My daughter is around me nearly every waking second. Our conversations are just like any other 5 year old conversation would be. Why is that hot? Why does the tree grow that way? Why is there a ball in our backyard? My personal favorite, why do you shut the door when you go to the bathroom? Being a Stay-at-Home Dad can be very lonely even with little feet walking around and asking the dreaded why questions. My daily routine consists of feeding, playing, feeding, playing, feeding, playing and sleep. My only real social environment is my daughter. When my wife is around Johanna wants to consume every second she can with her. My socialization with my wife begins after Johanna goes to bed. Since she works the night shift, her sleep schedule is off kilter which results in her being tired all the time. There are many other SAHD with a lifestyle similar to mine.
Years ago evolution created some miraculous innate ability for women to be able to cook. Men for centuries lacked that ability and were relegated to hunting for meat. Only until recently did a genetic mutation occur that triggered the ability for men to read directions from a cookbook. See what I did there? That’s a joke. Dads can indeed cook. We are very good at it too especially when given the chance.
I don’t know how many times I see people talk about their babies and how smart they are. Proud mommies and daddies will say that their child knows the abc’s by two. Or they started crawling at 4 months, started walking at 9 months, or started signing at 6 months. Countless posts are littered through Facebook to exemplify how great their child is doing. They leave no mention on what areas their child is lacking. It’s all in an effort to say, “my child is smarter than yours.”
As a child I lived on a ranch. At least it was called a ranch. My grandparents took care of the ranch for our landlord. The land covered hundreds of acres. The many roads that interweaved were covered with thousands of plants that had to be maintained by hand. There were 104 rose bushes. I know because I counted them every week as each would be individually watered. Coyotes flourished on the ranch. They were always in search of water, so a drip system did not work. They would shred the water lines. Each week it was my chore to help my grandparents water these plants. I did not enjoy it for one second. For that reason I would have never thought I would have liked homegrown blackberries and raspberries.
My daughters favorite meal from Taco Bell is a Nacho Supreme without tomatoes. She doesn’t take after me, because I personally love tomatoes. At least all the tomatoes growing in my back yard go to me. The past few years we’ve been eating fast food more and more often. Too often really.
The day my wife and I got married we were given some advice. A friend nef mine put my hand on top of my wife’s hand. He said, “take a good look.” That was the last time I was going to have the upper hand. After 10 years of marriage I learned that was complete garbage. What I’ve experienced is the wife isn’t always right and she doesn’t always have the upper hand.
For the past 5 months we’ve been contemplating unique baby boy names. Jolene and I cannot agree on any name. Choosing Johanna was fairly easy. We had a dozen or so backup names that we also agreed on. We even have a dozen or so animal names we want to name our future pets. A unique baby boy name, no so much luck.
We do have a list, but we have yet to agree on names. Many on the list are an affiliation of our heritage from Scotland, Ireland, England and many more. However, many of the ones we somewhat like have a negative connotation to someone we know. Some may not sound all the best to either Jolene or myself. Johanna has a few favorites as well. Since a lot of these names are very unique, we are not sure how many people will pronounce them in public, or if some will be made fun of. Below we are putting our list so far. Help us choose a name from the list below, or give us any ideas you may have to help us out. You could also help us out by helping us eliminate names by similar sounding relationships.
Part of being a stay at home dad come with a lot of negative opinions from society. There are a lot of things not to say to a stay at home dad. Fathers can raise children just as well as mothers. Children can be raised with manners, raised with love, and raised to be proper adults in society.
While out with my daughter I’ve heard many things that makes me cringe. Most I believe are not ill intended, but I believe these comments are based on misconceptions of how things are suppose to be. I’m not one to claim the victim card. However, I know it is important to think about what we say. These are my favorite 5.
A few years back I decided to do a photo project with my daughter. I entitled it, “Stay at Home Dad.” My passion for photography and my life of as a dad was blended together in one art form.
I created the project as a self portrait. A self portrait in what it’s like to be a father and more specifically a portrait of one who is actively involved in raising my child. At the time I thought I was complete with the photo series. I documented the photos in my Wedding by Photo website. A few years late I had wished I had continued with the series. With another child on the way I decided I want to continue the series. So as the time progresses I will add more photos to this website.
The original photos that I post below began with a photo I took with Jolene taking away my xbox. That was the only staged photo in the series. That photo sparked my idea for the series. Each photo can be difficult to take, since my hands are in all the photos. So it’s not very easy to get many photos, and often the photos I do attempt to get I never really get. Although, hopefully soon I will have more.
In 2002 if you would have told me that I would be a stay at home dad, I would have thought you were joking. That year I was voted most likely to succeed in my highschool class. I excelled scholastically, I excelled at sports, I was thoroughly involved in school being class vice-president, president of national honor society, received the schools highest Presedent’s Award, and I was thoroughly involved in extra curricular activities. Looking to the future I thought I would become something far different than what I do now.
The problem with being good at everything, is that I’m not necessarily great at one thing. I’m a decent artist, a decent photographer, decent at multitasking, however I have a hard time narrowing down my concentration to one activity. Around 2007 I attended medical school. The problem with medical school is that you have to devote all your time to one thing. My mind does not work that way. I have to expand my knowledge to a broad variety of things and not just one. So I left school to find myself.
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