My Project 365

WordPress has recently challenged its bloggers to  post something every day of 2012. While it will be difficult, I’ve come up with a way to make this happen while remaining as minimally taxing on my followers as possible.

Since I’m fortunate enough to see my children so often, I am going to attempt Project 365 by taking pictures of my babies every day and writing a little something to go along with it. Be it a funny story, a minimal description, or perhaps even a Haiku, I’m going to attempt this.

So I thought I’d explain why there will be daily pictures of my children on this blog and there it is. Everyone should know in advance that I absolutely suck at photography. Just be prepared for more pictures of two cute kids than you can possibly imagine. That was a little hyperbolic, I know.

Nevertheless, here is a preview of the cuteness to come.

The Shark with the Best Bite

Let me start off by saying that it’s weird to be writing about this. I’m 26. I should be writing about what awesome New Year’s plans I have (which I don’t) or how exciting this year’s football season is (it’s not terribly exciting), not how awesome my vacuum cleaner is. But I can’t resist my desire to let the world know that the Shark Navigator is possibly the best vacuum cleaner ever made. This vacuum really sucks; in the good way that a vacuum should. I vacuum about once a week and it consistently fills the dust canister after vacuuming my house two or three times.

The truth is that I wanted to rave about my vacuum cleaner when my wife first got it six months ago, but I’m always weary of reviews people write on a product that they just bought so I decided to wait to see how my feelings held up. After six months I can say I’m still in love with it and will probably love it until the day it dies.

It’s been updated from the model I currently have and the newer model allows you to remove the canister for greater portability. I don’t have pets so I haven’t really tested the attachments specifically designed for pet hair, but if the vacuum itself is any indication, then I can’t imagine they’re anything less than awesome.

It also has a five-year warranty, which is longer than any other warranty I’ve found on a vacuum cleaner. It’s super easy to clean and if there’s anything negative to say, it’s regarding how often it needs to be emptied. I don’t know if that’s a negative though because it just means it sucks up everything in its path.

The best thing about this vacuum is the price. Although $150-$200 may seem a lot for a vacuum cleaner, Shark boasts that it never loses suction, just like Dyson. The difference is that Dyson vacuum cleaners are closer to $600. So if you want a lot of value for your money, Shark

If you don’t believe in Shark’s awesomeness, just look for reviews from other owners. Nearly all of them love it. So if you’re in the market for a vacuum cleaner, get a Shark. You won’t regret it.

Neighborhood Playgrounds and the Dangers They Pose

When my son was born, he was the center of my world. The first child often is the center of a parent’s world. There’s also a massive attention disparity between a firstborn and any subsequent children. As sad as it is to admit, all the fanfare goes to the firstborn. That’s why firstborns are always the heirs to thrones and held in such high regard throughout several cultures. By nature, we’re always excited by the first of something.

And even when planning to have a first child, actually holding your firstborn in your arms is surprising. No amount of planning can prepare you for that feeling or the experience it will bring. That’s why it can be difficult for many parents to relax when it comes to their firstborn. We coddle them, we’re protective, we sometimes can have difficulty leaving them with others. We try to control everything around them so when the situation arises where they might accidentally poke themselves in the eye with the corner of a copy of, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?, they don’t.

When my eldest was about a year old, we started going to the park more often. He loved running around, climbing on the jungle gym, and picking up whatever he found on the ground. He’s two and a half now and none of that has changed, but my attitude toward picking up whatever off the ground has. The first time he scooped a handful of dirt and started rubbing it between his fingers and flinging it like a monkey, I freaked out. I went into daddy protective mode and pulled out the baby wipes to wipe off the dirt from his hands. As soon as I got them clean he did it again. I didn’t even realize I was such a clean freak until I became a parent.

I probably wouldn’t have thought much of it if the week before my wife hadn’t told me about some kid who, on the same playground, dropped his pants, urinated nearby, and went right back to playing. No one blinked an eye to this surprising act of public urination. The other kids went about playing and it was as if the other parents didn’t even notice there was a kid peeing very near where their children were playing. I wasn’t there, but my wife’s retelling of it was enough to send me into a panic when our son picked up dirt where some other kid could have possibly urinated or done who knows what else, and started playing with it like it was sand at the beach. That’s why ignorance is bliss.

So after fussing over my son’s dirty hands for far too long, I realized that I was once a kid too. My parents let me play in the dirt without freaking out. What kind of adult would I have turned out to be if they had? I had to let go. I had to be selfish by letting the consequences of my son’s actions take their course. If he got something, I’d just have to deal with it.

Nothing happened to him, thank goodness, and I’d like to report that no harm can come from playing with dirt, but that’s not true. A couple of weeks ago my daughter, also now one year old, picked up dirt and did the same thing with it at the park near our house. I let it be, she put her hands in her mouth a few times, but I just let it be. Now she has Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease. While there are dirtier things than dirt in this world, it still isn’t clean.