4 month old Database Administrator

I am not the kind of guy who likes to chit chat about the weather, what happened today or who did what. My little world is limited to only a hand full of topics. One topic that makes up close to 75% of my world is software development. So needless to say that was the only thing I could possible think of talking about to my daughter. It was the only thing that I felt I had some expertise on.

So the very first thing I taught my daughter was how to setup a web server with Apache and PHP. At the time I couldn’t tell if she was excited or mad because you could feel her kicking around in the womb. Today I got my answer. She must have been excited. The reason I figured that out was, she was cranky and fussy, I took her on my lap and began to read. I read her my text book from my Oracle class. It was about how to be an Oracle administrator. I read to her about installing Oracle and she calmed right down.

I guess I must be in a dream world because I would like to think she will grow up to be a Database Administrator just like her dad. I suppose she is too young to really understand. On the other hand if reading to her will help her grow up smart then I have started the process. Besides all that, learning Oracle has got to be much more exciting than reading about ponies and princesses but I have never been a girl or been a father of a girl before so I will find out in a couple of years when she learns what I am really talking about.

4th Year Anniversary Dinner

It felt a little strange leaving her at my parents place. It made me feel kind of old. I was, however, able to put those feelings aside really quick and enjoy a nice evening with my wife. Our date was simple and only a couple of hours but it was good to have sometime to sit and talk about absolutely nothing. No talking about work, what needs to get done or being interrupted by our baby.

This was the first time we left our daughter to go on a date. Now that she is old enough to be with grandma and grandpa for a couple of hours, I think it is time to start dating again. With the busy life of having a new born I had forgotten how good it is to just spend some one on one time with each other. I heard someone once talk about the importance that children see your relationship with your wife and that they see you need time alone.

The sushi restaurants better stock up because here is a list of some of our favorites:

• Tuna Nigri
• Salmon Nigri
• Gyoza
• Red Snapper
• Miso soup
• Yam Tempura

During our recent camping trip I heard a mother yelling at her child to stop at the stop sign. In fact, over the five days, I heard many fathers and mothers trying to get there children to watch for cars. Some instructing them to stop at the stop sign, some telling them to check for cars before crossing the road and not after, and other parents nearly having a heart attack trying to chase down their children. They all had different ways of desperately trying to get the point across.

Before I became a parent I would have thought to myself “Man, can’t they teach there kids to obey them?”. It is not that I think that teaching obedience is any less important now but I find myself rather observing how differently each parent tries to get their child’s attention. It is also interesting to find how every child requires different methods of teaching.

Everyday I find that I am realizing more and more that there isn’t just one method of teaching a child. Every child is a person who is very unique from any other child or adult. Successfully teaching a child can only come by understand, loving and caring for them not by just following a book, method or formula.

I have always been able to talk with my parents and I also know other parents who have open relationships with their children. So there must be something we as parents can do. As my daughter is only 3 months old I don’t have much experience but I thought I better find out what I need to do to start things off on the right track.

I was reading that at a young age you can teach your child the importance of communication and talking. It was specifically talking about father/daughter relationships. When your daughter interrupts you during a conversation you are having with another adult you must politely tell her not to interrupt and wait her turn. Then when your done talking you turn to hear and spend time talking to her. Even if she forgot what she was going to say and you don’t let others interrupt your conversation with her.

There was much more to what I read but that is what stood out most to me. Although my daughter mostly makes silly sounds and blows bubbles I have done my best to put this into practice. Everytime she tries to talk in her own language I turn to her and look her in the eyes. I talk back and try and let her know that she has my attention. I hope this will have at least some positive effect on her but if not then atleast maybe it is training me to give her my undivided attention.

Thanks.

Dinner Time

For a while there was no such thing as family dinners for my wife and I. Family dinners have always played an important role in both of our lives. Having a new born meant that this was over for us. It seemed that just five minutes before dinner was ready to eat our baby Joy would some how know and begin to cry at the top of her lungs. No matter how early or late we decided to eat our little baby had to keep one of us occupied.

Eating for us became like shift work. One would quickly eat while the other took the baby for walks up and down the hallway. One of us would get a hot dinner and the other would get the cold left overs. Our dinner time talks were over.

If this is you or your about to have a baby don’t worry, this is just a stage and you’ll find a solution. For us it wasn’t long before our daughter began to enjoy sitting in her chair and watch us as we eat and talk. Her chair is one of those bouncy chairs that vibrates. We only let her sit there during dinner because we don’t want her to get bored of the chair. For nearly the last month it has been working perfectly with out fail.

As we sit down for dinner we all hold each others hands and thank God for our family, the day and for our food. Then our little family enjoys the nice hot dinner and the opportunity to hear about each others day. Even our girl tries to share about hers.

All Smiles

There is one thing that my wife and daughter already have in common. They both love to talk. Best of all they love to talk with me. Joy gets the biggest smile and twinkle in her eye when I talk with her.

Most of my day is spent either in meetings talking about problems or sitting by a computer trying to solve what went wrong. My little baby does not care what went wrong, what the problem is, or even what I say. She enjoys it even if all I do is stare at her and make silly noises.

It is exciting to see her grow and learn to respond to us, to see her big smile when we talk with her or touch her tiny wiggly little toes. The toes that she just descovered. Her conversation is disrupted between being amused by her toes and the little fingers that all try to fit into her mouth at one time. She changes so fast, I’m sure that any dad knows just how fast.

For several minutes she will say ‘hey, hey, hey’. I am not sure what she is trying to say but you can see on her delighted face she is trying to communicate with us in the only word she knows. I love it. The exact meaning of what she is trying to say doesn’t matter, what does matter is that she loves to talk to us. If that is all she would say for hours then I would listen to every minute of it.

The pleasures we get from our baby are simple. I even though what she does is simple the joy is beyond what I could have ever imagined. Although I can not speak from experience, I heard the joy just increases as children get older.