Getting Through the Holidays

Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday. While the turkey and pumpkin pie are always amazing, it is family and cooking together that makes the holiday truly special for me. Christmas has always been a distant second, but I have a newfound appreciation for it now that I have children. It is so nice to see them get involved with the Elf on the Shelf, writing letters to Santa, and the smile on their faces Christmas morning is simply priceless. Until last year, I had been lucky enough to have spent every single Thanksgiving and Christmas day with my family, which can be pretty hard for someone in the military. Unfortunately, to reach a compromise that would give me primary custodianship of my girls, I agreed that their mother could have them for Thanksgiving every year, which was really tough to give up, and Christmas every other year. This is the first year that we are executing our Parenting Plan with their mother getting visitation rights during Thanksgiving and Christmas in the same year, which makes for a really lonely holiday season for this single Dad. So with my girls enjoying Christmas with their mother, her family, and her new fiancé (yes, already), the holiday season is forcing me to cope with this as best as I can and to try to figure out where to go from here.

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The Nutcracker – Ballet Tucson

Daddy Daughter Days do not happen as often as they did before, but on the rare occasion that I have a babysitter or family in town, I try to spend some quality one-on-one time with both Elaina and Gabriella. It is an excellent opportunity to bond with your child without sister interference, as they both tend to get frustrated when the other turns Dad’s attention away from them. Elaina is currently enrolled in ballet at her Child Development Center and she mentioned to me a few weeks ago that she really wanted to see the Nutcracker Ballet. Not really sure how she got this idea, but I aim to please. And it seemed like a good activity for a Daddy Daughter Day, which we have not had in a while. I got tickets for The Nutcracker, presented by Ballet Tucson, and Elaina was just ecstatic. She gets to wear a pretty dress and watch real ballerinas in action. I get to spend some quality time with my oldest daughter and broaden my horizons. Talk about a win-win scenario.

Someone is just beaming prior to the performance

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Weekend Activities – Pima Air & Space Museum

Since I was a young boy, I have always been fascinated with both airplanes and World War II. One of my fondest memories was when my Dad took me to Washington D.C., which included a visit to the National Air and Space Museum. Since the Pima Air & Space Museum in Tucson, AZ has an absolutely amazing collection of aircraft, particularly those from the Second World War, I have always wanted to make a visit. But with having two daughters who spend their evenings hosting tea parties in their princess dresses, when were they ever going to let me visit a museum with stationary planes? As I have mentioned before, these girls just keep surprising me.

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Weekend Activities – Children’s Museum Tucson

So we had a four-day weekend due to Veteran’s Day (to all you Veterans, thank you for your service), which meant that the girls got to pick two day’s worth of activities instead of just one. The first day consisted of Children’s Museum Tucson and the Pima Animal Care Center, the latter of which will be a part of an (eventual) series on our family’s journey towards adopting a dog. We have a membership at this children’s museum, just like we did for one at our previous duty station in Washington, because it pretty much pays for itself after two visits. And given that we have already been there four times in the last two months, we seem to be getting our money’s worth.

“And your child can earn their PhD in minutes!”

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Making Mealtimes Fun

So my oldest daughter has always been on the petite side. She eats well, but is very active, and never seemed to put on any significant weight. At one point, her pediatrician actually accused her mother and I of not feeding her, which was downright insulting. Eventually she started gaining weight, and compared to my youngest, she is my “good eater.” Now it is Gabby that wants to take her time with dinner, sometimes eating very little. Since she is currently in the middle of her age’s weight percentile and that her sister eventually snapped out of it, I am not terribly concerned. I just wish that they were not grazers and instead ate whole meals with smaller healthy snacks in between (as opposed to the other way around). Again, thankfully, those snacks usually consist of cottage cheese, grapes, strawberries, carrots with hummus, and deli meat, as opposed to just cereal and gummies. Either way, I try my best to make mealtimes fun in the hopes that they will leave the dinner table with both a smile and a full stomach.

Appetizers on the First Trip to the Park

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Weekend Activities – Tombstone and Buffalo Corral Riding Stables

So another one of our rules is that we have to “do something out of the house as a family” at least one day out of every weekend, which usually happens on Saturday (no completely lazy weekends for this family). Like every other weekend, I gave the girls some options to start. The Children’s Museum of Tucson? No. Patagonia Lake? No. Because Grandma and Papa had such a good time there this week, the girls decided they wanted to go to Tombstone, AZ, or as they call it, “The Cowboy Town.” They told me that one of the reasons that they wanted to go was so they could ride horses, so I added that we could go to the Buffalo Corral Riding Stables after we got back to post. After Elaina was famously quoted as telling me that “Dad, kids like to do things, not look at things!” during the tram tour at the Pima Air & Space Museum, I figured that they would be bored in Tombstone; as always, these girls keep surprising me.

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Cooking and Meal Planning

It may seem like I am quite the prolific writer for a blog that is only two days old, but after being a single Dad for more than 16 months, there is still a lot that my family has gone through that I have yet to post about. I figured the next topic to tackle would be something that single Dads (and single Moms, for that matter) can have some trouble with: Cooking and Meal Planning. Not only can it be a tall order for any parent to find a delicious and nutritious meal that their preschoolers will actually eat, but it adds to the difficultly level when you have to find the time before or after work to prepare and cook this amazing meal.

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Halloween with Grandma and Papa

My Mother and Stepfather (Grandma and Papa) briefly watched the girls while I was away at a conference and we figured it was best for them to stay all the way through Halloween. I mean, what 5- or 3-year old is going to turn down an extra week being spoiled by Grandma? Not these two. Although I did my best to persuade them otherwise, both of my girls were determined to go as princesses this year, with Elaina going as Elena of Avalor and Gabriella going as Rapunzel. I normally would not have minded except that they just wore the same dresses a month ago to Disney on Ice, they wear them to school and around the house all the time, and they did not give me enough warning to get a Flynn Rider costume (we went as the Rockford Peaches last year, with them wearing the ballplayer outfits and myself as the manager). We did try to add to their normal dress-up routine though, with Elaina getting some stickers for her face and Gabby getting a nice new pair of Rapunzel gloves, because of course they already had their tiaras.

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Welcome to our Adventure!

Enjoying the Tram Tour at the Pima Air & Space Museum

Every dad, if he takes time out of his busy life to reflect upon his fatherhood, can learn ways to become an even better dad. — Jack Baker

Greetings.

I am a single father to two daughters, Elaina (5) and Gabriella (3), who are more important than anything else in my life, as they very well should be. Unfortunately, the marriage between their mother and I did not work out and I was appointed the primary custodian of our children. While already trying to be the best father I possibly could, this meant that I had to step up my game even more. Single fatherhood is always going to be a work in progress, but every day gets a little bit better as I gain more experience and the girls become a little more understanding. Through school, meals, discipline, and our weekend activities, we are making it work and having a blast doing it.

I started this blog for two reasons. The first is to be a productive outlet for my family and myself by highlighting how much fun you can have when you put family first, regardless of your family structure. The second is to inspire and give hope to other single fathers out there, especially those that are the primary custodians of their children. Getting through a divorce is extremely difficult and it is a full-time job being a single father, but hopefully this blog demonstrates that it not only gets better with time and experience, but can be truly rewarding.

Thank you for being a part of our adventure.

Cheers!

Robert