the explosions today. Just heard from our friends down there and they are just fine. Scary stuff.

Back to the day. It was get away day for my parents as they headed back to Sarnia. So that meant packing up the boys, picking up my parents at their hotel and making another airport run. Harry was all for this as it is his new favourite place.

Everything went smooth and we hung around to look at planes.

Like A Dad Is On Instagram

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Instagram was nothing more than a running joke for me as I never got to use it living in a BlackBerry world. It seemed to be full of people taking photos of their dinner. But then I was up and running on my new Samsung Galaxy and I got hooked on the photo sharing service pretty quick.

So that means Like A Dad has a very active Instagram page full of filtered photos of the kids, cooking and whatever else this dad runs into over the course of a day.

Day 9: Adventures In Grandparenting

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Friday afternoon

Well this day is just half over and it has been a blast so far. It is a highly organized procedure to entertain two grandparents and two boys, while sticking to a somewhat normal routine. Add to that, our baby boy is starting to grow teeth. Yep, a little on the cranky side.

The day started off as normal. Breakfast naps and a little cartoon action for Harrison.

But from there is was a wild adventure filled with hotels, boats, bridges, sandwiches and expired parking meters. Nope, not Hangover 4, just a Friday with the grandparents.

After getting the boys all ready, we headed over to the hotel where my parents are staying.

Oh, one of the boy needs me. Will update when I can.

Day 8: Preparing For A Royal Visit

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My parents and Harry in Toronto, summer 2012.

Good afternoon, how is it going with you? Over here, I just finished with a decent house cleaning as we are preparing for a Royal Visit. My parents are flying in tonight and that means I won’t be online for a daily wrap. I will add more to this post as well as photos when I get the chance.

So far today, the theme has been sleep and a lot of it. I am referring to the baby of course. He slept all night and past 7am which was excellent.

Then he had a long morning snooze and by 1 pm he was ready for more. He must be growing or something. Anyways it has given me a lot of time to take care of a few things that have been piling up.

The sun came out early, so we did manage to get outside for a walk and it was great. I think that was the first time Charlie really got to bask in the warm sun. Yes he was squinting, but I don’t think he hated it.

You can see buds on the trees and the grass has turned green almost over night. Hard to believe there is a winter storm coming from Ontario.

And I don’t mean my parents (zing).