Capable dad

A few years ago, my husband had a very eye-opening experience.

I was attending the Discovery Toys convention in California, and we decided to take the whole family to San Francisco for an additional week after the "work" portion of the trip was done. He ended up flying to California a few days after me with our three children, who were 1, 3 and 5 years old at the time.

He couldn't believe how many remarks people made about why a MAN would be flying alone across the country with three children. People reacted with sympathy, concern, sometimes suspicion and an abundance of offers to help him along the way.

That same summer, he needed to make a quick trip to the store and decided to take the two boys in the bike trailer to pick up some groceries. He bumped into a friend who couldn't contain his surprise that not only had my husband taken our two children to the store BY HIMSELF, but he had done it with a bike trailer!

This friend had two children about the same ages as our boys, but had not yet been "permitted" by his wife to go anywhere alone with both of them.

The last straw for my husband came on several different occasions when people asked him if he was "babysitting" for our kids.

"I'm not babysitting!" he would tell me later. "They are MY children!"

That is when my husband started joking that he was going to start a web site for Capable Dads like himself. Surely, there were other men on the planet who could actually care for their OWN children!

My husband has a very dry sense of humor and he loves to tease me. I have a tendency to come up with grand ideas that I am convinced are going to impact the world. These ideas usually include a web site, marketing material and a significant investment of my time.

So, with quite a bit of sarcasm, his new venture, "The Capable Dad" was born. Well, actually, it wasn't exactly "born" but more like a figment of his imagination since nothing ever came of it. Still, I thought it was brilliant, and probably would have at least printed some letter head and business cards if it had been my idea.

When I started my blog last year, CapableDad decided to get on board with his own contribution to the blogging world. At first, he was going to call it everydayHusband, but come on! He's so much more than just the spouse of the everydayMOM, don't ya' think?

I insisted he name his blog CapableDad. And now he blesses me at least twice a year with a post.

I really don't even know what he's talking about with his most recent update. All I can say is that he has been in New Zealand too long and maybe the absence of kangaroos, the 17-hour time change and the lack of parenting responsibility has started to play with his mind.

The funny thing is, that even without any effort whatsoever on his part and only semi-annual posts, he will probably end up being a highly successful blogger while I will eventually drive off all of my readers with my weird sense of humor.

He is one of those people who excels at whatever he tries. Well, at least at whatever backyard game or unregulated sport that he tries. Whether it's "corn hole", miniature golf, darts, bowling, wiffle ball, freeze tag or horseshoes, he will usually be highly competitive his first time out of the gate.

He also has a way of endearing himself to people. I always joke with him that HE is the favorite child in MY family because my parents love him so much.

So, there you have it. He's definitely a CapableDad. I just thought I should give you a little background since he actually updated his blog. He rarely leaves me any comments, but as he always says, he is my "biggest fan".

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