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My wife was all nervous and such so I did my husbandly duty and did my best to calm her nerves before she left for Italy with her best friend/business partner. Yes I know the number for the doctor. Yes I know she should take tylenol if she has a cold. Yes I know how to administer a quick whack... sorry, a solid pat between her shoulder blades if she's choking on a piece of hotdog.
My wife's the type that can conjur up the worst case scenario for any situation. As an example she was telling me about the skeleton key (that's stuck in the door seperating our living room from our dining room) and how it could be used to get my daughter out of the downstairs bathroom if she suddenly ran in there and locked herself in and climbed up on the sink and got into the medicine cabinet and ...
My daughter and I get along great but... I'm not mommy. Hoo boy. I can hear it coming tomorrow morning - "where's mommy"? My answer will be graciously accepted but the dissapointment will register on her face as the realization that she's stuck with daddy sinks in. Now I understand why dads struggle so hard to do right.
And of course the phone will ring at 6:30am - when my wife finally arrives in Florence after her flight and train ride - and the first words I will hear after I say hello will be "is everything allright?" To which my answer, at that hour of the morning, won't be accepted so graciously.
Geesh. It's a lot of pressure. I feel like I'm going to go on stage and pull off biggest illusion of my life. And it's not just one person's expectations I have to live up to!
My wife is four months pregnant with our first. At least you've had the 2+ years to learn by osmosis...
LisaB
My wife's the type that can conjur up the worst case scenario for any situation.
My gawd! Are all women exactly the same!
Look at it this way: you say you get along great but "I'm not mommy." Now's your chance to erase that imbalance! This is great dad-daughter bonding time, take advantage of it. She doesn't need you to be mommy, but she does need to have just as strong a relationship with you as she does with Mom. :)
If all goes well, maybe you'll get as lucky as me: when my wife came back from that trip, our little girl was in such an "I love Daddy" mode that she hardly even noticed Mom was back. (Sure, hurt Mom's feelings a bit but Mom was also thrilled to see how well we did....)
Since we live so closely to Fenway stadium, I got calls everynight while the series was in Boston about what to do if a riot came to close to the car!
The years fly by fast and suddenly she'll be a teenager and want nothing to do with parents, and that means you. Those are the critical years where she'll need you the most, but want to get you out of her life even more.
So it's important to develop and maintain your bonds every chance you get, so you can still have some kind of a relationship in those trying years to come.
One piece of advice. If your daughter wants to talk to Mommy and she isn't on the phone. Have her draw a picture for Mommy or take dictation of a note for Mommy. This has helped in the past with my kids. Let them express what they need to.
Enjoy the week!
..... Shane
All I can say is, when I was 2, if my mom had gone away for a week and left us with Dad, I would've been ECSTATIC. My Dad always worked two jobs and when he was home, he was working on the house. (My parents bought a house together, which they couldn't afford, so they bought a wreck, and have been renovating it for 30 years. It's beautiful now. But my older sister never learned to crawl because there were no floors finished enough for her to crawl on, and my mother had to heat water on the stove to bathe me when I was an infant because we had no hot water until midwinter of my first year.)
Dad has four daughters and when I say I have only sisters, everyone says "No sons? Your poor father", and to this day, I don't know why-- little girls love their daddies.
In short, you'll do fine. Take this as an opportunity to bond with her, as everyone else has said.
(*They were little and yellow and had little feetsies, and there was a hood with bear ears on it, how CUTE IS THAT?)
10-4
Then call a baby sitter, get your best clothes sorted, I'll be there in an hour..we shall paint the town Red!
LOL - now why didn't I think of that?
Day one - I had her home all day: made applesauce muffins together; cleaned up some clay flower pots and put them away (6 trips in all down to the storage shed in a wheelbarrow - guess who got to ride in it); played with blocks; took a walk around the block so we could shuffle through the leaves; and finished the evening reading a few books and singing "You are my sunshine".
The usually means that Dylan hides in a really obvious place and then I pretend not to see him until he roars like a T-Rex then he chases me around the house for a while until eventually he collapses.
PS have you discovered toddler Valium AKA the teletubbies?
OMG - not the Teletubbies. Arrrrrggggggggg........ Try Blues Clues or Dora the Explorer - works like a charm, and they actually learn something too. Then head over to nickjr.com - they have printable coloring pages, Flash games, music videos, worksheets, etc etc. Second most visited site in this household, after WebmasterWorld, of course ;)
Almost as good as ice cream and cookies for breakfast.
NFFC, tempting... very tempting.
Teletubbies have lost their charm. Dora is a big hit as is a collection of Barney movies. Blues Clues and Spongebob are on-again/off-again. I'll have to go visit the nickjr website. Thanks.
Jenstar, I'll have you know that I'm the one who does all of the cooking and dishes in our house. :) What's more I enjoy it!
I'll have you know that I'm the one who does all of the cooking and dishes in our house. What's more I enjoy it!
You go! I would call you a "renaissance man", except it would sound like bragging because I do the cooking and dishes here, too. :)
Momma has called but is afraid to speak with her on the phone for fear momma will realize how much she misses our daughter. I had the same problem when I called from London. It doesn't really hit you until you're the one who's 3000 miles away. So far so good. ;)
I had the same problem when I called from London.
Me too. I had tried to get through to speak to my daughter while I was away, but they were always out and about doing exciting things. When I finally did get through and we chatted, it made me realize how much more I missed her than I thought I did.
There are several members here who can recall me sitting at midnight in the Thistle's lounge, looking at my daughters pictures, while trying not to miss her so darn much. But I then got to show off my daughter's pics, which made it seem not nearly as bad ;)
u da man.
keep up the good work matey...
Shak
swiper, no swiping
