This is just a tribute . . . to dads

Also, if you haven't read my more emotional Father's Day post, you can read that here. It was featured on DadCentric's 30 Days of Dads last week. Happy Father's Day!

On learning facial features

It's a truly wonderful, heart and mind expanding thing to watch a newborn begin to recognize and explore its surroundings.

How many page views is a lot? And why do I even care?

So, I got a lot of traffic over the weekend after I had the guest post go up on DadCentric as part of their "30 Days of 30 Dads" series. I got some nice feedback there, and I've been enjoying what others have written in the same series.

But what counts as a lot of traffic? I ended up with a little over 300 hits by the end of Friday, and here's what last week looked like in a graph supplied by Blogger:

On holding hands (a meditation on being a father)

Around the time that my daughter Addison turned 18 months old, she transitioned from finger-holding to hand-holding. It was a big moment. Now don't get me wrong, it was cute the way her warm little fingers would curl around my single big one, like a bunch of tiny tentacles. And since she's rarely inclined to hold my hand or my finger, I'd take either one in a heartbeat. But if I have a choice, hand-holding is the tops. Let me explain.

On keeping it real

Not me, my daughter. I haven't got a lot to add to the "keeping it real" discussion, so I'll just let my sleeping daughter express the sentiment. Apparently, she doesn't lose her cool even in the midst of dreaming about mammaries and blinking lights. 

So, here's me and Addison encouraging you to check back tomorrow for my Father's Day post that's going up on Dadcentric. Can you tell I've never guest-posted anywhere before? That my excitement is totally out of proportion to the circumstances?

Eat your peas or get out

So, I love my daughter, but if there's one thing I've learned about parenting, it's that kids have to learn about consequences.

On poop

So, I'm going to make a new post every day starting today in order to celebrate the guest post that I was asked to contribute at Dadcentric this Friday. Here's today's:

My wife is always telling me to use the proper terms for things. For instance, she hates it when I say something like, "Fiddlesticks! Addison just kicked me in the nuts!" She'll glare at me and whisper, "That sounds so gross, don't call them that. They're testicles." Okay. Though now I kind of want to call them "fiddlesticks." So, which sounds worse? Poop, or defecation? The "proper" term sounds a little like "desecration," to me (which I suppose it could be, in some circumstances). Or like something that would require you to go to the hospital. There's also "defenestration," which is very different, but still not recommended, especially in Prague. And they all sort of point to "castration," which makes me a little uncomfortable as well. Honestly, I'm inclined to stick with "poop."