My kitchen floor in Beaverton was covered in green crepe paper and half-eaten chicken nuggets by 10:00 AM last Tuesday. Leo is four now. Four is a big deal in our house because it means you finally get to pick your own birthday theme, and he chose “big scary dinosaurs.” I spent three weeks hunting…
Leo’s 5th birthday was on April 12th last year, and let me tell you, Portland decided to give us a classic “liquid sunshine” day. Seventeen five-year-olds trapped in my living room with a sugar high. I had spent weeks obsessing over the best centerpiece for carnival party setups because I wanted that “wow” factor without…
My kitchen floor felt like a giant glue trap by 4 PM on April 12, 2024. Leo had just turned two, and my living room looked like a scene from a low-budget disaster movie where the monsters wore primary colors and capes. I sat there, nursing a lukewarm coffee, surrounded by shredded wrapping paper and…
My classroom floor currently looks like a plastic cup factory exploded, and frankly, I wouldn’t have it any other way. Last Tuesday, I stood in the middle of Room 402 with twenty-two screaming second-graders, all trying to solve a riddle hidden on the bottom of escape room cups for kids I’d bought on a whim….
My living room looked like a jungle exploded, and not the cool, National Geographic kind of jungle. It was more like a humid, glue-covered disaster zone where a very tired single dad was trying to figure out why he promised twenty adults they could wear safari gear at a six-year-old’s birthday party. Last April, on…
My daughter Maya turned nine on June 12, 2025, and I learned a hard lesson about paper cuts, cheap glitter, and the absolute chaos of a Denver windstorm. We threw what Maya called her “Royal Rocky Mountain” bash. 14 kids showed up. That is a lot of sugar-crazed royalty running around a backyard. Once the…
My living room looked like a magenta explosion had met a tropical hurricane on the morning of March 12, 2024. I was standing on a shaky kitchen chair, sweating through my “World’s Okayest Dad” t-shirt, trying to tape a rogue Mirabel foil balloon to the ceiling while my daughter, Maya, yelled that the “butterfly vibe”…
My kitchen table looked like a dragon had sneezed on it after Leo’s 7th birthday on October 12, 2025. Remnants of “Polyjuice Potion”—which was mostly green Gatorade and ginger ale—stained the white lace tablecloth I promised my wife I’d protect. We had fifteen 7-year-olds running around our Denver backyard, screaming about Dementors and tripping over…
Leo turned eight on April 12th, and my living room currently looks like a plastic brick factory exploded in a hurricane of primary colors. If you have ever stepped on a 2×4 rectangular brick at 2 AM while trying to find a glass of water, you know the specific, searing pain that only a father…
The humidity in Austin on July 12, 2025, felt like a warm, wet blanket that someone had forgotten in the dryer for three days. My nephew, Leo, was turning four, and despite the fact that I am usually the “cool aunt” who brings the best gifts, I found myself volunteered to host a backyard bash…
