Dad’s Workbench: A Dad Blog

Saying Goodbye

Saying Goodbye

Only days away until we will be saying goodbye to our first home. We bought it about five years ago. Even though we love our place, we are looking forward to our new home. A little more room for our little girl, rec room for my wife to take care of a couple kids (as a side income), and a school yard to take the kids to.

Five years ago I was make very little money as technical support and it was all we could afford. Working hard to save money, getting a better job as a Software Analyst / Database Administrator and now becoming a dad, it was time to get something a little bigger and better. At times it felt like we were going nowhere.

Now looking back all those months of scrapping by, it was well worth the sacrifices. We paid off our mobile home and have a large down payment. Someone said that the success is where preparation and opportunity meet. There are sacrifices, preparation and work before you can ever become successful. If the opportunity comes but there was no preparation  ahead of time you miss the opportunity.

Just thinking about my little girls life, what will make her life a success? As a dad it is my responsibility to prepare her for life. It will me sacrifices and work for me. It will mean getting her to do things she might not always like. There will be good times and though times but in the end she will be a success.

So I guess that is my goodbye to our home, the work, the hard times and the good times. It is a hello to an opportunity taken and preperation for the next opportunity down the road.

Living With Grandparents

Working in IT and living in a small city do not really go together well, especially when lumber and mining our the main industry. However, with both sets of Joy’s grandparents living here we decided to stay (at least for now).

To us family is more important that having a big house, new cars or holidays. Don’t get me wrong, I like those things very much. I also want to make lots of money. In fact, if you have lots of money you probably can afford to work less and spend more time with them. So I think there is a balance spending time to make money and spending money to make time.

Right now neither money nor time are in my favor but I am working hard to keep a balance. Having grandparents around has been great. She loves all the attention from grandparents, uncles and her favorite aunt

To live a wealthy life requires success in all areas of life. Finances, health, family, friends and a relationship with God are among the things that make our lives wealthy. A lack in one area usually means a lack in another area. Somethings hold more value and we all value somethings more than other things.

For us grandparents rank very high on the list of things that make our lifes wealthy.

No Joy

Until Now

Up to this point all our parenting skills required of us was to meet her physical needs, show her we love her, that she is protected and that she is safe. I don’t think that was too hard for either of us. We both come from great, loving and caring homes. We have great people that serve as examples all around us.

With Joy learning to crawl we have also begun to teach her the word “No”. In our society it seems as if this word does not exist. Everyone is told they can have what they want, do as they feel and that there is nothing to stop them. I believe that self discipline brings success. It brings success not only to us in the physical form (our positions, money and jobs) but it also brings success to the real us (who we are as a person, relationships and our thinking).

Teaching “No”

Joy now crawls towards the power cables and Ethernet cables to our computers. If we say “No” to her she will slowly move her hand away then attempt again. Each time we say no she is learning it is something she shouldn’t do. She does not fully understand what it means and she definitely does not understand why. After saying no a couple of times we move her to something she can have because we know that she does not completely know what we are saying to her. We want to show her there are some thing she can not have and other things she can freely enjoy.

We take the opportunity to say “No” a couple of times so that she can learn. Eventually she will know what “No” means then once she fully understands it will be a matter of if she chooses to obey or not. Obedience is where real parenting comes in. From obedience, self discipline will come in the form of “Do I do what is right when Dad and Mom are not watching?”.

There will be times when she can’t understand why we say “No” even if we do try and explain. The harm remains the same if she understands or doesn’t understand why. The harm is there when we are watching or not watching. Obedience and self discipline keeps us safe and brings us success.

Being The Example

That is a hard enough topic to think about when we talk about raising kids and definitely an important topic. Let us not however just look at how to raise our kids without being the example. So let me ask this question: Are we as well educated adults willing to accept “No” from people of authority (Bosses, governors, and others who are over us)? Will we do what is right whether we understand or not, and whether they are watching or not?