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First Draft Father: Give the Baby What He Wants
If there’s one thing that can cause a ton of stress in your life, it’s not having enough money. When times are tight, the prospect of not having enough cash can add a tremendous weight to every single...
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First Draft Father: I Will Not Whine
Ethan has developed a few new skills. The first is pretty endearing. The second, not so much. When he’s ready to be picked up from the floor, his high chair, jumper, crib, or swing, he has this way of...
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First Draft Father: Don’t Miss the Train
Every week there’s something new that Ethan can do. And some weeks he does things that I never saw coming. Take the train for instance… One of his Nanas gave him a cool train set that is made of wood...
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First Draft Father: Ethan’s New Toy
Our son Ethan has a new toy. It’s white and it goes VROOM VROOM. It easily holds a mirror where he can see himself. It has plenty of room for him. It even has latches for his seat. As much as Ethan...
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When All the Things Are Terrible
I used to think I was terrible with babies and all small children. I’d try to say “Hi!” to a baby and he’d look away or start to cry. I’d try to talk to a kid and she’d say, “Whut?” I took the lack of...
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First Draft Father: Daddy Hates the Dog Next Door
“Arf! Arf! Arf!” That’s what we hear next door these days through the paper-thin walls in our twin home. It wasn’t supposed to be like this, but another exception was made for a neighbor’s lease. Mind...
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A Father’s Plea to the NHL: Please Don’t Throw Pizza at My Child
Do I want Ethan to jump up and down like a maniac for a free Papa John’s pizza? That’s what I thought about during a commercial break at an NHL hockey game between the Columbus Blue Jackets and the...
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First Draft Father: Why We Resist Change
I have been learning lately that I am a hopeless creature of habit. I don’t just crave routines, I become sentimentally attached to them. This sentimentality is multiplied with a baby in the mix. Ethan...
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I Am a Distracted Parent
I set out with Ethan in his stroller for an afternoon nap on a frigid, blustery day last week. Headphones lined their way from my iPod to my ears that were encased in layers of fleece from my neck...
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Maybe I Don’t Need a Break from the Baby After All
Julie’s mom visited us at the end of last week and into this week for about five days. She saved us from eating Chipolte for every meal and losing our minds if Ethan’s nap didn’t last long enough. By...
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First Draft Father: A New Kind of Insanity
I heard the grinding, clicking sound come from the vicinity of Ethan. When I picked him up, there was no mistaking it. He was grinding his teeth and clicking them together—loudly. It was like finger...
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Household Projects Are Like Dipping Your Hand in Boiling Water
I should have known that starting a wood working project at 5:30 pm would end with me sticking my hand in boiling water. It was inevitable really. It all started with a terrible, terrible idea. The...
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First Draft Father: Life Speeds Up to a Crawl
It finally happened when I looked down at Ethan one day a few weeks ago. He hadn’t disappeared. He’d just moved. A little. His frustrated cries had given way to contentment when he finally seized the...
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The Heretical Meditating Father
I begin my day with a cup of Irish Breakfast tea and a bowl of yogurt, granola, and fruit. I stand in the kitchen because I wake up early and don’t want to slump over the table. I open my Kindle to the...
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Eating and Writing All of the Wrong Things
Yesterday I plucked a piece of hay out of Ethan’s mouth. Julie once removed three blades of grass. This morning he definitely swallowed a piece of cardboard after gagging on it for a few seconds. We...
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There Is No Category for Our Family
A few weeks ago Julie and I discussed our family, and we concluded that there really isn’t a tidy category for our set up at home. I’ve been calling myself a “stay at home dad,” but that label has...
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First Draft Father: You Can Do a Lot in 15 Minutes
We’re taking Ethan on his most epic trip yet this week. We’ve done 5, 8, and 13 hours in the car with him. As I’m writing this, he’s taking his first airplane ride, just a few days shy of 11 months...
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Did I Worry About the Wrong Things for Parenting?
We’re approaching Ethan’s first birthday, and I’ve caught myself revisiting some of the thoughts and experiences leading up to his birth. A huge part of my own preparation was a lot of worrying about...
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First Draft Father: Stupid Things People Say on Hikes
There’s a law of hiking with a child that I discovered during our recent trip to Colorado: If your child is sleeping in a backpack while you’re hiking, someone walking by and shout, “WHAT A CUTE BABY!...
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First Draft Father: The First Exhausting and Wonderful Year
We were staying up late the other night trying to remember as much as we could for Ethan’s “first year” baby book. When did he first smile? Who really knows that? Was it gas or genuine recognition?...
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