Beach Vacation Packing Essentials for Dads

Posted on 08 18, 2008 under Mantivities by foodad | Comments

“Here comes the donkey
Chained to a ten ton plough
he’ll never make that hill in a million years
whip CRACK beat em down” -What the World is Waiting For - Stone Roses

That donkey is me. One of the Ocean City locals commented that I looked like a pack mule and that she was impressed with the amount of stuff I hauled to and from the beach every day. We noodads are used to this though. We can carry 10-20 times our own weight in gear. Maybe that was ants. At any rate, whether it’s carrying things through the airport, carrying multiple kids to the car in a rain storm or hauling beach gear we can pile it on.

The daily routine for me this vacation was to load up the beach cart, drag it down to the beach, set everything up and then commence digging. Digging post holes for beach umbrellas, piles of sand for sandcastles, moats for said castles and holes for the sake of having holes. This year it was a lot easier because I actually went to the hardware store about an hour before we left for the shore and bought a shovel. I have been keeping a list of all of the things that I think are must haves for a beach vacation for dads.

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Solving Food Dilemmas With Food Faces

Posted on 08 16, 2008 under The Manual by Noodad | Comments

If you watch the Iron Chef you would know that “plating” is a big part in presentation of your meal. If you just throw a spoonful of slop in a bowl your kid will most likely not want to eat it. Oliver only asked for “more” because he was a dirty, starving orphan. Your kid needs to find eating fun and enjoyable. Here are some things that I have found success with when it comes to presentation of the meal. Read the rest of this entry »

What I learned about Flying with Kids 2008 Edition

Posted on 08 10, 2008 under The Manual by Noodad | Comments

A couple of years ago I wrote here on Noodad.com about what you need to know when flying with kids. My experiences at the time were small potatoes compared to the planning and fine tuned execution needed to pull off this one. Now I had 3 kids: a 5 year old girl that thinks she knows everything, a 3 year old boy that is potty training, and a 1 1/2 year old boy that does not like to be pinned down in a car seat.  All this with a cross-country flight from Raleigh, NC to San Diego, CA with a layover at a little airport called JFK in New York.

Here’s what I learned from our trip. This list is not in order of appearance, only order of traumatic impact.

Always bring a change of clothes for you and your kids
Just when you think your 3 year old has mastered the “i need to take a piss and dump so I’m going to tell someone” this comes along. My 3 year old decided to not tell us that he peed in his pullup. 4 hours later his pee soaked pullup started trickling out onto his shorts and onto the plane seat. Then before realizing this fact, I sat him on my lap thereby soaking my shorts with his piss. Now we are faced with a decision of humiliating the poor kid for the duration of the flight and the layover by making him walk around in a pullup or having him sit in his pee-soaked shorts for the rest of the flight. We chose the latter. Good times. Read the rest of this entry »