Twenty-four toddlers in a humid Houston living room sounds like the start of a horror movie to some, but for me, it is just another Tuesday in October. My nephew, Leo, turned three on October 12, 2024, and my sister begged me to help her manage the chaos because I have survived a decade of…
My living room in Austin looked like NASA exploded on a Tuesday morning, and quite frankly, I was here for the chaos. Leo turned six on June 12, 2025, and I had exactly three hours before eighteen energetic kindergartners descended upon my house for what I hoped would be a “One Small Step” masterpiece. The…
Austin in June is essentially the surface of the sun, but that didn’t stop me from trying to hang a three-foot-tall glittery castle from a live oak tree in my backyard. My dog, Luna, was already vibrating with excitement, mostly because she thought the giant cardboard structure was a new, very expensive chew toy. I…
Rain was absolutely hammering our Portland windows on April 12th, turning our front yard into a muddy swamp, when my phone rang. My sister was stuck in Denver. Flight canceled. And her son Toby’s second birthday party was scheduled for exactly 48 hours later at my house. Fifteen toddlers were already RSVP’d. I had zero…
Leo stared at me with those big four-year-old eyes on June 12, 2024, and I knew I was in deep. He didn’t just want a birthday party; he wanted to live inside the Mushroom Kingdom. Being a single dad in Atlanta means I’ve learned that “winging it” usually leads to a house covered in glitter…
The air in Denver is thin, but the expectations for my brother-in-law’s 30th birthday were sky-high last weekend. Dave is a software developer who still spends his Friday nights in “survival mode” building blocky fortresses. My wife, Sarah, and I decided to throw him a surprise bash that didn’t feel like a toddler’s playroom. Finding…
My dining room table in suburban Houston was covered in exactly three pounds of wet kinetic sand, a violently malfunctioning hot glue gun, and forty half-cut artificial palm leaves. It was October 12th, 2023. I teach first grade. I survive six full-blown, chaotic classroom parties a year by running a ruthlessly tight ship. But my…
The Austin sun was brutal on October 18, 2025, and my backyard looked like a neon-green crime scene. I stood there, sweating through my “Coolest Aunt” t-shirt, while my golden retriever, Barnaby, tried to eat a tattered piece of black crepe paper. Eleven kids, all nine years old and fueled by enough sugar to power…
Six a.m. found me hunched over a kitchen island covered in sticky red residues and tangled fishing line, wondering why I promised my eight-year-old son, Leo, the most epic Marvel-themed bash Denver had ever seen. My wife, Sarah, slept peacefully while I wrestled with a six-foot vinyl sheet that refused to hang straight. This was…
Western Avenue was a slushy mess on March 12th, the kind of Chicago afternoon that makes you want to hibernate, but I had eighteen six-year-olds arriving in three hours. My twins, Maya and Leo, were turning six, and Maya had specifically requested a “shimmery underwater sparkle palace” which, in mom-speak, meant I needed a lot…
