Posts Tagged ‘Single Mom’
I can’t help it. Every Friday around 3:30pm I start to get nervous. I go into overload at work completing everything I can or putting it into a folder I can pull out on Monday morning. I start checking the weather for the upcoming weekend. Check driving conditions. Making sure when the whistle blows at 5pm I am ready to head home and start “My Weekend” with my kids. After all, for the past 15 years my every other “Weekend” started on Friday. It was Daddy Time and I was thrilled.
I wish I could say that every weekend was perfect. Well..I guess I could because this is a blog and I can say pretty much what I want, but that would not be honest. I have promised y’all from the beginning that I would always tell the truth even when it didn’t always make me look the best. I believe that if your goal is to be a Successful Dad, there will be mistakes made along the way, and it is up to you to learn from those mistakes, make the correction and do better the next time.
My biggest mistake occurred early on in my new life as a Single Dad. I failed to properly plan for the weekend. Failure to plan my friends can be a nightmare.
Here is my beginners list:
• Proper clean clothes
• “ALL” homework
• Food in the house
• Toiletries stocked (shampoo, TP, female product, conditioner, nail polish remover, band aids, brushes, hair ties, hair glop to make it curly or straight, etc)
• Milk
• OJ with and without pulp
• Uniforms
• Contact info for sleep-overs
• Church clothes
• Shoes of all types
• Times for weekend appointments
• Contact info for Mom
• Knowledge of who is and who isn’t in trouble and what that means at Dad’s house
• Activities planned (shoveling snow and mowing the grass are fantasies..LOL)
• Coats, boots, flip flops, shorts, swim suit, gloves, hats, sunglasses
• Menu planned
• House “clean” to start the weekend
Just a few things to keep you going and keep “Your Weekend” the best it can be. Now go do what you have to do to…
Make it a super Weekend,
Kevin
A Single Dad friend of mine sent me the following story. I knew as soon as I read it that I had to share this with all y’all. I apologize for not knowing who the Author is. However, I suspect that person is a Parent of 2 or more toddlers.
An older, tired-looking dog wandered into my yard.
I could tell from his collar and well-fed belly that he had a home, and was well taken care of. He calmly came over to me, I gave him a few pats on his head;
he then followed me into my house, slowly walked down the
hall, curled up in the corner and fell asleep. An hour later, he went to the door, and I let him out.
The next day he was back, greeted me in my yard, walked inside and resumed his spot in the hall, and again slept for about an hour. This continued off and on for several weeks.
Curious, I pinned a note to his collar: ‘I would like to find out who the owner of this wonderful sweet dog is, and ask if you are aware that almost every afternoon, your dog comes to my house for a nap…’
The next day, he arrived for his nap with a different note pinned to his collar:
‘He lives in a home with 6 children, 2 under the age of 3 – he’s trying to catch up on his sleep. Can I come with him tomorrow?’
I did not have 6 kids with 2 under the age of 3, but my 2 kids provided me plenty of opportunity to wish I could be like that dog and go curl up and take a nap. One of the ways I worked around the non-stop action packed life of youngsters was a sleeping bag on the floor and all of us taking “Nap Time”. I do believe this worked at least 6 times out of the 100 times I tried it.
The key is to know that raising little ones isn’t as easy as good ole Dr Spock tried to get you to believe. Remember, kids don’t know how to read so they have no clue how some Author thinks they should act. And if you don’t believe me ask your parents how “perfect” you were at your kid’s age. I bet you find out that you were way more rambunctious than your children.
Enjoy every opportunity you get to be with your children. They truly are God’s special gifts in your life. Know that being a tired Parent is normal. In fact, when you throw being a Single Parent into the mix, your tired level increases exponentially..no worries everyone of us Parents has experienced the pleasures of being dead tired on your feet. Welcome to Parenting in the 2000”s. Now you know why any Parent of kids between the age of 16 and 25 can sing every verse of the Barney theme song.
Now go do what you have to do to…
Make it a super day,
Kevin
Watching the Opening Day Ceremony last night got me to thinking about how proud the Olympian Parents must be. All the time and sacrifice to insure their child had the opportunity to live their dream. As the USA came into the arena, one of the people I was watching the ceremony with said, “That’s it, time for me to go home”. Of course we were curious why he had to leave so early. In typical mid winter fashion the culprit is a hockey tournament and he has driving duties. His morning would consist of 100+ miles across an International Boarder, leaving at 4am, with an SUV full of 9 year olds.
I realized that it is not only Olympian Parents who give up time and sacrifices to insure their child has an opportunity to live their dream. Every day Parents do this on a routine basis. Does not matter if it is a hockey tournament, a golf match, equestrian competition, softball/baseball game, basketball, football, soccer, piano recital, dance recital, the list is endless. Now multiply the “competitions” by a factor of 4.5 and you have the added number of practices. A staggering number of pick ups and drop offs.
As a Single Parent of young ones this task can be overwhelming. Each child has their own practice and game schedule, and tournaments run all day long Saturday and until you lose on Sunday. Now you get to multiply the number of pick ups by the number of kids you have. If your littlest ones are not old enough to play on a Team, you still get to haul them along. Imagine how boring it is for the little ones the next time you catch yourself wondering “can’t they just make an out, score a goal, complete a song”.
This brings me to the point of this blog. For the next couple of weeks you will hear a lot of chanting for the good ole USA. We will discover the Winter Olympics next superstar. There will be stories of how an Olympian’s Parent drove them to 4 am practices, or moved the family to be closer to expert training. You’ll find yourself glancing at medal totals and cheering for your Country’s count. The world will embrace the athleticism that is the Olympics. Enjoy, celebrate, and let yourself get into the moment of the excitement of the Olympics. But do me a favor.
Every time you see a Parent with young kids, every time you go by an arena or dance hall full of kids participating, every time you pass a vehicle full of rowdy kids, can you please take the time to acknowledge the Parent carting the kids around so the can have an opportunity to live their dram? Let’s go out of our way to say “Thanks, Way to Go, Good Luck, give a thumbs up gesture, to those deserving Parents. Who knows you might be giving the encouragement needed to keep an Olympic Gold Medal dream alive.
Now go do what you need to do to…
Make it ma super day,
Kevin
I was in my Library this morning, and thanks to the Sunday paper being late, I needed something to read, so I grabbed an old Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes “Tenth Anniversary Book” to keep me occupied. There must have been a reason for me reading and laughing and enjoying the magic of Calvin and Hobbes. Can life really be stressful and chaotic when you view it through the eyes of a six year old? I was getting into seeing the stress of selling my house and moving in a completely different (Calvin succeeding from the Family and moving to the Yukon) way. When all of a sudden BAM..I read the following story.
It seems Calvin accidentally broke his Dad’s binoculars. He was being very careful with them. Somehow they broke when he was running down the driveway tossing them in the air trying to catch them. Awesome story, and completely believable because I think I’ve been there done that a few times. Anyway, finally Calvin cracks under the pressure and spills the beans to his Dad. I am assuming Mr. Watterson’s bug eyed, open mouth, ALL CAPS AND BOLD PRINT, depicted Dad as a wee bit upset over the incident. Seriously guys, does this sound the least bit familiar to you?
How many times have you lost it over something your Ex or friend or child has done. For some reason our natural tendency is to get louder and louder and more animated in explaining to whom ever is pretending to listen, exactly where they went wrong. It almost seems to be hard wired into our Dad DNA. Now yelling goes by many names. In my house it was “yelling” and “military voice”, growing up it was “Dad’s having a conniption” (my kids at their worse made my little brother and I seem like we were behaving in church), my neighbors kids always say their Dad is “calling livestock” (that’ll teach ya to marry a farmer’s daughter), so what do your kids call your explosions? You know they make fun of you all the time. Just like you made fun of your Dad or Coach when they blew their lid. Heck that is how we get “blew his lid”.
I was loud and animated and scared myself a couple of times. I constantly apologize to my kids for teaching them that misbehavior is dealt with through yelling. You see even though I stopped yelling in 2002, it was too late. If you read yesterday’s blog you will know what my actions did..teach my kids to be very loud at times. Those of you who are Dad’s or Mom’s of youngsters, please step back and rethink the yelling part of raising your children.
I love the way this story ends. Calvin with tears running down his face says to his Dad “I have an idea, let’s pretend I already feel terrible about it, and you don’t need to rub it in anymore”. What a brilliant point Mr. Watterson. If your child has done something wrong and you are at the reactionary stage of uncovering the truth. Step back and think how you would like to be told the obvious, “You messed up and I am pissed about it”. Then structure your talk in that matter. After all as the story ends, Calvin’s Dad is sitting on the bed apologizing for yelling at him for breaking the binoculars because in the big scheme of things it really isn’t so bad. Heck in another 10 years Calvin will be wrecking the car”.
Now go do what you have to do to….
Make it a super day,
Kevin
As I have been sharing, the Big Move is now entering the 3rd week. This means that I have been going through “stuff” from 23 years as a Married Parent of 2, a Single Parent of 2, and an Empty Nester. Any idea which time period the most “stuff” was accumulated? OK here is a hint; I was a Married Parent for 8 years, Single Parent for 13, and Empty Nester for the past 2 years.
Truth time, I just asked a trick question. “Stuff” has no idea why it is in your house. It is just in your house and does everything possible to never leave your house. I have uncovered “stuff” my Ex forgot (do you really think she forgot or realized I would never look?) to take when she moved out, “stuff” I brought back from Germany and Kansas that has never been opened, “stuff” my neighbors sold at yard sales instead of throwing away, “stuff” that is no longer considered safe for young children to sleep in or ride in a car in or be strolled around in, “stuff” that fit me when I was very big and kind of big and big and a bit less big and a lot less big, “stuff” I was fixen to do (model airplanes, kites, make home made beer kit, hidden Christmas presents, books, etc), “stuff” that broke or was replaced and some day I was going to do something with it, and finally “stuff” that makes me cry every time I look at it because it is so full of memories.
It is this last group of “stuff” that I want to talk about today. The “stuff” that is full of memories. You know what I mean, boxes of photos you were going to put into the still in the wrapper photo albums. 8 big black garbage bags full of stuffed animals. Of course you not only remember which animal belonged to which child, but when they were bought and how they were used (sleeping aid, tag along friend, sleep over not too uncool animal, broken collar bone make it feel alright animal, etc). Little kid clothes that in spite of the food stains look brand new. Sheet and Comforter sets. Sports “stuff”. Family games that may or may not have all the pieces..heck it might just be the box the game was in. 20+ decks of cards which combined might have 3 complete 52 card decks. Little things that went to other things that you know were important things in the life of you and your child. Enough “stuff” to fill eighteen (18) 60 gallon totes with matching lid. All nicely labeled “stuff I can not throw away”. .
Where this will ultimately be stored is anyone’s guess. My goal was to downsize. Not to get a bigger place so I can store all the “stuff” I can never do without. Even though for the past 2-10 years I didn’t even know it was in the closet/basement/garage/attic. I am definitely looking for creative ways to store this “stuff”. After all GrandPa said there was no way it could be stored at his place. Plus the Ex said something about finders keepers but it is great to know where it is. Did I mention “creative ways” should also be thrifty ways?
Thanks to my friend Dave Lakhani, I learned of an excellent way to deal with trophies. You see 2 of the totes are trophies of all shapes and sizes. I remember almost all of them and when they were earned. I was telling Dave I was really having a hard time with these and what I should do. His solution was not only brilliant, but is tough to argue with from a “but they are mine” stand point. What you do is taken off the plate saying what the Trophy is for. You know the brass (or brass like) plate generally on the bottom of the Trophy. Take the stack of plates to your local Frame Shop, and tell the owner you want to remember the accomplishments in a wall hanging (a small apartment wall). Let the frame shop worry about matting and type of frame and material based on your thrifty budget guidelines. Gather up all the old Trophies and donate them to a local youth organization.
You now have a Wall of Fame keepsake, and somewhere in the community an entire new set of Parents are wondering how to store the new Trophy their daughter or son just brought home.
As I learn new ways to store “stuff” I will continue to share with all y’all. Now go do what you have to do to….
Make it a super day,
Kevin
