Pros and Cons of being a stay at home dad..... just a few anyways.

Well first and foremost, the best pro is that I get to spend the days with my heck of son Adrien. Which just so you know is awesome. I always hear parents say they miss their kid or that they missed something their kid did. Like the first time they crawl or walk. I had the privilege to see those things. To match that in the con column is I don't get much family time. I get to see my wife all of about 10-30 mins a day usually. That is not enough for me. Spending our saturday's together is awesome, it's just not enough. Pro number dos would have to be that I am not dropping Adrien off at a daycare that who knows what he would do all day. No offense to daycare workers, but i guess i just like to know what my kid is doing. Not to mention the equal of this pro is not paying for daycare. Holy moly. Con number two would have to be I don't get very much "me" time. I wake up when Adrien wakes up and my only breaks are while he naps. Which are usually taken up by housework during the first nap and me getting ready for work during the second nap. Then Kim gets home, I bag up my dinner and I'm out the door. I don't consider driving by myself as "me" time because I'm driving somewhere I don't want to go. I work my 5 hours. Then drive home and usually go to sleep between 11 and 12. Depends on how tired I am. That is monday through friday. Sunday is my 10 hour work day so there isn't much time to squeeze in some time to myself. Saturday is the only day for said "me" time. But it's also the only day for "family" time. So this too is part of the con, having to choose. So most of the time I consider mowing the lawn or cutting down trees in the woods as my "me" time which is kind of shitty time, but works. Sometimes while Adrien is napping Kim let's me go outside and work on the truck or something like that. Not saying that not having time to myself is her fault. I just always choose the family time over the time to myself. The last issue I'm going to touch on is sort of a pro and a con. Which is why it's last. I have turned into what most call Mr. Mom. I cart Adrien around and do the grocery shopping or run the occasional errand. I wash, fold and put away clothes. I wash the dishes. I plan and cook meals. Well unless Kim picks out the recipe, then it's she plans and I create. I don't necessarily do these things every day, except cook. But I actually do a lot around here. I never try to throw it in Kim's face. I never say I do more than you. Because at the end of the day, I do it to let my wife spend a little bit of time with her son before he goes to sleep. I get somewhere around 9 hours a day with Adrien. You figure, she only gets about 3 hours a night with him. That's if she doesn't have a meeting of some sort. So for those 3 or so hours I want her to be able to enjoy her son. Watch him play and act silly. She deserves it. So the con is a lot of hard work. The pro is my wife not having to worry about anything but spending time with our precious son. That my friend's makes all this worth it. I get time with my boy and my wife gets time with her son. To me, it's just a little work in between.

blah...Monday...blah

So as per usual, I haven't posted in a while. It's monday and Adrien is napping. Which means I am making the grocery list.... YAY(totally fake). I don't mind going to the grocery store. It's actually pretty fun. But I always hate making the grocery list. Kim has decided to start eating healthier, which is good for her but bad for me because I like calories and fat and carbs. Also it makes making this list even damn harder! So she finds recipes in magazines or in blogs that she reads and leaves them laying on the table or pulled up on the iPad. But it's usually only like 2 maybe 3 recipes. I always try to tell her I have to buy 6 meals when I go to the grocery store. One of those being something she will actually cook on sunday's while I'm at work. So 2 or 3 recipes don't really help me that much. As a side note here as to not have her smack me the next time she sees me after reading this, thank for the help that you do provide me with for grocery shopping doll face. So here I sit, listening to The Black Keys, making a grocery list and chatting with said doll face on Skype. I hate monday's. I don't know why. For most people monday means back to the work week. Well that was yesterday for me. All 10 glorious hours of being at that dreadful place. It is a job though. Not better than this job, but this job doesn't pay. It is more rewarding. When I don't have to change anymore really horrible crappy diapers, he can learn to pee in a toilet and can say his ABC's backwards then I will know all my hard work has paid off. There are a lot more rewarding things. I just picked the three most awesome in this scenario. After finally getting my copy of the Tao Te Ching back, i started reading that last night. I have to read it aloud because that is the easiest way to understand it. I may have to read it like 4 times just to make sure i understand it all. Anyone who has ever read may understand this. Unless you're smart and didn't smoke a lot and drink a lot when you were younger. To you I say, good for you. Onto baby stuff. Adrien seems to be growing by the day. Understands near about everything you say to him. Just refuses to say words. He can say what sounds like hello, hey and no. But uses them all at times not suitable for the word. However when we go off and he is sitting in the cart he knows to say HEY to get the person's attention shopping next to us. It's actually pretty funny. This time with him I would not trade for the world. He is a sweet little boy. He loves us and loves to pull Kelly's tail. So I'm not a hundred percent on whether he loves her just yet, or just sees her as another play toy. Banana however, he loves that cat to death. This is about all I have for you on this dreadful monday. Wait one last thing, I am almost 4 months tobacco/nicotine free. Which is totally awesome. Even though I miss it and want to smoke every single day and if it weren't for my responsible neighbor JB, i would have already cracked a few times. Now that's really all I have at this point unless it matters that I switched to listening to Stone Temple Pilots. I swear one of these days I am going to write on here 3 times a week. I'm going to leave you all with a chapter from the Tao Te Ching. Just something to think about....

                                                  II. Self-Development
When everyone recognizes beauty to be only a masquerade, then it is simply ugliness. In the same way goodness, if it is not sincere, is not goodness. So existence and non-existence are incompatible. The difficult and easy are mutually opposites. Just as the long and the short, the high and the low, the loud and soft, the before and the behind, are all opposites and reveals the other.

Therefore the wise man is not conspicuous in his affairs or given to much talking. Though troubles arise he is not irritated. He produces but does not own; he acts but claims no merit; he builds but does not dwell therein; and because he does not dwell therein he never departs.