Give your best advice to an expecting father

Congradulations!

Originally Posted by dirk diggler

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4) buy extra carseats for your inlaws and anyone else that will be moving your children around. In my prior job, I had litigation cases involving children injured when they were not strapped in properly. Extra carseats say you the hassle of trying to unswitch and reinstall them in the cold and dark. Also - buy the Britax brand. They are twice as expensive but ******* worth it. The design of the straps and hooks is something of simple wonders!


+1 - and set rules with your wife as to how you handle car seat and saftey issues, and stick to them. you will have lots of people trying to convince you that your rules are too strict and you should bend them "just this once", the basic argument will be "when we were kids we never used car seats or seat betls and we drove around in an old station wagon full of smoke". stick to your rules.

5) Be prepared to get sick. often. Kids are human petri dishes. I am suffering from a cold right now because of the youngest one.

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+1 espectially during the first year that they are in a group setting - preschool or what ever.

Ed, Dewy, Dirk and GT - thanks again - great, useful advice. Re car seats, we already bought them so I guess it's too late to change brands. All the grandparents live abroad so it's a little different for us, although we'll have to make sure that they have the right safety equipment. We'll stick to safety rules - better safe...

everyone who extended their congratulations - thanks a lot

xchen - you're an idiot and just won a spot on my ignore list

another twin thing - when you go to a resteraunt, find the person who will clean your table and tip them 5 bucks. then don't worry about what your kids do. they will make huge messes, until they are 3 or so don't worry about it, let them do what they want, it isn't worth trying to teach them to keep their space neat at that age, and it will just raise your stress level.

Originally Posted by Dakota rube

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This won't come into play for you for awhile, but always kneel down and get on an eye-to-eye level with your kids while you are talking to them.

DR - Thank you for this.

Congratulations, and good-bye sleep! Seriously, I have a 6yr-old daughter and a 3yr-old boy, and my wife in particular is about on year 7 of sleep deprivation. Mind you, as my brother is fond of saying, you can sleep when you're dead ...

Some random observations:

- your smell is important to bonding with children (especially daughters to fathers), so hold them often
- they are not as fragile as they look, so don't freak out the first time you give one a bath etc.
- don't waste a lot of money on clothes for babies/toddlers since they don't give a crap and there's tons of hand-me-downs to be had from your wife's co-workers/circle of friends. Same goes for a lot of the gadgetry (with the exception of safety-related items which are critical like car-seats)
- you are going to get an object lesson in your own parents' sacrifices. Acknowledge them if you get the chance
- get ready for tedious repetition like you have never, ever experienced in your life. I have probably reminded my children to say "please and thank-you" over 10, 000 times already. Whatever you do, don't give up when it comes to inculcating what you value
- talk to your wife about parenting expectations. There may be differences that will surprise you, and you need to come to some sort of accomodation so that it can work for you both
- lower your tone of voice when you need them to listen (this is often why women are ignored) and don't respond to "drama" with more "drama" -- you need to be calm when nobody else is
- teach your children to handle disappointment gently but firmly -- it might be the most important skill we ever learn
- you are going to be changed by this process and you have to find a way to be OK with that

I'll stop there, because there's only so much that will be useful from my experience to yours. Trust your instincts and values -- there's more than one way to get it right, and there is no substitute for authenticity.

Congratulations! My wife is pregnant with our first so I share your excitement.

Originally Posted by JoshC

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Congratulations! My wife is pregnant with our first so I share your excitement.




eg1 - thanks a lot - lots of good stuff

Originally Posted by gdl203

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xchen - you're an idiot and just won a spot on my ignore list
I think he was just kidding my friend.

Congratulations.
I have two boys, 2.5y and 11 months.
Sleep deprivation is the worse, but you get used to it: kids don't know what a week-end is, except they get to see mom and dad all day (both me and my wife have a full time job), so they tend to wake up even earlier on saturday and sunday morning!
Breast feeding is really the most convenient, no baby bottle to prepare in the middle of the night: grab the baby, feed, put the baby back to sleep. It will be hard at the beginning for the mother, you should encourage her if it's her choice.
Get a routine in place quickly, this is especially true when they will get older (> 6 months) for a go-to-bed routine roughly at the same time every day.
Mine slept all night around the age of 10 months (ie. 7:30pm to 7 - 7:30am).
If you are willing to, learn how to tie a baby carrying scarve: they do wonder to get them to sleep when they are very young and free your two arms to cook, eat... http://www.bebe-portage.com/Le-kango...-dos-sac-a-dos
If you like to cook, forget the nice and quiet evening dinner. When you have the time, cook large quantities so you can freeze some. In the first few weeks, even dining at the same time with your wife could be a problem.

!luc

Luc raises a good point about 'wake up time'. Your sons will not be sympathetic in the least when you may have had an extra glass of wine or three When it's time to get up (or even when it's not!), it's time to get up . They have absolutley no regard for hangovers, the selfish little After a long tiring day when everyone is finally tucked away and sleeping soundly, you'll take a sip of your favorite libation and think "now I know who God invented alcohol for"; the first time you overindulge you'll realize God has wicked sense of humor!

Your baby will poop in the tub at some point. Be sure to have something on hand that you don't mind having poop in to scoop it out.

Last advice to a fellow styleforumer, the first thing you should do back home from work is change clothes.

!luc

congrats! big of a pain ********** as it is, i am watching my three goons interact now and there is no greater joy!

My brother just had a kid, so I'll pass along some of the good advices given.

I read a tip a few replies back regarding tipping GENEROUSLY the waiter. By all means do it. My wife and I found that we can take our little ones ( 4 and 2) out to eat. For average level restaurant (Red Lobster, Longhorn, Olive Garden..etc) we buy each of them a Happy meal. They get to eat and play with toy. We eat FAST.

For fancier restaurant, we place our order and have the waiter bring EVERYTHING out at once. Don't really care about order either; main course before appetizer is OK. We also eat FAST.