One of those nights...

Come, take my hand. Follow me on a journey of mishaps and an incredible series of unfortunate events that might make you question having multiple kids. 

Here is the timeline of our night last night that somehow my wife and I survived;

Cooper starts crying, I go in to check on him. He's puked all over his bed. Ok, so into the bath for him. Strip the bed, get new sheets on. Put dirty ones in wash. Cooper comes down to living room to calm down. By this time Parker hears commotion downstairs so he comes down. We decide to watch Paw Patrol to relax. 

An hour and fifteen minutes later and both boys are back in bed. Good, that wasn't so bad.

After twins take down 2 bottles we figure out we've mismixed the formula, too much water.

Panic, Google, read forums, text momma Baer. 

Momma Baer would be my sister in law, our best resourse for all things baby. She is basically a baby encyclopedia, with an appendix for twins

Dismantle, clean, dry, reassemble Baby Brezza. 

We go up to bed with the twins. This time with proper mixed bottles. We get settled, starting to feed then we hear Parker call out for mommy and daddy. I'm sure he's fine, lets take a look, open the door,

"I made a mess." Bless his little soul.

This time Parker has puked all over his bed. Ok, Parker in the bath now, Cooper's a light sleeper so he comes into the bathroom to investigate. Ok, in the bath with him too. Strip bed, new sheets, new pillow.
 

Both boys are out of the bath. Get Cooper dressed and back in bed. He's not too happy about that, he's crying. Bring Parker's bedding down to laundry, switch over Cooper's bedding. Realize Cooper's bedding flooded the washing machine. 

Load Parker's bedding, sans comforter. 

The twins are now fed proper with proper formula. The problem that comes from formula that is too watery is that pee...a lot of pee. 

Change Lucas, lay him down on the bed while we finish with Sophia. He pees more, soaks his clothes, his swaddle, our comforter. Rookie mistake, pee pee was not down.

Change Lucas, swaddle him.

Change Sophia, swaddle her.

Twins in bassinet.

Parker has been up with us the whole time. That's ok, he likes to help.

Put Parker to bed, Cooper asleep. Notice he is almost falling out of bed. Move him. Mistake. He wakes up, cries.

Close door walk away. 

3:15am

Mommy is in bed, exhaustion setting in.

Daddy is in garage, jotting down everything that has just happened in the last 7 hours.

Drinking. 

3:30am

House is quiet. 
Morning soon.... 

5:45am

The twins wake up for feeding, as expected. Finish that with no problems.

6:15am

"Daddy, I made a mess".... Shit, poor little guy. So now Parker is in bed with us, as we have no more change of sheets. With a towel under him of course.

6:45am

Parker starts uncontrollable crying, I rush him to the toilet, just in time. 

6:55am

Looks like daddy is up for the day.

Ridin' Dirty

What do you get a three year old boy for his birthday? Obviously the biggest thing you had always desired as a little boy. That's right, super powers....no wait, Power Wheels!!

Who didn't want a Power Wheel when they were young? I still wanted one until about a week ago! 

So here it is, Parker's Ford F150. We cruise the neighborhood pretty much on a daily basis now.

See our build, reveal (they went to bath while I finished up), and adventures below. Enjoy

Family vs Work

The ultimate struggle. Work to support your family or simply support your family. This is the choice every parent has to make. 

Even before I had kids I always told myself that I would never choose work over my family. Period. I understand the choice isn't that black and white, but why isn't it?

Growing up I was lucky enough to have a dad that owned his own business. This gave him the opportunity to be at any of my events he wanted to be. Granted he was the coach of my soccer team, which were the main events of my whole childhood, so he sort of had to be there. Maybe that is why I feel the way I do. Being spoiled with that fact and being an only child for the majority of my childhood I was lucky to have my parents attend all of my events.

So work or family. I imagine lots of people will argue and say things like; "...I have deadlines..." "...so and so is sick so I have to cover their work..." "...we could really use the money...". While all of those are very real possibilities to choose work over family are they really valid. I mean REALLY valid? 

If you choose to work late to get a few extra hours on the paycheck is it worth it to come home to have your wife tell you, "Oh you should have seen Little Johnny. He was amazing tonight! He scored the game winning goal! You would have been so proud of him!"

"You WOULD have been so proud of him!"

That is something I never want to hear as a father. Of course you would feel proud. Obviously. What father wouldn't. At the same time, what father wouldn't want to be there, in that moment, to witness it for himself and feel that pride bursting from his chest. That is where I want to be. I want my kids to be able to look over at the side lines and see me there. Smiling ear to ear. To have him run over and give him a huge high five. That is what I want. 

I argue that the decision between work and family is very much black and white. You may just be clouded with other colors. Red being the major color that throws off the black and white decision making of this equation.

Paychecks and jobs come and go. Memories don't. Even in the digital age where everything can be recorded. Nothing compares to being in the moment, feeling the energy and actually experiencing it. At the end of the day your kids don't care how much money you made that day. They care that when they scored that game winning goal that you were there in the stands. That's what matters to them, and in the end, that is all that matters.

Technology & Kids

I know a few parents who are in a desperate fight to keep their kids away from technology. We all know too well the lengths we all go to trying to hide our smartphones while still keeping them within reach to keep an eye on our social media. For the most part we are all trying to instill the same childhood on our kids that we had. One full of play and imagination and social interaction. Well, as a gamer parent and a tech fiend I'm here to tell you that it is a losing battle.

Now I usually have Netflix on for the boys while we are downstairs and I am gaming on the PC, but during that time they are also playing with their trains or jumping around on the couches. And yes, we do have a screen in the vehicle, but that is only for long road trips. It isn't even in the car unless we are taking a long drive. However we do keep our phones away from the kids. At the moment there is a time and a place for technology. But that time is increase, and soon you won't be able to find a place that doesn't have some technological interface.

You see technology is only going to increase in scope, availability, and accessibility, exponentially from here on out.

“Technology has advanced more in the last thirty years than in the previous two thousand. The exponential increase in advancement will only continue.”

— Niels Bohr

Right now you are worried about your 2 year old playing with your smartphone and wondering at what age kids get phones now a days, I know we were thinking about that. I've heard parents say how their kid can work their phone better than themselves. Well in the next 10-14 years when they are at that age there might be something completely different that takes the role of phones as we see them now.

My first flip phone, which could call and send sms messages only was less than 15 years ago. Now your phone has your watch, day planner, phone book, web browser, email, social media, streaming video, music player, gps, camera, exercise companion, etc. Think of the next 15 years. You can't. You can't fathom it. Could your grandparents have dreamed of the idea of Skype/Facetime with their grandkids from across the world? Being able to see family in real time as compared to snail mail letters that they used to communicate with over the course of weeks. It's literally impossible to imagine what is coming.

Just as you are so detached from your parents "back in my day" stories, your kids will be rolling there eyes at you. You can already see evidence of it now. Do your kids even know what the icon for the save button is? Do you really think about what you are saying when you say, "roll up the window", "can you tape that show", or "hang up the phone". None of those really apply anymore. You don't roll up the windows, you don't tape things, and you don't hang up the phone any more.

You can't fight the advancement of technology. You can only learn and grow with it. Don't get stuck behind. Times are different, your kids have the power to connect to the entire world in an instant. What you can do is teach your kids about safety in the technological world. Namely on the internet, below are links to previous articles, mainly regarding kids and gaming, how to help protect them and how positive online communities can be.

Related articles;

What your Kids are Playing

How To Protect the Ones you Love

Online Community

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