Children’s Activities: Finding a Balance

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We have been racking our brains over what activities to put the kids in this fall and it has proven to be an overwhelming task. On one hand, there are so many great programs out there that I know the kids will love, but the downside is that we risk burning them and ourselves out by trying to fit too much in.

I asked parents if they thought there was a perfect number of activities for children and, not surprisingly, I received a myriad of different answers. The suggestions touched on everything from stress and lack of family time, to cost and enjoyment. I have compiled a few of them here and would love to hear your thoughts in the comments section below:

• I think parents put their kids in far too many these days. Just like we need ‘down time’ so do kids. School, is one thing, but having them in other activities three- five evenings a week, and on weekends is ridiculous. Give them some time to be kids and learn how to make their own fun, use their imaginations, play outside, and to just live a simple life. I think that one extra activity a week is MORE than enough.

• Depends on ages, homework level and family time. We did many more before they were in school. Now I find two a week for each of them is a good balance so they still have time for exercise, school work, chores, friends and family.

• We did a number of activities and the kids enjoyed them…but when we found THE ONE, we dropped everything else and now they LOVE it!

• I definitely think there is such a thing as too many. Kids need time to just “be”. To be quiet, to read, to use their imaginations, to play freely, etc.

• I believe there are too many. I have 2 children, one who is very active. We do dance and if she wants to do a sport she can. Now being in kindergarten, by the time you pick the kid up, do the activity, get home, do homework and eat dinner, its bedtime or past. And you still have to get the bath worked in. My sister has 3 all in school and all have 2 to 3 activities each. She is exhausted getting pulled every direction every night of the week. I think society has forgotten about good old family time!

• Last year we did 4 activities per kid and I found it extremely stressful! Now we are only doing 2 per kid and I feel a HUGE relief (not to mention money savings!)

• There’s def such a thing as too many! We do one or two per season – but keep it quiet-ish in the fall to help set up for a successful return to school season.

• The magic question. We’re waging this debate now at home. Just getting to the ages where the schedules start filling up. We always had them both in swimming and gymnastics, now she wants to play hockey, do we drop one? Fine line between fun and burning them and us out. Feel like we’re at the top of the activity roller coaster, just about to drop in….no turning back now.

As you can see, there are many different opinions on the subject and there are many variables, such as school, number of children and their ages. With the sheer number of programs offered these days, it’s easy to see how you could pick 3-4 activities for your child without even realizing how it is going to affect your family time schedule.

For us, the perfect balance seems to be two activities a week but I really like the idea of searching for the one that they love and then fostering that above the others. Another important point raised was the one regarding the stress and well being of the parent. It’s great to keep your kids active but if the cost is that you suffer at the rest of your parenting duties while trying to be a super parent, is it really worth it?

I want to hear your thoughts on this issue. What is your strategy when it comes to signing your child(ren) up for activities?

Throwback Thursday ~ The Hardy Boys

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Frank and Joe Hardy were staples in my young reading days. When I say “staples”, I mean they were the only books I read as a child. That probably had everything to do with the fact that my father seemed to own every single book that was ever published in the series. That, and the fact that I hated Shakespeare and refused to read his books in school. There’s also a direct correlation between that and my failing Grade 12 English twice…

I can’t remember much from the books themselves except that one of the books pictured above, “The House on the Cliff”, was my go-to Hardy Boys mystery. In an attempt to force these books on my kids someday, I have started scooping them up whenever I see them at garage sales. I can’t imagine they hold up to the likes of Iron Man and Game of Thrones but I am sure going to try to get them to at least try it out.

For some fun facts, you should check out their Wikipedia page. I learned a lot about the series that I hadn’t known about, such as the fact that beginning in 1959, the books were extensively revised, largely to eliminate racial stereotypes. Anyway, I loved these books and felt like throwing them some love today.

What were your go-to books as a child?

Dad Blogs Exposed! ~ DadScribe

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I’m happy to announce that Dad Blogs Exposed is back and with an all new format. I decided to go with a Q&A style approach to let the Dads tell you what they are all about in their own words and I’m excited to be able to share their stories with you.

This week I am happy to have had the chance to talk to Carter Gaddis from DadScribe. I met Carter at the Dad 2.0 Summit in Houston earlier this year and had the opportunity to share the stage with him as one of the conferences spotlight readers. In our brief interactions in Houston and the conversations that followed, I have learned that Carter is as genuine a person as they come and I feel lucky to have met him. Below are his answers to my questions about fatherhood and blogging.

CD – Why did you start blogging?

CG – I needed a creative outlet, so I started a blog. I spent 24 years covering sports for newspapers and websites, and the kind of writing I do professionally now (while steady and secure) doesn’t give me the same thrill. Plus, my sons are too young to know about that part of my life, so DadScribe originally was intended to be a platform for sharing those stories. It morphed into a catch-all for our experiences as a family, and my experiences, in particular, as a father. Every now and then I’ll remember a funny or poignant story from my sports writing days and share it, too.

CD – What can people expect from your blog? Do you have a specific topic with your writing or do you write whatever you feel?

CG – As I sort of touched on in the first answer, DadScribe has evolved. I suppose it remains a work in progress, but readers are as likely to find a photo essay about our family vacation to Cape Cod or trips to Disney World as they are a three- or four-paragraph prose poem about a sleepy Saturday morning. I have also branched out into sponsored content over the past few months, but I only accept assignments that are relevant to our family and can be used to tell good stories. I’ll also delve into politics and social issues every now and then if I feel compelled to speak out on a topic. Here’s one of those political posts, which happens to be my most-read post.

CD – What has been your biggest challenge as a father?

CG – Time is always my greatest challenge. I work a full-time job, as does my wife, which means our boys spend a lot of time in daycare, after-school care or summer camp. I envy parents who are able to work out of their homes, because even though I know those situations present their own challenges, at least they don’t have to spend two hours (or more) every day commuting to and from work. Those two hours away from my sons are the two toughest hours of the day for me. The math of it tears me up: 10 hours a week, 40+ hours a month, 500+ hours a year. That’s about three weeks every year I spend battling traffic, rather than being there with my sons. It’s tough, especially since I never had a commute for the first 24 years of my career. Then again, I was on the road for 100 or more days a year back then. So, it’s all relative.

CD – What one piece of advice can you give to a new Dad?

CG – My best advice for new dads is to ignore unsolicited advice.

CD – Do you have any long term goals for your site?

CG – I want to write well, continue to build on my modest readership, and see where it goes. I doubt I’ll ever become a “professional” blogger, at least not with DadScribe. For now, if I can tell stories that entertain people and make them think, I’ll be happy.

CD – What is your social media weapon of choice and why?

CG – I am most active on Facebook, because I like the interactivity and the universality of it. Most of my traffic comes from Facebook shares from my personal site, and most of the people I’m connected with online and in real life are active there, too. I’m also on Twitter @DadScribe, Instagram (dadscribe) and Pinterest, as well as Vine. Right now, though, Facebook remains king for me.

CD – How has blogging affected your life?

CG – I didn’t see it coming, but blogging has become much more than a hobby. It started when I was invited to read at Dad 2.0 Summit. That was an incredible honor and it opened my eyes to the depth and warmth of the parent blogging community. The weekend in Houston was transformative. Since then, I’ve had the good fortune to work with several brands and PR/marketing firms that really get it when it comes to parent blogger outreach. That has been a nice surprise, and it has made me want to do even more of that kind of work as time permits. Primarily, though, blogging has given me a group of friends that I never would’ve had otherwise. At my age, making new friends is not high on the agenda. This has been a good thing, though. A very good thing. The guys at www.dadcentric.com, many of whom I met in person for the first time in Houston, have been especially generous, as have my fellow Dad 2.0 Spotlight Bloggers (yourself, Jon Hockey Jesus, Kevin McKeever and Whit Honea). It’s deeper than that, though. I didn’t just find a “tribe,” as they tell you to do when you start out as a blogger. I discovered a weird, pixelated world populated by living, breathing parents who share many of my interests and help me see things from a different perspective. I want to keep that going and deepen those relationships, even if it means masking my inhibitions and utter lack of talent on a karaoke stage at the next Dad 2.0 in New Orleans — with or without a dancer’s pole.

I’d like to thank Carter for his time in answering all of the questions and I’ll be back next Wednesday with a new Dad to parade around for you!

Dadscribe 2

The New Hat

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My son got a new hat the other day. There was really nothing special about it. If anything, it looked like one of the many poorly crafted hats that I had enjoyed in my younger days.

“I picked it for Grampy in heaven, because he liked baseball” he said with a proud smile. I gently leaned in, kissed his forehead and told him that my Dad would have loved the hat. I did this calmly and in full control of my emotions, however, on the inside, my heart was racing, the tears building as my lungs gasped for air and I was suddenly flooded with a swell of memories from my days with my father.

What my son doesn’t know is that, over 6 years later, I do the same thing. It seems that almost everything reminds me of my father in some way or another. Ultimately, it’s the reason I stopped playing fastball, because that’s the thing we shared more than anything else and every time I took the field, after his death, the emotions became too overwhelming.

There’s also my unreasonable love for anything Sherlock Holmes and the sudden instinct to purchase old Hardy Boys books whenever I spot them. There are many other situations I can think of that, good or bad, have me instinctively doing something with no rhyme or reason attached to them. I’m no head doctor, so I’m not about to try to figure them all out but I’m assuming its normal behavior for anyone who has lost someone so close to them.

I thought about how I was distancing myself from the things we shared together instead of embracing them. It’s not that I wanted to forget, it’s just that I don’t want to be constantly reminded of it, if that makes any sense. It’s hard, man. Life has definitely become easier but those last days certainly haven’t vanished from my memory. That said, I didn’t want to return to that anxiety ridden “Why me” place that I spent so much time in. I want to be the story of the guy who fought through adversity and came out stronger on the other side, not the guy who caved to the memories and hurt his own family in the process.

You may look at my son’s new hat and just see a poorly made hat from any department store in the world, but to me, it’s a symbol that I’m doing better now. It taught me that life can go on, even with the heart break, and that my father’s memory will live on in my children even though they never had the chance to actually meet him.

I dusted off my ball cleats last weekend in hopes of making a comeback next season; because I know my Dad would have liked that.

And This One Time, At Coupon Camp…

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I have a confession to make. There was a time, back when we only had one child, where I may have been one of those crazy coupon binder people that you see on the show Extreme Couponing. Now, I don’t want to say that I am not proud of this fact, because let’s face it, there’s nothing wrong with trying to save a few dollars for your family. The problem is in the way I was running this elaborate couponing scheme.

I would visit all my favourite coupon sites, like Save.Ca, print out every coupon they had available, even if I didn’t need them, and then store them in my little black book until they expired. Sure, I used the good ones but I was wasting way more than I used and, in the end, my incompetence became way too much work to manage. Fast forward to today and I feel like I have come a long way from those days of sandwiching coupons for allergy medication (we have no allergies) with a coupon for $1.50 off a Lady Bic disposable razor.

These days I do almost all of my online deal searching at Save.Ca because they have a virtual one stop shop for everything from coupons to flyers and other great deals. They even let you create an online shopping list by clicking on items from the various flyers. Just because I didn’t make it a binder carrying couponer, doesn’t mean I can’t still save money on the things my family actually NEED. In fact, as I was typing this post, I popped in to see what was new and found these two amazing deals immediately:

Michaels CouponIndigo Books
 

If you are still reading this, I have to ask you why you haven’t already left to check out everything that Save.Ca has to offer?? Okay, okay, before you go I will leave you with the best advice I can give for new couponing families: Only collect and grab the coupons/deals you need! If you only use one type of laundry detergent, don’t print coupons for three different brands. Yes, they are shiny and remind you of money, but you will end up throwing them out and those detergents will never know what it’s like to feel the love of a shopper who is getting a deal.

I think I’ve rambled on enough, don’t you? Look a little bit lower, watch the video about how awesome Save.Ca is and then thank me after you’ve saved 40% on that new glue gun from Michaels, that you have absolutely no use for.

Disclosure: I received compensation for my work with Save.Ca. That said, I couldn’t have made this up if I tried and the whole thing is 100% true.

A Boy In Gymnastics? Say It Ain’t So?!

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Starr Gymnastics

Those of you who follow this blog know that I rarely get bent out of shape and write a post out of anger. The truth is that confrontation, especially online, gives me anxiety so bad that I almost always shut right down and cease to function. That said, a discussion I had earlier this week is still ringing around in my head and I need to get it out.

The discussion was about what activities were available for kids in our area. Included in my list of suggestions was gymnastics, which was immediately met with a scoff. When I asked why, they explained that they didn’t want their son to become, “you know?” to which I calmly answered, “No, I don’t know, please explain”. I then explained how my son was in gymnastics and how much fun he was having with it. They quickly back tracked and tried to explain how their son wasn’t very sporty and blah, blah, blah, the damage was done. Sadly, this isn’t the only case of this I’ve heard lately.

I’m not an expert on the gay community or what triggers the different emotions people feel, but I’m pretty sure that sports have nothing to do with it. When we signed my son up for gymnastics, it had never crossed my mind that it was a sport designated to a specific sex. He has a mix of boys and girls in his class and, more importantly, he loves it more than any of thing we have put him in. THAT is what I am looking for when choosing an activity for my young children, not whether or not they will be teased about it.

This brings me to the thing that bothers me the most about the whole situation. The kids who tease and bully others for doing something that is traditionally done by the opposite sex, don’t get that stereotype out of thin air. They get it from the so-called grownups around them who continue to comment and joke about how it’ll “turn them gay” if they take part. Forget, for a minute, the fact that it is an insult to the entire gay community, but you are also brainwashing your child to see differences as wrong and by doing so you are breeding a whole new generation of hateful behaviour.

Why not try this instead? The next time your child wants to try out a new activity, let them try it out. If they excel at it and love what they are doing, instead of mocking it, try fostering their love for it. There is enough ignorance and hate in the world already without teaching our children that something as simple as choice of sport is worthy of ridicule. Let’s give our children the power to choose without judgement.

My boy likes his gymnastics class, he loves his teacher, he’s doing physical activity and he smiles from ear to ear the whole time. And that’s more than enough for this Dad.

My Top 5 Summer Driving Songs & Your Chance At $500

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The good people at KANETIX asked me to write about my Top 5 Summer Driving songs and when I couldn’t think of a good reason not to, I immediately got to work. After 6 days of deliberation, my list was finally complete!

KANETIX, an online comparison site for insurance, mortgages and credit cards, recently commissioned a study to find out how music impacts your driving. The results weren’t terribly surprising, but they were certainly interesting! Turns out Talk Radio listeners like to put the pedal to the metal and Hip Hop listeners are more likely to be charged with stunt driving.

This is where I come in! KANETIX wanted to know what songs get me and a few other bloggers fired up in the Summer time and I was happy to share. Here are my Top 5 Summer Driving Tunes:

1. I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor – Arctic Monkeys – I perform this song in my band and it is the most electrifying thing I have heard in a while. If you haven’t heard it, I highly recommend it.

2. Rockin’ In The Free World – Neil Young – Neil is my musical idol and my top 5 list could have easily been Neil Young songs. His music is graceful and never fails to calm my stress.

3. Wheat Kings – The Tragically Hip – It’s the Hip, need I say more? For my American friends who have no idea who the Tragically Hip are, please start at the album “Up To Here” and continue on from there.

4. MoneyGrabber – Fitz and the Tantrums – I have no idea what it is about these guys but every time I put this song on, I find myself drumming and singing at the top of my lungs. That means they are doing something right!

5. Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town – Pearl Jam – Last but certainly not least, this song has been a staple in my top 5 songs since the day I heard it. The first time you belt out the line “Me you wouldn’t recall, for I’m not my former”, you will be hooked like I was.

That’s it for my summer play list, I hope you enjoyed my selections. You are also invited to head over to the KANETIX blog to vote for your favourite playlist. If you vote before August 23rd, you’ll be entered to WIN $500!

I’m also curious to know, What are YOUR Top 5 Summer Driving Songs?

Life Is Short; Do All Of The Scary Things!

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The photo above is a shot of me reading an emotional post about the death of my father for about 150 people at the Dad 2.0 Summit in Houston last year. It took all of my strength not to cry while doing it and I’m proud that I not only got through it, but that I even got up there and did it in the first place. Doing the things that scare me has kind of become the motto of my life these days and the rewards for doing that have been endless.

Throughout my school years, and I’m talking ALL of them, I was the shy kid who didn’t do anything that would draw attention to himself. I would purposefully take a failing grade on assignments where we had to present in front of the class, because my anxiety was so high that I would get sick just thinking about standing up there in front of everybody. In my Grade 11 music recital, I pretended to play my trumpet because I was afraid that I would be the one to blow it for everybody. I played fastball and hockey, I had my small group of friends and that was it. I thought I was happy.

When my father passed away, I went through a terrible bout of anxiety that basically robbed me of a year of my life. Towards the end of that time, I took a long hard look at my life and decided that I wasn’t living it to the fullest. My unhappiness had nothing to do with my wife or newborn child, though, it was all about me and the lack of effort I was putting into this one, short opportunity we get to spend on this earth. I made a decision to stop feeling sorry for myself and to make the most of the time I had left on this earth.

I’m no doctor but I can tell you that since the day I made that decision, my anxiety has ‘almost’ disappeared and I have never been happier. Instead of shying away from the things that would normally scare me into submission, I am tackling everything head on and worrying about the results after I have finished. Because of this, I have had so many amazing and life changing opportunities that have helped me become a better person, husband and father to my family. Here are just a few of the cool things I have been able to do in my short time as a Fear Hunter:

* Interviewing and Skating with the cast of Disney on Ice
* Speaking at the Dad 2.0 Summit
* Interviewing and making a crazy video with Buckets Blakes of the Harlem Globetrotters
* Ziplining for the first time
* Regular appearances on the CTV Morning Live TV Show (Scariest of the scary)
* Monthly parenting segment on CJAD 800 Montreal radio
* Will act as Community Leader at the upcoming Blissdom Canada conference in October

Every single one of these things is something that scared the crap out of me and every one of them is something that I am proud I accomplished. There are many more as well and each has been as rewarding as the last. My point is, life is short, so if you want to make the most of it, you have to start going after the things that scare you. Now look, I’m not ready to go jumping out of a plane or anything…yet. I’m saying that even small victories are still victories that will lead you to something bigger. Transformation doesn’t happen overnight but it most certainly doesn’t happen if you don’t go after it.

I’ve fallen a few times while chasing down fear but I’m not going to let it beat me anymore. My father always went after his dreams and while it took me a little while to catch on, this is definitely something I want my kids to remember about me. So let’s hear it. What are the scary things that are holding you back?

Always A Humbling Experience At ‘The Gil’

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Pictured above are the Lake Simcoe Lightning fastball team, who also happen to be the champions of the 6th Annual Gil Read Memorial Fastball Tournament held this past weekend. This year’s edition of the tournament was by far the best we’ve ever had and I couldn’t be happier with the direction it is trending in.

I’m always left humbled by the end of tournament weekend by all of the hard work that people put into making it a success. Not only is it a testament to the memory of my father but in a world where social media magnifies all the bad, it’s nice to see so many people who are coming together to do something good for the kids. From volunteers pulling 8 hour shifts and off duty doctors tending to injured athletes, to bartender volunteers staying until 1am and locals lending us their BBQ when ours breaks down, I am always left amazed at the amazing community of people this tournament has supporting it.

Our corporate sponsors give year after year without so much as a follow up email, with some of them even offering money before we ask for it. We are endlessly appreciative to companies like Rebel Tents, Play It Again Sports, Logs End, Cabotto’s Dining Lounge and Broker 4 Tickets, who give up their hard earned money so that we can continue to put on this event and provide funding for the kids. These companies understand what we are trying to do and it creates a family atmosphere instead of a business one, which is truly amazing. There are so many more and they will get their love in due time.

We started this thing 6 years ago with no idea what it was going to look like and now we not only have a flourishing tournament, that hit it’s 12 team goal for the first time, but we’ve also been able to raise enough money to help a lot of kids who otherwise would not have been able to compete in organized sport. I am proud of the work we are doing, humbled by the amount of help we are offered and I know my Dad would have loved every second of this tournament and initiative.

Thank you to everyone who showed up, helped out, sponsored, played, spent your hard earned money, tweeted, shared, laughed and cried (okay, that was just me) at the Gil Read Memorial Tournament this year. Without you, none of this would be possible and we wouldn’t be able to provide for these kids who just want to have the same opportunity that their friends have.

Cheers!

My Favourite Part Is When Our Kids Give Out The Trophy!

My Favourite Part Is When Our Kids Give Out The Trophy!

Disney Planes Screening Giveaway

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I don’t rock too many giveaways anymore but seeing as how I am as excited as my kids are for Disney’s new movie Planes, I am dusting off the old giveaway machine. I am going to be giving away a Family 4 Pack of tickets to the screening of Planes, for August 7th at 7pm, at the Silvercity Theater in Gloucester. Now you can see the movie before anyone else does! Cool, right?

HOW TO ENTER

The main character’s name in the film is Dusty, and all you have to do to enter is leave a comment below, letting me know what your call sign would be if you were a Plane in this movie. I would choose “Guster”, after one of my favourite bands! Good Luck! Contest closes Friday, August 2nd at Noon.

FILM INFORMATION

From above the world of “Cars” comes Disney’s “Planes,” an action-packed 3D animated comedy adventure featuring Dusty, a small-town plane with dreams of competing as a high-flying air racer. But Dusty’s not exactly built for racing—and he happens to be afraid of heights. So he turns to naval aviator Skipper, who helps Dusty qualify to take on Ripslinger, the defending champ of the race circuit. Dusty’s courage is put to the ultimate test as he aims to reach heights he never dreamed possible, giving a spellbound world the inspiration to soar. “Planes” takes off in theatres in 3D on Aug. 9, 2013, and will be presented in Disney Digital 3D™ in select theatres.