As a father of two girls there is a perceived notion that you must raise your daughters in a certain way (or at least I sometimes get this impression form the people that I interact with). At the same time, when I talk to fathers of boys, I hear differing things about their impressions and the ways in which they feel that they can and should raise their boys as well.

For girls, there is the impression that society expects that they will be introduced to dolls, dress up and the like and that fathers will support this feminine societal view. While boys are given toy guns, legos, cars or trucks to solidify their manhood. Who says though that it has to be this way? Who says that a girl can’t love playing with cars or trucks? Who says that a boy cannot like playing with a Cabbage Patch Kid doll?

For me, I have always encouraged my girls to do what they want to do. Whether this is playing baseball or dolls, dress up or cars, I am encouraging them to be the person that they want to be while at the same time encouraging them to explore areas outside of the normal societal mores.

It’s an afternoon in the Divadom and my wife is working, that means that I am the head honcho, the one and only guy in charge, or am I? Living in a home full of glitz and sequins I find that there are days when I think I am in control and in fact I find myself stuck somewhere in between, or in a place that sometimes feels like Dad purgatory. Have you ever been in this same place? Where you make rules and they are tested, you make punsihments, but they don’t seems to make a difference? Yes, this is the land I call Dad purgatory.

Today I wanted to talk about the protection of our children and being able to let go when needed.

I am a Rotarian and their creed is “Service Above Self”, thus for me it is important to be able to live this on a daily basis and also espouse it to my children with the hope that they will follow my example as they grow older.

As a father there are times when I just want to freeze time and not let my girls get any older. I want to capture their innocence and bottle it up so that they will always know what it was like to be free of inhibition, doubt, and the other cares of the world.

I have always written in journals. I still even have journals from when I was younger. As I have gotten older I still have continued to keep a journal.

Children need to be exposed to many things as they are growing up. As parents it is important to let them explore different types of activities and interests. We need to encourage these interests and not trivialize them in any way (even if they don’t make sense to us).

When I talk about being engaged, I am referring to doing things directly with the kids that are important to them and that they find enjoyable and fun. This could be something such as cooking with them, playing sports or games or other such activity that brings a smile on your and your child’s face (as hopefully you are having fun as well).

One of the most important things in learning a new language is to speak to others in the language and have others speak to you in the same language. Also, in reviewing numerous parenting books, language acquisition of infants is greater with those that are spoken to often. Thus, from an early age parents need [...]

Children are exposed to violence everyday as they turn on the television, look on the computer, read magazines or stories. They see it in front of them and yet do not always know how to process this.

Being a good role model encompasses not only what you say but rather what you do in your everyday life. Your children are watching you everyday to learn the things that are not only expected by you, but also what is right and expected as a contributing member of society today. Thus, the things you do or do not do say volumes to your children whether you know it or not, and whether you like it or not.

Today’s children have more and more opportunities to remain sedimentary. They have every type of technology at their fingertips and whether it be television, video games, the computer or other such activities, they can sit for hours inside instead of being outside remaining active.

Children are looking for your approval at all times. They want to feel that they are wanted, needed, and accepted for who they are. As they begin to grow and learn about their passions as we talked about in yesterday’s post, it will be important for you as their parent to do whatever you can to become your child’s biggest fan.

As the new year starts and football season amps up with bowl games, the superbowl this weekend and other such great sporting events like this, I have been reflecting about what I have done to allow my girls to enjoy the sports that I like as well. Ever since that have been with us I have shared with them certain sports. For me, it is usually Football or Basketball.

I have girls, I have been able to give them the opportunity to see the Monster Jam in the past and they loved it. I was a bit surprised, as I never grew up with this in the past, but they were simply mesmerized, and could not believe that vehicles could be as BIG and as LOUD as they were in the venue that we went to. With this in mind, I wanted to pass this great deal along to you and your family.

For many of us we will walk into the new year with grand aspirations about what we will do, or what we hope to accomplish this year. We call them resolutions, but unfortunately, for most of us they tend to become null and void pretty close to the same time that we make them.

Happy Holidays from all of us at Dad Revolution!

Kids are creatures of habit, they expect things to be the same as they have been in the past. For me, this was specifically important as we moved in the past year. Both of our girls were at an age where they knew the rituals that we had been doing at our old house.