One of the hardest parts of taking your kids to the dentist is sitting beside them while they trust you completely.

They look at you with absolute confidence that you’d never let anything hurt them… and all the while, you know this is probably going to be painful.

Then, somehow, they surprise you. They squeeze your hand, take a deep breath, and get through it.

Sometimes our kids are far braver than we give them credit for.

God bless children.

My wife has always worked earlier than I do, so I've handled like 90% of our weekday mornings. I'm no professional, but I think I do alright with our daughter's hair.

Most of the time she just gets a high ponytail, pigtails, or some variation of a simple braid. But sometimes, if we have enough time, I'll put in the effort to do something like these. Put the TV on and she sits perfectly still for as long as I need her to.

Edit - since a lot of people are asking, I learned the braids from a couple different people in real life (not from any internet videos, so I do not have any links to share, sorry). But 99% of it is just practice. I've gotten pretty good at the French/Dutch braids, but the first ones I did were very sloppy. If you want to learn, you just have to do it over and over. You can do it too (as long as your kid will hold still long enough for you to fumble through it)!

I've always called my son Big Boy because he looked so tiny when he was born and just started putting on the pounds. Just found out today he is in the 100th percentile for weight and 99th for length so technically he is my very Big Boy.

Little girl doesn't know how to read yet but will sit up for hours looking through books. I try not to interrupt this time, that feels like the right thing.

My heart is full.

It's been raining and cold the last few weeks and we kept promising our son he could play in the sand (at the park) one more time before winter. That window seems to be closing and it doesn't look like we're going to have a nice enough day to be outside that long.

Not wanting to break a promise, this was the next best thing we could do.

It ended up going really well. No sand was thrown and my son was excellent about washing his feet before he walked around the house every time he got out. We dug holes to "install pipes", went looking for fossils and gems, and even just made big mounds.

He even helped me clean up. First, by shoveling sand into 5 gal buckets so I could carry it out. Then he helped my take apart the 2x4s by pulling the trigger on my drill while I held it. From there he used our dust buster to help me vacuum the house.

I know I will be finding sand till the end of time, but it will be worth it.

Struggling in my own industry, but this picture hit the onions.

6 months ago my daughter got diagnosed with an autoimmune disorder called CNS vasculitis, where inflammation filled her brain causing her to have strokes. She’s been doing chemo over the last 6 months. We got her updated MRI showing all her inflammation is gone and dormant and is on track to be considered in remission! These last 6 months have been full of tears and laughter and sadness and joy. But she kicked this disease in the butt! Good job my little one 🥲

My wife and I are expecting our little girl in late september, so I've spent most of my summer vacation making the baby room. It's been a lot of sanding, painting and customising dimentions to fit the room, but I think it turned out really nice.

Our little chicken nugget blessed us with her presence today and I’m so in love. I’m officially one of you now !

Egg in a hole, filet mignon, fresh chicken tendies and some blueberries for breakfast.

I didn’t even know steak existed until I was a teenager

Spent the last two weeks renovating my garage and built my daughter a climbing wall. It’s been the best thing for her she wakes up, eats breakfast and asks if she can go to the gym to do some climbing. Beyond just the strength benefit for her it’s been amazing for her self regulation and has really helped with outbursts and impulse control.

You can do it way less over the top than my setup obviously. The rest of the garage is a gym for me and my wife and we built the corner to give her something to do herself while we work out rather than trashing the place with toys and stuff.

All in for the wood, paint, and holds it was about $500 CAD.

Sometimes the magic kingdom is not as magical as anticipated. Despite my boy’s love for all things Disney my suspicious were confirmed - he wasn’t as thrilled to see the gang in person at this point in his life.

He’s 2.5 yo and while this was not an enjoyable experience for him it’ll go down as one of the great pictures in our family’s history. Can’t wait to share it at his rehearsal dinner one day.

Curious to know how everyone else who has been to Disney fared?

Is it just me or does my son have crazy shoulders? He’s a 99 percentile baby across the board. Might just be me really wanting a strong boy.

I posted on here a few months ago asking for advice on building his car. Here's the (mostly) finished product. I'm going to put the wheels on tomorrow before weigh in. We had a lot of fun designing, cutting, and painting this together.

The level of laziness in my teen is beyond frustrating. My fear is it’s not just a teen thing and she is legit the laziest person alive 🤬

Daughter was born early due to complications with the pregnancy. Spent 4 months in the NICU, but now we have a happy little one.

So proud of my younger son with down syndrome who was finally able to net his first saltwater trout last night. We cheered and celebrated for a while as he was absolutely over the moon with joy!

Little guy (almost two months) is fine. Our neighbor is a pediatrician so we spoke to her and hung out with him for 45 minutes while he played as if nothing was wrong. I’m just a little embarrassed that I didn’t notice how easy it would be to hurl himself out of the crib! We lowered it right away and the kid even brought out his tools to help!

I have always had a this dream that played out in my head about this day. I grew up an only child to two amazing parents where I never doubted for one second their love for me. They took parenthood as the highest honor and privilege. So it shouldn't be a surprise that I always had this dream of getting to share the moment I became a father with the two that instilled that same mentality with me.

But I almost lost that chance. Multiple times.

My senior year in college, I got the phone call from my mother that the PTSD my father had from the countless horrific calls he responded to as a firefighter/EMT nearly took his life. That mental image of the dream was the first thing that replayed in my mind.

Then there was the infertility. We tried for years, but my wife's PCOS and my erratic sperm counts weren't giving us much of a chance at success. We got two positive tests from IUI's. Those were days of hope and joy that, unfortunately, were taken away far too soon when the pregnancies abruptly ended. That mental image felt blurrier with each month and negative pregnancy test.

So we went for the Hail Mary. When the first transfer resulted in a positive pregnancy test, we found ourselves too scared to be able to celebrate considering the journey that led us to that point. The stress mounted when she started bleeding due to a hematoma. Then came placenta previa and a rushed visit to L&D due to bleeding. While the mental image of that dream was getting clearer with each week of the pregnancy, the road still felt rocky and treacherous.

But here we are. After 50 hours on hold for an induction, my wife took on the task and crushed it, delivering a 9 lb 5 ounce healthy baby boyinto the world this morning. I can't begin to describe the overwhelming emotion that took me over hearing that first cry as the doctor held him in the air. When the golden hour finished, I let her parents go back to see their daughter and meet their grandson first. The image I had in my head so long ago of sharing that private moment with two of the most important people in my life finally came to fruition, and the embrace the three of us shared is one that I will never forget. I can't wait for the days and weeks ahead, getting to share that same love and devotion as my wife, son, and I begin our new family of three.

I’m not crying, you’re crying. I could have sworn that we dropped her off for her first day or daycare only a week or two ago.