My Role as Daddy

First of all, I want to acknowledge what everyone already knows: Shana is Supermommy. It constantly amazes me the effort she is willing to put forth in order to groom Emma into a pleasant, well-adjusted little person (not the vertically challenged kind, the young kind). Speaking of little people, how many of you are aware that the term "midget" is offensive to little people? How many of you are aware that OK Kids uses "midget" as a classification for baseball teams consisting of 11 and 12 year olds? I wonder what other pejorative terms we could use for other sporting groups?

Try as I may, I always fall short of Shana's abilities. I have decided that it is okay for me to be a little less able, I have other roles to play. I tend to be a little more lenient, but I try to provide discipline as neccessary. In the world of good cop, bad cop I am probably the good cop. Sure it is a little unfair, but hey, I'm Daddy.

It was funny to me early on when Shana didn't want to leave Emma for even an hour, because I had to get up every morning and leave Emma for eight to ten hours each day. I missed out on a lot, but that's the way things seem to work out. Someone has to bring home the proverbial bacon. I don't get to spend nearly as much time with Emma, but I have heard it said that all time spent with your kids is quality time. When Shana started working overnight on Fridays, it gave me a chance to have time with Emma on Saturday morning. I would have to make her breakfast (I am a pretty good cook but she usually prefers a few Eggo waffles), get her dressed (I usually chose comfortable play clothes instead of prissy dresses), and occupy her time with activities (and the occasional Backyardigans show). I called it babysitting, Shana called it parenting. Sure it made it nearly impossible to do many other things I would like to do on a Saturday morning, including sleep in, but looking back it was time well spent. I took the above picture during one of our Emma and Daddy adventures last week. She thinks it is fun to clean up the garage and I am not going to turn down the help.

Tonight Shana went to a scrapbooking get together with some of her friends. I encouraged her to go, it gave me a chance to hang out with Emma for a while. We played in the backyard with the animals, I gave her a bath, and put her to bed. When I put her to bed, I had a similar experience to what Shana has posted on here before with Emma wrapping her arm around my neck as she drifted off to sleep. It's those types of things that make me appreciate being her Daddy. I know when the time comes and we have another little one around the house my role as Daddy will take on a new meaning and I will spend more time taking care of Emma. I think we will get along fine.