BIG HONKIN PHOTO POST!!

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

WOW. Thats it, just wow, mostly at how busy Craig and I have been. We both have a ton of material in the drafts but, for now, here are some photos from the past month or so, its a content heavy post, beware!!

best part of some "janky" as c called it,  carnival in our town!


 HA! Insane static!

 Putting Craig to work1
 In a perfect world, THEY DRIVE!


 The following few photos are from a series I started and never finished. They are all taken with hand-held lighting during the day, super high shutter speed, high iso.










 Monkey Joes!




 @ Olgas Cup & Saucer in Providence


 My boy is getting so big! Seems like just yesterday he needed me or bath-time!

THE WINNER of the Land's End Polo Shirt: THINK PRIDDY BLOG

Thursday, June 23, 2011

First off I want to thank everyone that entered via tweeting, commenting and following our blog! Secondly I want to wish everyone a Happy Belated Father's Day and hope you had a great one. So I used a "Random Thing Picker" to choose a winner so it would be fair and our winner is... drum roll please... Christine Rojas of the Think Priddy blog!  Congratulations Christine! I will be e-mailing you with details so we can get this shirt shipped out to you! Thanks a ton everyone and we look forward to doing more giveaways VERY soon :) -C





p.s. please take two seconds to click the banner below and then click the little brown speech bubble, no signing up, just 2 clicks and you can help us stay in TBB's Top 10! Thanks guys <3

C.C. Chapman's video from the Father's Day Pampers Cookout!

Monday, June 20, 2011



An open letter to my boys, the secret of life.


 When my wife, Adriana, of Just by Living and Monkey & the Bug asked me to do a fathers day guest post for her I was worried I would have a hard time knowing what to write. There are other posts in the series from some great dads such as Derek from Tart and Don from Adeline's Daddy, so the bar was set pretty high. I sat down to write with an empty head, but that quickly changed. I found myself flooded with words and could not type fast enough to get it all out, which is similar to how I feel for my kids.

There was a time, not too long ago, where I was putting a ton of myself into my career, too much actually. I have ALWAYS taken the time to play with my boys, to roll around on the ground with them, play pokemon, go for walks, play with legos, and read countless books. Being there was not the issue, it was the amount of me that was there. I am easily distracted, and getting this new business of mine off of the ground has not made things any easier. I am constantly responding to text messages, emails, and fb isues on my phone, and it always breaks my concentration, my attention, my 100% bonding time. This is an easy mistake to make, a slippery slope, a tough cycle to break, but I am out of it. I realize that I am rambling right now, and this has nothing to do with the letter to my kids, but I guess it does in a way. When I sat down to write that letter I was flooded with love for my boys, as I am on a daily basis. When I wake up next to Hendrix and his big ol mop of hair I swear I can feel my heart swell, when I look in the rear-view mirror at Christian's beautiful eyes as he tells me a 45 min story about some video game he is creating in his head, I feel as though I could listen forever. I made the conscious effort to be more available, to COMPLETELY be there when I am with my children, and I suggest you do the same. It is so easy to get wrapped up in the world, in worrying about paying bills, settling beefs, planning events, and all the 1.5 million other things that go on around you. The reality is: its all bullshit. Those are the things in life that dont really matter, give them the minimal amount of attention and swift kick in the ass they need and turn to your children, thats the secret of life, for me anyways.

Ok, I wasnt planning on writing that much, I apologize, and thanks for getting this far, here is the letter I wrote, I hope you enjoy it.

Michael


Some Fathers Day tips for both old and new dogs alike!

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Before becoming a father, officially, as in before the birth of my first son, I read a lot. I pushed my way through books about parenting, birth, education, and every other topic I could think of that would prepare me for being a father, and very little of it hit home. It felt like the books were written in a very matter of fact manner that were meant to push other peoples views and vanilla flavored facts down your throat, who wants that? A young man that is about to embark on the biggest, most exciting/terrifying adventure of his life? NOPE. I have to admit, when I was first asked to share some parenting tips, I quickly flashed back to late nights spent reading and trying to "learn" about parenting, but the simple fact is, you just do it. When my wife shared concerns over whether she was going to be a good mom, or how she would do this and accomplish that I always told her the same thing: you just do. And you know what, she just did, as you will do, and every parent out there is (hopefully) capable of.


Currently, I have two children, one of them is 9 going on 19, the other is almost 19 months, and I have definitely learned a lot from the both of them.  I am married to a wonderful, supportive woman, who is the mother of one of my boys, Hendrix, and my other boy, Christian, is from a previous marriage. I learned a lot going through a divorce and custody proceedings. The majority of what I learned is that it sucks, and there really is no "right" or "easy" way to go about things. I own an event planning and management company which allows me to be home during the day with my boys, it doesn't get much better then that! Ok, enough about me, here are a couple nuggets of wisdom if you will. Hopefully these will help smooth a few of the bumps for you new dads, and ease a few knots of tension for the seasoned vets. One of the things I try to remember, as a dad, is you CAN teach an old dog new tricks, especially if that dog is a sleep deprived father at wits end!


Tip 1: 10 minutes goes a long way! Sit down with your kid before work and read a book, plop them in the tub for a quick bath, or just tickle them silly out on the front lawn! This goes for after work, before you make that important call, during work (if you work from home), or in the middle of a big project. When you dont have time for quantity, go for quality! You would be surprised how far that short bonding session goes and how it can change both of your days!


Tip 2: Make it work! IF you are separated, divorced, or even if you were never married to the baby mama, make it work! Your child, no matter how much you think they cant, will FEEL what is going on between the two of you. Think before you speak and never allow yourself to get baited into a fight. Once you stop fighting that sail quickly runs out of air and becomes useless, eventually the waters calm, and you can see the horizon again.


Tip 3: Put the camera down, live in the moment. Documenting your life as a family is important, but not as important as being part of that perfect moment you are trying to capture so desperately. Some of the best memories I have with my kids are up in the old brain-bucket, and thats good enough for me!


Tip 4: Take care of yourself! Its easy to get run down, especially as a new dad with a high maintenance bundle of joy on your hands. If you are sick, exhausted, over-stressed, under-fed, or overweight it will definitely inhibit the fun, caring, and involvement you have in your child's life so learn to make the time to take care of yourself. A healthy dad is a happy dad!


Tip 5: Dont be afraid to jump in with both feet! A good daddy knows how to do a french braid, knows every word to his kids favorite song, is not afraid to crawl around the house (mall, park, side of the road!) and make dinosaur sounds! If you have a girl, you  better know how to set the table for a tea party, if you have a boy, you need to know what each bakugans strength is and how to battle!


Tip 6: Remember who you are! Your wife, girlfriend, baby mama picked you for you. Your kids love you for you, and you should love you for YOU. Do not let those Zeppelin LP's get dusty! You are cool as hell and you should not be afraid to show it! I dont care if you listen to Michael Buble or Michael Stipe own that ish and display it proudly! 


So there it is, hopefully these help and feel free to pass on any of your words of wisdom, I know I can always use them!

Pamper's Little Miracles Father's Day Cookout!

Saturday, June 18, 2011

It's 5:30PM and the little one is down for a nap because she is so exhausted, we all are. We had a VERY busy morning! We were invited by our new friend C.C. Chapman to attend a exclusive Father's Day cookout being sponsored by Pamper's and their 50th Anniversary Little Miracles Campaign (which we wrote about here). It was a very fun day and we were honored to be among the 30 families invited.


We arrived a bit late due to the Bruins Parade taking place in Boston but got there just in time to partake in some Baby Yoga. Hendrix and Sierra were a bit nervous but with a little help from Dad and Dad we got our stretch on real quick.


Both hands to the toes!


Sierra looking at something, not sure what though. C.C. in the background working on his film which we are both going to be in and are very excited to see!


Here Hendrix is eating a fine delicacy: The Knuckle Sandwich.


Sierra pouting when we tried to get her to play the parachute game.


Sierra's beautiful mother, Lauren instagramming some photos.


I asked Michael and Henry to take a nice photo which they did. I asked Christian to do the same and did not get the same results (see next photo).


Whenever Christian is asked to take a photo you get a wonderful face like this, he's basically the most photogenic person I know, p.s. how awesome is the skull sweater?



After a bunch of fun games it was time to chow down on the meal provided by the NE Aquarium and Pampers.  Thanks guys!! Mmmmm.


The last activity before hitting the Aquarium was a raffle for some awesome prizes! Including a Tricycle, Movie Tickets and the Grand Prize of a Flip Ultra HD camcorder! When they asked for a child volunteer to pick the winners Sierra and I stepped right up. Guess who we picked to win the grand prize?


YEP! Michael and his family won the video camera! I assure you it was not rigged. Sierra is just a good picker I guess. She also picked some free IMAX movie tickets for mama and myself, who's babysitting?

After all the festivities outside it was time to head inside to check out the Aquarium. We have been before but it is always fun and the kids seem to enjoy it more and more each time. The first stop was the penguins which are always fun to watch swim and play.
 

Here Sierra is enjoying a close up view of some tropical fish. She kept saying "FISH! FISH!" and making her fishy face which we've been practicing for weeks now.

The NE Aquarium located in the heart of Boston only steps from the TD Bank North Garden was in full support of our hometown Bruins winning the cup as you can see from their Stanely Cup on the bottom of the fish tank! 
 

Look everyone, Michael has crabs!

I kid you not this is a real picture. Michael uses "6 to 8" sugars in his coffee... I tried telling him if he needs that much sugar perhaps he should switch to chocolate milk or apple juice. YUCK.

Next we headed to the seal tank which Sierra LOVED. 

We all had a wonderful time and were very tired by the end of the day!


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