My kitchen smelled like a wet basement for three days straight because I thought I could outsmart a balloon and some flour. Being a single dad in Atlanta means you’re often the guy trying to figure out how to make a twelve-year-old’s birthday not suck while also trying to keep the dog from eating the…
Standing in the middle of my living room on May 14, 2024, I watched twenty-one kindergartners vibrating with sugar-induced energy while trying to balance mismatched china teacups on their tiny knees. I was sweating through my “World’s Okayest Dad” t-shirt, praying the white carpet wouldn’t end up stained pink by the gallon of raspberry lemonade…
I can still hear the rhythmic clicking sound of two thousand plastic bricks being dumped onto my hardwood floor. It is a sound that haunts my dreams, right along with the smell of overcooked tater tots and the sight of a glitter-glue explosion in my second-grade classroom. Last March 12, I hosted Leo’s 7th birthday…
My eardrums still ring when I think about April 12th. Denver was sunny, the grill was hot, and 22 seven-year-olds were descending on my backyard like a pack of caffeinated hyenas. I had exactly $85 left in the birthday fund after the cake fiasco, and I needed to find the best noise makers for four…
Scrubbing neon pink frosting off my marble-look backsplash at 11:47 PM on a Tuesday wasn’t exactly how I envisioned my week ending, but that is the reality of being a mom to three kids under twelve in the rainy suburbs of Portland. My oldest, Sophie, just hit that weird “tween” transition where she is too…
Glitter is still coming out of my floorboards two years later, and honestly, I think it’s just part of the subfloor now. My youngest, Mia, turned three on October 14, 2024, and she was obsessed with “spinning like a princess,” which is toddler-speak for ballet. I had exactly zero dollars in the “fancy party” fund…
Standing in my kitchen on October 12, 2024, I realized that a group of eleven four-year-olds has the collective decibel level of a jet engine, and I was about to give them whistles. My son, Leo, was turning four, and I had this vision of a “Hero Training Academy” in our backyard in Atlanta. I…
My basement smelled like rain. Muddy puddles. Not real ones, thankfully, although the Denver snow outside was melting into a slushy mess on February 12, 2024. My daughter Maya was turning two, and I had exactly eighty-five dollars and a spreadsheet to make her world turn pink. I am the kind of dad who reads…
My living room looked like a Pepto-Bismol factory exploded. It was a Saturday in April, and I was standing in the middle of a pink vortex trying to figure out how to fold a napkin into a cat ear shape. I am a single dad in Atlanta. I don’t naturally “do” pink. My usual weekend…
April 12, 2025, was the day I finally broke. My nephew Caleb was turning three, and my sister—bless her heart—decided a “Fintastic” underwater theme was the only way to go. As a Houston elementary teacher with twenty-two second-graders in my classroom every weekday, I thought I was prepared for anything. I was wrong. By 2:00…
