One of my favorite pastimes is taking pictures of Swee’Pea and TheMonk.  Even more fun is going back and looking at some photos and the joy it brings to me knowing that I survived that time how much fun that time in our lives was.

So when the nice people at Chicco, the Italian juvenile products and toy company, approached me about giving away a free twin stroller here, I thought I’d do a contest surrounding photos.  The stroller is a double stroller for sizes birth to 40 lbs.  It retails for $219 and is a good travel stroller as it folds up compactly. It looks like this:

So, here’s the contest… First, I really want the winner to put this stroller to good use. So, extra points if you have multiples or two small children close together in age. Second, I would like you to submit your favorite photo for consideration. You can present it any way you like but a caption that best describes the photo would be great (see below for examples). You can either email me with it (address is on my sidebar to the right) or you can provide a link to your blog in the comments section. If you are currently pregnant and don’t have a photo of your kids, you can provide photo evidence of said pregnancy. Everything will be considered.

The contest ends at 11:59 p.m. PST on Friday, July 25th. Good luck!

Here’s some of my photos that would warrant consideration…

You can make your own “Motivational Poster” at FD’s Flickr Toys.

Tug at the heart strings

A Gentleman and a Lady

I’m guest blogging today over at Rattling the Kettle.

Go on over and read about “Blog Friends” Vs. “Real World Friends.”

Oh, and leave a comment. The guest blogger who gets the most comments gets a kitschy knick knack from Hawaii and I could use a little more kitsch in my life.

Thank you!

I was tagged by Christine at The Bean Blog for this meme and I’m just now beginning to forgive her. I have done many memes in my blogging life but THIS one was downright impossible. I have almost 700 blog posts and I was expected to pick just one in each category.

OH. MY. GOD. I was tagged on March 6th. It only took me 40 days to finally choose my favorite posts in each category. And I’m STILL not convinced I picked the right ones. (Although it was fun to re-read my archives. You should try it some time.)

Anyway, before I pass out from sheer frustration I finally submit these choices…

Here are the rules:

Go back through your archives and post the links to your five favorite blog posts that you’ve written.

Link one must be about family.
Link two must be about friends.
Link three must be about yourself.
Link four must be about something you love.
Link five can be about anything you choose.

Post your five links and then tag five (or more) other people. At least two of the people you tag must be newer acquaintances so that you get to know each other better.

I tag:
Da’Gorgeouses
Life, Liberty, & Vodka Tonics
Deanna
Mamieknit bits
And Whit because I like to torture my friends.

When I was growing up, I never had trouble fitting in. I could hang with the surfers, band geeks or athletes without seeming too far out of my element. I was on the fringe of the cool kids - mainly because I don’t think I really wanted to fit into that particular social group all of the time.

In some ways, the blogging world sometimes reminds me of high school. There are popular blogs, artistic blogs, blogs that are bursting with potential, blogs that everyone knows and loves and blogs that only a few seem to know about. I’m not sure where I fit in but because I’ve been around a few years I’ve been able to establish some roots in the blogging world. I’m like that senior in high school that some of the freshman look up to but will one day do much better than that senior ever did.

Having said that, a month, or so, ago I noticed that there was some buzz in the blogging world about a new website called Alltop that had different categories of the top blogs, news sites, and other web-friendly sites with their RSS feeds built in. This, it seemed, was where all the cool kids were hanging out. The best part to me was that there was a Daddy Blog section where a plethora of great daddy blogs were being showcased. Many I was aware of but there were even more that I had not seen before - a telling sign of how far us Daddy Bloggers have come in the past few years. The only problem, in my very biased view, was that I wasn’t included.

So, I’m not ashamed to say, I emailed them and pleaded my case. “I wanna be a cool kid!” I begged. And just like that, I was included. It was as easy as high school used to be.

So anyway, I’ve now been included with some heavyweight Daddy Bloggers. I encourage you to go over and check them out. There’s also a great Mommy Blogger section as well.

Check ya out later. Maybe we can all hang out in the quad at lunch time

For quite a while now it has been extremely difficult keeping up with all of the comment spam that I receive on this blog.  I moderate all comments that haven’t been previously approved and I would say that I moderate over 150 spam messages a day - and that’s after adding many, many commonly used spam words into my comment blacklist section on WordPress.

So, since I have recently changed hosts and now have the help of my brother in managing the technical aspects of my blog (because I can point, click and type but that’s about it), we have decided to add one little extra step for those leaving a comment.  When leaving a comment, after entering your name, email address and blog (if you have one) you’ll have to type in a word to verify you are a real person.  That word will not change and it’s not difficult to read like some of those on Blogger sites that you have to guess if there are two “v”’s or one “w”.  I hope this won’t create too much of a deterrence for those who want to leave a comment.  This was, in my opinion, the least intrusive solution to the spamming problem.

Please let me know if there are any problems with leaving a comment or if this little tool would discourage you from leaving a comment.  Part of the joy of having this blog is the dialogue I have with many of you through comments so I don’t want to have you be too incovenienced.  Hopefully this is a good compromise.

Happy commenting!

Friday, my blog will be transferred to a different host. The way my brother explains it to me, visitors living in Nashville may or may not see any new posts before those living in Abu Dhabi. Something about computers propagating or stars aligning or something like that. To tell the truth, after he said, “We’re gonna make the change on Thursday night…” all I really heard was “blah, blah, blah… import posts… blah, blah, blah… you can post again.”

I guess I should have paid better attention.

Anyway, you won’t notice anything but I won’t be where you think I am for a day or so. I think he said we’ll close comments too so you may not be able to wish me well. I know you’ll be thinking it though… because we’re close like that.

Just think, after today, you won’t have to worry about me running out of bandwidth ever again!

You weren’t worried about that at all, were you?

Oh well. See you soon.

Wow.

What an uprising of support! I am overwhelmed by all of you who came out of the woodworks to show your support. I am very grateful and very humbled by all the comments. Thank you to everyone!

And just to show you how grateful I am, I’m going to let you wear your Lightning McQueen pajamas top to daycare today.

Oh wait. That was TheMonk.

Anyway, thanks again and have a great day!

This post has been a long time in coming. When I first started blogging I did it to keep my family and friends up to date on our lives as we moved far away from everyone we knew. As we became pregnant and had our twins it became even more important for me to blog to keep family in touch - but also to chronicle the lives of my kids and how much I love them. I want this blog to be a gift to them in the future.

But somewhere along the way I gained readers who weren’t related to me. This was unexpected but extremely gratifying. I put a counter on my blog and I began to be consumed by how many people were reading my blog on a daily basis. Many times my choice of blog posts were aimed more at these anonymous readers rather than my own kids. I had lost touch with who my audience really is.

It was then that I decided that I would re-focus my blog. Even though I might not appeal to some who were reading, I decided to focus almost entirely on fatherhood and stories about raising my two little ones. Through this transition I did lose some readers. Oh well. While it was hard to lose that readership I decided it was worth it. The only readers that really matter are Swee’Pea and TheMonk.

Not that I don’t appreciate all of you who continue to follow our story. You are certainly welcome to come along for the ride and I do appreciate the comments that most of you leave - showing your connectedness to the story that I have laid out. It allows me to feel bonded with many of you who are going through similar struggles and joys or can identify with what I am writing about.

But not every commenter has been welcome. My post immediately before this one, for example, produced an unexpected comment. In this post I played on the time-honored tradition of overprotective fathers when it comes to fathering a girl as well as my impending gun ownership. And, in my typical style, I tried to produce a laugh out of these two converging stories in my life. I liked what I wrote - even proud of the way it came together. Some of you who commented got it. You laughed along with me and I was pleased that you appreciated my sense of humor.

Then, yesterday my good friend MetroDad linked to me in a post and I got quite a few new visitors from his blog. One woman, a new visitor named Kat, left a comment that really, really bothered me. She called me sexist for writing about “protecting my daughter’s virtue” and asked why I wasn’t writing about protecting my son’s virtue. She was disappointed that I was “cultivating sexism.”

I have never been insulted on my own blog before. I have heard about it happening from other bloggers but never experienced it myself. I have only deleted one other comment on my blog before this one but I deleted it. Obviously she has not read the many, many posts I have written about how I want my daughter to grow up (this post, for example) and she didn’t know me. My attempt at humor was, to her, a sexist remark and I didn’t agree so I decided to remove her comment, send her an email explaining my thoughts on her comment and move on. But it still bothered me. And it didn’t die because today she left another comment asking why I deleted her previous comment.

So, I submit this to you, dear readers (old and new). I am who I am. I know that I am a good person who wants the very best for my children. I know that I have a good sense of humor but that not everyone may appreciate it all of the time. I know that I have respect for women, people of color and those who differ from me. I am not sexist. Nor am I perfect.

Because this is my personal blog and something that I take pride in and will someday want my children to read without being influenced by someone who has an impression of me that isn’t accurate because she does not know me AT ALL, I deleted the comment. As much as I love comments, I feel like I have the discretion to decide who comments on my blog. And THAT, Kat, is why I deleted your comment.

So, if you don’t like what you are reading, then there are an estimated 50 million other blogs out there to find something that which you can better relate. Some of you have connected to what I am writing here and I appreciate that. If you haven’t connected, then I encourage you to move on.

That is all I have to say about that.

Now, back to regularly scheduled programming.

I was tagged on a meme by A Very Open Book. The meme is simple in concept. Five thing you want your kids to know. Simple right?

Well, it turns out, choosing just five things you want your kids to know is not as easy as it seems. If I only have five things they should know, should it be something that will keep them from being beat up, like, “Don’t wear plaid with stripes” or should it be more useful over the long haul, like “always check your eggs before buying them”? Perhaps it should be something that could save them embarrassment, like, “Never turn down a mint if offered.” Or maybe they should know the pythagorean theorem - that thing has gotta be useful for someone, right? You see? The possibilities are endless.

Nevertheless, I had to narrow them down. And if you ask me this question a week from now, I’d probably give five different answers but these are my answers today.

1) I want them to know that they can do anything they put their mind to. I want them to know, in their heart, that they can make their greatest desires come true if they are willing to go after it with all of their heart.

2) I want them to know the feeling of giving joy to those less fortunate. Knowing the look of appreciation and relief in someone’s eyes when you make their life just a little bit easier.

3) I want them to know love. I want them to know what kind of love they deserve and settle for nothing else. I want them to find someone that they know, in their hearts, will love them unconditionally forever.

4) I want them to know that they will always have each other. I envy the bond that they have already because they’ve known each other their entire lives. I want them to absolutely know that they will always be there to support each other and love each other.

5) Finally, I want them to know how much their father loves them. I cannot put into a few words how much I love them and my greatest desire is that when my children are older that they will know, without a doubt, that their father loves them with every fiber of his being.

A while back I wrote about my battle of the bulge. It’s not a huge bulge but I feel it and, frankly, I’m getting tired of feeling it. Back in November, when I first announced I was going to battle this bulge, I began working out at the Y two to three times a week and I was on my way. I was feeling good and beginning to look good (if I do say so myself). Then, my new job hit and, at first, I had no time to exercise. I was working 10-12 hour days and I was exhausted. But recently, the pace has slowed enough that I have been feeling like I need to work out again. I just needed a push.

That’s when I saw Darren write about his desire to get fit - codenamed Project X (X is for eXercise) and he invited others to join him. He even decided to start a blog to chronicle Project X. So, I impulsively said, “SIGN ME UP!”

So, I’m going to try this again. Darren’s already starting to work out. Me? I had to polish off the last sleeve of Thin Mints so I won’t get tempted when I start Project X. You know, a guys gotta be prepared.

Wish me luck!