Dad tip #106: Dinner time can be stressful

Okay, here's dinner time around here:

• Dinner cooking or leftovers reheating.
• Cat meowing like CRAZY to be fed.
• Baby starting to fuss because he's getting hungry too.
• Uh oh, what's that smell? Is that dinner burning?
• Whoops, tripped over the cat while trying to check on dinner.
• Dinner's fine, get baby's food ready.
• Get all the food on the table.
• Everyone eat as fast as you can.
• Baby finished his dinner first.
• Get baby cleaned up.
• Give him a toy to play with.
• Eat more of your own dinner.
• THUMP! Baby's toy is on the floor. Pick it up.
• Try to finish your own dinner.
• THUMP! Baby's toy is on the floor. Pick it up.
• Try to finish your own dinner.
• THUMP! Baby's toy is on the floor. Pick it up.
• Try to finish your own dinner.
• THUMP! Baby's toy is on the floor. Pick it up.
• Try to finish your own dinner.
• Repeat until baby's bedtime.

So, the advice here is just to get yourself in the right mindset that dinner isn't necessarily a relaxing time of day anymore. As long as your expectations are set realistically, you'll find that you can able to enjoy that hectic bit of time with your wife and baby as much as you ever enjoyed dinner time.

Really!