A Stay at Home Dad in a Go to Work World
“Being Elmo: A Puppeteer’s Journey”
I was watching The Daily Show last night and Jon Stewart had Kevin Clash as his guest. I would guess that the vast majority of the world wouldn’t have any idea what Mr. Clash does for a living but I would also guess that the vast majority of the world recognizes, in an instant, the results of what he does. No, he’s not the button designer on ipods, he’s the voice and soul of Elmo. His appearance on the Daily Show had a rare element to it. Mr. Clash seldom appears without the furry red monster attached to his arm. However, Elmo was there in voice (along with Jon Stewart doing a passable Elmo, saying not so passable things).
Good Imagination Versus Bad Imagination
So with Halloween approaching my four year old asks “Daddy, are vampires real?” I hate these types of questions. My initial reaction is to provide the simple and direct “No” but I also find that the questioning after an absolute answer goes sideways quickly. Instead, I try and get some additional information before I launch into a historical account of Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia; the romanticism of the early 19th century Gothic fiction that was based on the Eastern European folk tales of wampir; and the current day bastardization of the original Gothic material.
How Traditions Begin – Happy Cake!
As you can probably guess, the focus of the past week has been on a very special day for my four year old. Like any well networked individual, you don’t simply have a birthday party on your birthday and invite everyone in a single event. You stretch it out like the week leading up to the Grey Cup (Canadian reference) or Super Bowl (American reference). You have your closest friends come out to private function with live entertainment, you follow that up the next day with cupcakes and birthday stickers at preschool,the day after that being your actual birthday you have lunch at Nana’s, and complete the week with an immediate family celebration involving cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. My birthday celebrations have shrunk to a few “likes” on Facebook and toddler’s asking “but when’s my birthday…”
With all of this attention on a birthday, it makes sense that my 22 month old would incorporate into her expanding vocabulary some birthday related language. However, she has used some unique linguistic algebra to create her own phrase. She has combined “Happy Birthday” and “Birthday Cake” into “Happy Cake”. Obviously, the “birthday” portion of each phrase cancel each other out and your left with the logical “Happy Cake”. It has been used to describe the cake, the event, and really, just having a warm fuzzy feeling. It is almost always said with enthusiasm and for a few nights has been part of her mantra for falling asleep.
So in the spirit that it has been conjured, here is wishing everyone “Happy Cake”.
Read MoreAwesome Four Year Old Birthday Party Suggestion
My three year old had her fourth birthday party on the weekend, thus, for the next 365 days, she will be referred to as my four year old. Along with the title goes the ability to, apparently, do absolutely anything. In the past 24 hours, I have probably heard “I can do it, I’m four years old” about thirty times (I know I exagerate on occasion, but this is more like a conservative estimate). Me – “Honey, what do you want wear today?” Her – “Don’t worry Dad, I’ll pick something out and come down.” Really, instant maturity, awesome. Me – “Honey, instead of touching the computer, can you come and eat lunch?” Her – “Daaaad, I’m just replacing the BIOS with a UEFI to offset any potential malware infecting our machine, I’m four years old now.” Really? I don’t even know what that means. Me – “Honey, can you come off the roof?” Her – “Daaad, I’m going to fly, I’m four years old now.” Really, I don’t think that’s possible. Right there’s my problem. I actually have limits and restrictions on what I think I’m capable of doing. I wish I was four years old.
Read MoreMy Preschooler and Her Imagination
I wrote a few weeks ago about my three year old’s entourage. My original thought was to pay particular attention to when any of the three members of the group appeared and to see if what I had discovered made sense. Of course, the old adage a watched pot never boils definitely was applicable. It was nearly two weeks before any of them appeared. Then, one morning, she came down after waking up and announced that Ariel, Rapunzel, and Sally were all there. Great, now was an opportunity to learn more about the three imaginary friends. I asked my daughter what they looked like. Her response, “they look like nothing”. I asked for further clarification, which I got with “like not there”. Ok, I guess we were all “seeing” the same people then. I asked what they wanted to do and was told “nothing, they’re just here”. It was time for breakfast and our daily routine began.
My Preschooler and Horseback Riding
Last week my wife and I opened the lid to our very own version of Pandora’s Box. I knew there was a strong potential that my three year old would enjoy learning to ride a horse. She had been on a couple of “trail rides” that consisted of her riding on the back of a horse while gripping the horn on a western saddle and looking both proud and nervous while the horse walked up a path for a couple hundred meters and then turned around and came back. Subsequently, my wife found a great coupon deal for a local equestrian centre so she bought it and we arranged for two half hour lessons last week.
A Stay at Home Dad Reviews NBC’s New Comedy “Up All Night’
My ability to pay attention to what’s on TV has become severely restricted. I have a handle on the schedules for PBS Kids and Treehouse and have a pretty good idea what has made its way onto the children’s section of Netflix, but beyond those TV niches, I have no idea. So as I was reading through my Google alerts for “stay at home dad” I read about a new comedy this fall featuring a stay at home dad as one of the primary characters.