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Love is Patient, love kind.

Ever been to a wedding a hear that bible verse before? Better yet, have you been to a wedding and not heard it before? I was thinking this morning about that verse and how relevant it is for marriage, but maybe even more so for parenting.

Last night I was trying to launch a new website for work when my wife screamed downstairs, so off I went. As I reach the bathroom I hear “but we don’t use that much toilet paper to wipe our butts!” That is never a good sign.

I grabbed the plunger and off I went to try and loosen up the toilet. Honestly, it was not as bad as I had feared. It took maybe a minute? But what it showed me was a difference in how I handle things and how I was raised.

Growing up, I would have gotten in trouble for stopping up the toilet. Maybe grounded? I stopped for a minute, found Baby B and hugged him and told him that he did a good job of wiping his butt and then we went to the bathroom and I showed him how to get toilet paper off the role and not use as much as he did.

Love is patient, love is kind.

Could it have been bad, sure! But I have had to fix that once before for Baby A, so it isn’t the end of the world. Could I have gotten upset, sure but why? He was trying and didn’t do something intentional. So why react like he did? Instead, I used this as a time to show that I was proud of him and that he did a good job.

Parenting is hard and sometimes, we do have to get upset with our kids. Sometimes, it is hard to be patient, but they are learning and they are trying, so why shouldn’t we show a gentle and loving side to them?  If we teach our children to show love toward others, to be patient toward others and most importantly, be kind toward others, we will have done a great job as parents.

Love is patient, love is kind.

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It is funny how the weekend has changed and is constantly changing for me as I grow older and after becoming a Dad. Single me would look forward to the weekend because of going out, drinking and partying. Dad me, looks forward to the time with my boys.

My time with my sons is the most important thing in the world to me. We laugh, play and have a lot of fun and I do try to mix a little bit of education into the weekend as well. Having a mother that taught school for over 45 years, a few of those things/ideas have rubbed off on me. Our weekends have become a time to bond and for me to teach them about cooking and grilling and I have loved it. When I was there age and to be honest, I really don’t remember my father teaching me how to cook let alone how to use a grill. So for me, it is really important to be able to spend that time with them.

The boys and I start on Wednesday talking about what we are doing for the weekend and I try to prepare them for things like, a basketball game that I want to watch or planning our meal plans for the week. My time with my boys are what I live for and mean the world for me. So as I get ready to leave the office today, I can’t wait to get home to see my boys, wrap my arms around them and get ready for the weekend and the downtime.

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It was bound to happen and yesterday morning around 3:00 a.m., I realized that I had had been living on borrowed time. Around 3:05 a.m. sitting in the reclined holding my son, because he had been coughing and was having a hard time sleeping, but it was then I realized that I couldn’t swallow and that I was 99% sure that I had STREP!

So, off to the Urgent Care Center I went yesterday morning, hardly able to talk, hardly able to swallow, no energy and beyond exhausted. I talked with the Dr, she looked in my throat and said “you’ve been living on borrowed time” and only echoed that same statement when she found out that I had not had strep in 30 years.

It is really hard being sick, it is hard being sick as an adult and I think that it is even harder being sick when you are a parent. Because, a parent still has to get things done and ensure that their children are taken care of and fed and bathed. Those things still have to be done.  Even though we might, as parents are living on borrowed time fighting off sickness and illness and finally get hit, we still have to get things done.

So today at work, I have little to no energy. My throat is still really swollen and it hurts to swallow. But, my kids are better and they went to school today and were happy to see their friends this morning and that is all that really matters.  And even though I ran out of time and finally got sick, it was still good to see how my kids have done the last few days and seeing them help out more around the house and have shown me a lot of compassion.

I am really proud of those little boys.

 

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Well, it appears that the boys have had a relapse with their strep. Yesterday, one of the boys was at the Dr and the other went to daycare, but came home not feeling well.

A friend of mine asked how hard it was on me as a parent to see my kids not feeling well and I really couldn’t put it into words. I know how I am when I don’t feel well and it is hard, but seeing your kids not feel well and not being able to really do anything, is just the worse feeling in the world. As a parent, it is our job to protect our kids and provide them with a safe and loving environment, but the reality is, they will get sick and they will get hurt.

A relapse to a sickness isn’t that uncommon, in fact, it happens more than we want to realize. But the reality of it is that our society is willing to take medicine because it is a quick fix, when in reality, there is a good chance that we are causing more harm than good to our bodies long term. And I am the worlds worse.  Since I was 5, I’ve had tubes in my ears, well as of January of 2016, 10 or 11 times in each ear. And when I get a sinus infection and I can usually tell pretty quickly, I’m at a urgent care center getting the three medications that I need. Should I wait? Maybe? But I don’t have time to wait!

Being a parent is a full time job, 24/7 365 days a year. But the reality is that parents, like kids, don’t have time to get sick and a relapse only slows things down that much more. But right now, in this moment, that even though it looks like a minor relapse for the boys, they are in relative terms, healthy. They aren’t in a Children’s Hospital. They are here with me. They are safe. They are getting better. They are my life and I will do everything that I can to protect and keep them safe and tonight and tonight, if they wake up, again at 3:00 a.m., I’ll take them downstairs and rock them and keep them comforted. Because, that is what a parent does when their child is sick.

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Sometimes it is good to step outside of your comfort zone. Life can get too boring if you don’t.

Tonight, I’m going to do something that I’ve never done before, I’m volunteering at a Shelter, to help those that have no where to go tonight and mind you, today’s high was in the teens, so tonight will probably be in the single digits. And why a cold weather shelter, I don’t know, why not? Our church has two nights a week that they go, check people in, get them situated, etc. and I thought why not?

My life has been very boring lately and more importantly, predictable. I needed something. I needed something that would shake my day/life up a little and to help me step outside of my personal comfort zone and do something completely different.

My hope tonight, is that I can be there to help someone else. I hope tonight, I can provide a kind word, give someone a warm meal or drink, give them a blanket or just sit and listen. My hope tonight, is that someone appreciates what I am doing. My hope tonight, is that they see how much I need this, as much as they need me there. My hope tonight, is that this is the first step of living outside of my comfort zone.

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Sometimes I like to drift off into a deep thought and just forget about life for a little while and as we wrapped up the end of the year, I spent a lot of time in quietness. I needed some time to reflect on life, step away and gain focus.

We’ve gone through many changes in the past year, some good, some not as good as we had hoped.

  1. We for the most part as a family remained healthy, minus the typical colds, etc.
  2. We did have our first ER trip though for Boy B & Boy A did have to get stitches, but considering that they are over 4 and these were our first visits, that isn’t too bad.
  3. My wife and I both continued towards our goals of losing more weight. I believe that we are both around 20 – 25 pounds from our Phase I goals.
  4. Financially was 1 step forward and 3 back. We got hit with a lot of unexpected bills this year for cars. So, that has been a constant struggle these last few months, BUT we increased our giving to charity by close to $2,000.
  5. We found and have gotten involved in a new church and have really felt that this was a much needed change for us.

I’m sure that I’ve missed a lot, but those were just a few of the things that coming to mind last week as I was reflecting on the year. But it was also during this time of being in deep thought, that I realized how big of a difference the boys have made this past year. We had to change their daycare and put them in a daycare center, as opposed to the in home daycare that they were use to and they did great. We’ve asked them to trust us more and let them do more, i.e. they are always outside with me at the grill and they are both learning how to cook.

And it is through this time that I’ve also realized that my boys are growing up more and more and that I’ve got to change and adapt more. I have to be ok and allow them to try new things and take some leaps of faith. These little guys just never seem to stop amazing me and learning new things.

To say that I’m a proud father, might be an underestimate of the day. To say that I am sad that they are growing up really fast, is also an underestimate of the day as well. So as I reflect and sit in silence and enjoying my time in deep thought, I hope that all of those that are reading this, have a safe and happy 2016.

And one day, when my sons learn about this blog, I hope that they understand how much I love them and how proud of them that I am. And I hope that they read these words and gain an insight into my life with them and pick up a few little things along the way about being a father of twins.

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Traditions are made to be broken, started, altered and passed down. And this Christmas was definitely hit on all of those this year. And all of my best plans for Christmas Eve, failed quickly, but taught me a really valuable life lesson.

Growing up, Christmas Eve was my favorite day of the year. It represented a time of anticipation and innocence. Normally, I give my staff at work the day off and I man the office, but this year, I took the day off and planned on grabbing wings and a cold beverage, grabbing a few last minute things for my wife’s stocking and as a family, going to church and then getting baking cookies and putting out luminaries and watching It’s A Wonderful Life. Each of these things, minus going for wings and beer, were things that I did as a kid growing up and something that have and still mean the most to me about Christmas. But this year, things didn’t really work out like I had expected or even thought that it would.

On Christmas Eve eve, my wife was at work and called to say that she was going to the local urgent care and that she was pretty sure that she had strep throat. Great! Two years in a row of her being sick, last year was pink eye. BUT, that wasn’t the real concern, the real concern was the boys and it was quickly appearing that they too were sick with strep and that this was becoming a tradition of them being sick at Christmas.

So, my plans for Christmas Eve went from going out and having some downtime, to taking the boys to the urgent care center, only to have it confirmed that they too had strep throat. The problem, Boy B HATES medicine and oh right, he didn’t just have strep, he also had Scarlet Fever. After getting home and trying for a few hours to get medicine into Boy B, it was quickly apparent that he wasn’t going to take it. After a quick call with a friend of mine that is a Doctor, he advised us to take him to the ER and that Scarlet Fever wasn’t something to mess around with.

So, there goes my lunch of wings and a beer, shopping, and now Christmas Eve service, because my wife and son headed straight to the ER for our first ever visit. The medical staff was awesome! They not only took care of him immediately, got a dose of medicine, they were able to break his fever. And not only did they take care of him, the ER Doctor, took his hand and lead him down the hall to a toy closet, were he could pick out any toy that he wanted! How awesome is that (this will be a future blog story about the toy closet)! So what toy did he pick out? A Star Wars Storm Trooper helmet, not because he loves Star Wars, but because his brother does and he knew that his brother would want to help him color it.

RELIEF! He was on the mends.  Peace and a deep sigh of relief for a moment.

After a few hours in the ER, my wife and son arrive back home and within 30 minutes of being back he ate more in just those few minutes than he had in the previous 24 hours. He was back to being a little boy, that was smiling and excited at the arrival of Santa coming in a few hours. So, in a few hours before their bed, we still had time to bake and decorate cookies, we watched the Charlie Brown and then we put out cookies and Reindeer food. And as we were putting out the food for the reindeer, I remembered the luminaries.

Luminaries for me growing up, were the start of Christmas. I didn’t always have the best Christmas mornings, often time there was uncertainty if this was my families last Christmas together or if there was going to be a lot of arguing? But luminaries represented calm and peace in a sometimes difficult time in my life. And as I got the luminaries together to put out in front of the house, I had the boys to come over and I told them how this was one of the many traditions that I wanted to pass down to them and they really seemed to love the way that the luminaries lite up the walk way out front as a way to give Santa a landing strip for their house.

After the boys settled down for the night and Santa had come and gone, I realized that I was still able to keep some of my traditions and even pass some down to the boys. I was able to run out for a few minutes and get candy for my wife’s stocking and found her a few other little gifts. I was able to watch our Christmas Eve church service online (Love technology and that our church really leverages it and a cool way to stream church services) and I was able to have a glass of wine while wrapping gifts and watching It’s A Wonderful Life. But most importantly, my kids were feeling better and they got to for the first time, help me put out luminaries and got to see their expressions as I talked about the candles and how peaceful it was before Santa came.

Traditions are important. Traditions are made to be broken, expanded upon, altered, started and most importantly, passed down.  I most certainly hope that the tradition of being sick at Christmas is broken, but I really look forward to seeing how next years traditions grow and stick with the boys.

 

 

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A phrase that I hate to use before the end of the year, before Christmas, etc. but this last week has been a rough stretch for us. The end of the year is crunch time for all of us, work, play, etc. But this past week has been especially rough, because the oldest has been going through night terrors again.

We’ve had a lot of changes between daycare and adjustments with schedules, etc. But the last few nights have been hard, because there isn’t much that I can pin point and directly say, yeah, that is causing the night terrors. Sure, maybe off his schedule and exhausted, that could definitely be an issue. His eating was ok, mostly fruit and a slice of pizza, so not a huge amount of sugar. Growing? Maybe?

But here is what I did realize this morning around 2:00 A.M., it doesn’t matter. We all go through a rough stretch from time to time. And even though he is having these night terrors, he doesn’t remember them in the morning, though he did say that he didn’t sleep well last night. But all in all, I really don’t think that he has any concept of what is going on. And, the other realization that I had, is that there isn’t a lot of solid advice on what to do either to resolve it. There were suggestions, some we’ve tried, some I discredit based on conversations with our pediatrician and a family friend that is a psychologist.

So tonight, a new routine, not exact, but I think that it will be close.

  1. Dinner by 7 p.m. (usually they were eating around 7:30 p.m.) and no tv.
  2. Cleanup the living room and watch 2 quick YouTube videos of Puff the Magic Dragon and Rainbow Connection.
  3. Bath by 8 p.m.
  4. Ready for bed and quiet time by 8:30 p.m.

Here is my logic. The boys are more active now and playing harder at daycare, thus they are getting exhausted quicker. We were letting the boys watch 4 YouTube videos and though I am not thinking that this is the issue that is triggering the night terrors, it is better safe than sorry to just make several changes, all at once. And finally, quiet time before bed, this will consist more of stories that I read and/or make up and tell them, as my father did for me.

I have no clue if this is going to work or not, but 3 nights in a row of sleeping sitting up in a recliner is paying its toll on me and I really need some sleep. Rough stretch, sure, it hasn’t been the easiest, but this year, as I reflect on the year, we’ve had a good year and more to come on that in a future post next week. But all in all, our rough stretch is just a part of being a parent. Just when you think that you’ve got things figured out, something changes and there may or may not be a reason for it, but you have to roll with it.

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Week 1 is now officially over at the new daycare and the boys absolutely love it. They have done awesome there and it has definitely been a change, but a positive one.

We have definitely started a solid routine with the boys and one that will only continue to prepare them for kindergarten next year. Each morning now, we wake them up a little earlier and get them feed breakfast and double check their lunches to make sure that they are still good with their food. And we get them out the door now, most days by 7:30 – 8:00 am. ( Our old daycare provided breakfast and lunch, so our mornings were a little less structured and in some regards, easier.)

Now, we get the boys to help pick and pack their lunches and help us out each day. So, week 1 is over and we have survived and the boys have had a blast.

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Today marked a new day in the life of not only my boys, but mine as a father.  Today, the boys started a new daycare. And for those that missed out on that story, you can read part of it here, as since the majority of that story is personal and private for the daycare provider.

But over the weekend, we took the boys to get a lunch box and last night we got them to help us pack their lunch for today and they were beyond excited. I really think that just simple as simple as letting them help pack their lunch, made a HUGE difference in the transition of the new daycare/pre-K school. And then this morning, both boys were up early, they dressed themselves and were ready to leave, well before I had my first cup of coffee and the entire time, I kept wondering if the shoe was going to drop and one or both were going to freak out.

Around 8am this morning, we made the 3 mile drive, went in and got them checked in, talked with their teacher and the boys actually hugged us and told us to leave. I was tearing up and they are kicking us out the door. A new day in the lives of our boys. Today they walked into a new daycare/school for the first time and immediately started making new friends. My whole day, I’ve been on pins and needles waiting to hear how the day went.

A new day is coming to an end and another first is behind us. This new daycare is really going to prepare the boys for kindergarten, help them learn how to write and both boys are starting to show a interest in learning how to read. Our last daycare was an in home and we all loved the that environment and the lady that took care of our sons and we are very grateful for the time that we had with her. We are also very sad that she was shut down and especially for the reasons that it lead up to it. But we are also hopeful that this new daycare will prepare the boys and give them a head start to their next year in school.

Today, was a new day.

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