Fatherhood anonymous; an open discussion on being a dad.

[Iowagriz]

thanks!

[SkiLyft]

Having kids definitely is about adjusting your activities!


Swimming in October? Sure..


Neighborhood watch



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[liv2ski]

Pretty sure I said this pages ago, but raising decent human beings is hard work. Frankly, i would of passed if the decision was solely mine, but it wasn't and my adult children are the best thing that ever happened to me. My wife adores our granddaughter GG more than anything, so ya, forget your plans, as kids are still going to fuck them up.

[fatnslow]

He's pretty good with the edger and what boy doesn't like torching shit?

Man, that is legit. I completely failed at having my 3 grown kids help with anything around the house. Mostly due to my impatient when they were young and being way to overwhelmed with activities. When you have 60 minutes to do about 3 hours of shit you just go into survival mode.

[ghosthop]

Thank you for all the good advice in this thread.

Two things that really made the difference for us this summer were a Deuter Pack and Yepp mini. We hiked and biked a ton of miles and I was able to share some great days with the kiddo.

We are currently gearing up for winter and I am curious about the collective’s experience with boots and fleece mittens, things that worked or did not. Both for around town in the Salt Lake valley, so cold but not frigid. I have been leaning towards bogs and a hestra liner that can pull double duty with over mitts.

5C this morning and he wanted to go for a bike ride.

[tgapp]

Thank you for all the good advice in this thread.

Two things that really made the difference for us this summer were a Deuter Pack and Yepp mini. We hiked and biked a ton of miles and I was able to share some great days with the kiddo.

We are currently gearing up for winter and I am curious about the collective’s experience with boots and fleece mittens, things that worked or did not. Both for around town in the Salt Lake valley, so cold but not frigid. I have been leaning towards bogs and a hestra liner that can pull double duty with over mitts.

5C this morning and he wanted to go for a bike ride.

that's right buddy, drive those shovels, get your weight forward now

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[anotherVTskibum]

In my experience, until their hands get bigger and they get more dexterity, they'll have difficulty doing much with mittens on, and gloves are pretty much impossible to get on right. That means that they'll want to take the mittens off to pick up interesting things, including snow and ice. Having the ability to get the mittens back on while outside is rather helpful. YMMV, of course.

[Timberridge]

that's right buddy, drive those shovels, get your weight forward now

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Well, he won't need to worry about pre-releasing on those Salomon heels.

[riser4]

that's right buddy, drive those shovels, get your weight forward now

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Exactly. Stay out of the back seat.

[basinbeater]

Also, they will lose them. I pretty quickly decided if it is just running around town, they can go without gloves or mittens. Cause I don't want to deal with them. My wife on the other hand would make sure they had gloves or mittens all the time, and when they invariably got lost, she would get pissed at the kid for losing them.
My advice is, salt lake ain't that cold. If you are just running around town, don't bother. A sweatshirt they can pull over their hands works and won't get lost. If you are going to do something outside at night or in the mountains, the cheap gloves at level 9 work fine and don't cost as much to lose as the fancy kids hestras.

[The Reverend Floater]

Thank you for all the good advice in this thread.

Two things that really made the difference for us this summer were a Deuter Pack and Yepp mini. We hiked and biked a ton of miles and I was able to share some great days with the kiddo.

We are currently gearing up for winter and I am curious about the collective’s experience with boots and fleece mittens, things that worked or did not. Both for around town in the Salt Lake valley, so cold but not frigid. I have been leaning towards bogs and a hestra liner that can pull double duty with over mitts.

5C this morning and he wanted to go for a bike ride.

We run sorrel type boots on our girls (3 & 8), combined with fartbags, wool hats and mittens.

They're going to ditch whatever gloves or hats you give them, so budget accordingly. Also, despite temps regularly in the single digits here, they never get cold. Our girls will play in the plow piles in our driveway in the dark without complaint.

We like the sorrels because you can lace them tight and then ductape your fartbags over them for all day excursions. They also have Mucks but they're not as warm and allow more snow in them. Buy a shit ton of wool socks.

[fatnslow]

Also, they will lose them. I pretty quickly decided if it is just running around town, they can go without gloves or mittens. Cause I don't want to deal with them. My wife on the other hand would make sure they had gloves or mittens all the time, and when they invariably got lost, she would get pissed at the kid for losing them.
My advice is, salt lake ain't that cold. If you are just running around town, don't bother. A sweatshirt they can pull over their hands works and won't get lost. If you are going to do something outside at night or in the mountains, the cheap gloves at level 9 work fine and don't cost as much to lose as the fancy kids hestras.

i can't believe I'm recommending thi since I'm still traumatized from childhood BUT my mom used to have a leash that ran through the coat that kept the mittens together. Couldn't wait till I was old enough to get gloves and not have a leash..... when I turned 27.

[riser4]

i can't believe I'm recommending thi since I'm still traumatized from childhood BUT my mom used to have a leash that ran through the coat that kept the mittens together. Couldn't wait till I was old enough to get gloves and not have a leash..... when I turned 27.

Lol. Me too, man, me too. In her defense I left a trail wherever I went. I'm just visiting this fine planet. I still lose my hat in the spring when the weather gets nice. My kids weren't as bad as me. And hiding my stuff from them so they couldn't place mine when they lost theirs was huge. Plus it made me finally keep better track of my shit. In my 40s...

[fatnslow]

Lol. Me too, man, me too. In her defense I left a trail wherever I went. I'm just visiting this fine planet. I still lose my hat in the spring when the weather gets nice. My kids weren't as bad as me. And hiding my stuff from them so they couldn't place mine when they lost theirs was huge. Plus it made me finally keep better track of my shit. In my 40s...

My mom always knit us mittens with strings. All I wanted was some store bought GLOVES with slots for each digit and NO FUCKING LEASH with my mittens flopping around.

[SchralphMacchio]

Ghosthop, how old is the kid?

For just going around town, especially in the Yepp or Deuter, handsocks man. Cheap to replace, hard to remove, takes the bite off. Tuck in under jacket to make them extra hard to take off. Won’t work great in rain or wet snow but it’s better than nothing. Infant mittens don’t even have thumbs, so basically no different than a thick sock other than ease of removal via teeth! Waterproof mittens are expensive, easy to lose, and usually bigger than the kid actually needs so they don’t actually trap that much heat!!! But yeah once it’s truly snow season then I get the mittens out, velcro them as tight as I can, and watch for them to be pulled off like a hawk. I had nice Columbia ones for kid number one but after watching the way kids lose mittens went into fuck it mode and use cheap Head branded mittens from Costco, since they are cheap to replace.

Small kids buff just scrunched around the neck also takes the bite off, or pulled up over the ears and head leaving the face exposed, with helmet on top as needed. Or beanie and hood when they are in the backpack.

Boots, I found Merrell brand makes the best warm toddler footwear if you are willing to spend for it. They have a variety of options down to pretty small sizes. With other brands I found that they start stocking actual waterproof and insulated shoes and boots at around 10K US and bigger, but I could get fully waterproof Merrell footwear with varying levels of insulation definitely down at 7K, not sure I checked smaller sizes.

I usually pair all that with Columbia puffy pants and various fleece or puffy upper layers under a one piece rainsuit shell. Then when they face plant in the snow or roll around in it, it mostly stays on the outside.

Rain cover for the Deuter works to trap heat on a cold day (it’s a vapor barrier) even if it’s not raining or snowing. One bitch with most of those frame backpacks is you have to get the kid in and out of the pack (in my case Poco) sans boots and put the boots on once they are situated, remove them before taking the kid out. A minor pain when you are XC skiing somewhere and you want to let them play / toddle in the snow for a bit. They can handle some legit weather in those packs man!

You may have already, or are about to, discovered that it’s truly hard to find good quality clothing for tiny kids (infant and toddler sizes) for shit weather, unless you are willing to pay for Patagucci and Columbia. It’s kind of alarming how much kids clothing is made to look like it ought to work in crap weather but is actually cheap junk. I guess it’s the same for adult clothing, but we have way more selection of actual good stuff. We don’t get super cold weather here, but we get windy 35F thick ass fog when it’s time to go for a walk, endless misty rain, sideways blowing snot snow in the mountains, and then rare single digit morning temps in the mountains. My kids have been in it all … they still can’t handle 30 mph snow blowing in their faces without melting down but I’m working on it [emoji12]

[Touring_Sedan]

I'll echo what's been said about socks, gloves and hats. They'll get lost, have a backup. I threw a few in the back cupholders of the car.

We had our midgets in the backpack carrier a bunch in the winter and there would always be a gap between shoes/socks and pants. That shit got cold, fast.

We found the best place to score boots and outerwear was DI and Savers. Kids rarely wear out that stuff at that age, they just outgrow it. Hit up stores in West Jordan, South Jordan, Sandy, Draper. The rich bitch parts of town. You'll find $40 Merrells for $4.

Disposable hand warmers in the pockets help a bit in the brutal temps, but keep them away from the skin. Those things can get really hot.

I agree with BB, around town, fuckit. Unless you're strolling around the lights at Temple Square, they're rarely out of a conditioned space for long. FFS, my 7yo daughter biked to school this morning in a t-shirt. It was 38°.

[SchralphMacchio]

Ah yes, the gap above the boots to the pants, forgot about that one. I had oversized rain pants specifically for use in the Poco!

[ghosthop]

Thanks all.

15 months this past weekend, I should have clarified that 'around town' means riding in front on the Yepp. We are a one car household and my wife leaves for work at 530, so often the decision is made to let him sleep in. He is stoked about trains and we will utilize Trax more often this winter.

For better or worse, he is set with actual winter gear because we have consistently hit the Pata 50% sale since before he was born. For future readers, we have also been super happy with the REI house brand for filling in the missing cracks(e.g., REI was the best option for UPF pants, much better summer weight than Patagonia and better fit than NF. Cinch waist and elastic ankles meant 2T fit him fine at 12 months.) and I got him a pair of REI fleece mittens. After all the comments in here about toddlers dropping mittens, the fact that they have a cinch instead of elastic sold me. I too had a long chord in my jacket as a child and I will sew one onto these if it becomes an issue. So far he has been really good about keeping on the sun hat in the summer and fleece hat this fall.

No luck yet finding boots that aren't total clunkers but will keep looking. Merell is a great call in Salt Lake because there is an outlet outside Park City. Their barefoot style toddler shoes are also easily found on sale and are considerably more cost effective than the boutique brands.

I hope everyone had a great Halloween. I thought he would be too young but he crushed it last night, he had knock, grab candy, put in bag down by the third house. Fingers crossed he can get out the whole trick-or-treat by next year.

[schuss]

If you can swing how spendy they are, the hestra kid mitts are fucking ace as they have a 3/4 length zip so you can just jam em on the front of the hand and zip em tight to the point they don't really fall off. THAT said, lots of good options and like many said - they'll lose them. For boots we've had good luck with kamiks, sorels and mucks.
Also - I highly recommend trawling sierra trading post and other outdoor gear spots during outlet or other sales, as I reliably can get good snow gear for 60-70% off (got two pairs of high quality snowpants this year for the 7 and 9 year old for a combined 60 bucks brand new out of evo). Touring Sedan's advice is also spot on, as we frequently donate our stuff after running through our friend list for pass-downs. (speaking of, anyone need a matching patagucci snow setup for 3T?)

[californiagrown]

Damn. We get pretty much everything for our 2yr old off FB buy-nothing groups in our local area. between buy-nothing and grandparents, im honestly not sure we have bought him a single piece of clothing, aside from a 20 pack of socks, in a year or more.

He has been stoked to go skiing and do snow stuff all summer since he was first exposed to it last spring. He was enthralled by Sammy Carlson's new short film which is mostly POV when i put it on the big TV to watch. I took him for a walk around at the local ski area in about 4" of freshly fallen snow and he was loving it. Apparently he was digging it even harder than i realized because he dug out his mittens from a drawer yesterday, put them on and asked to go to the snow. Gotta keep that snow=fun association going strong!

[Hopeless Sinner]

Damn. We get pretty much everything for our 2yr old off FB buy-nothing groups in our local area. between buy-nothing and grandparents, im honestly not sure we have bought him a single piece of clothing, aside from a 20 pack of socks, in a year or more.

He has been stoked to go skiing and do snow stuff all summer since he was first exposed to it last spring. He was enthralled by Sammy Carlson's new short film which is mostly POV when i put it on the big TV to watch. I took him for a walk around at the local ski area in about 4" of freshly fallen snow and he was loving it. Apparently he was digging it even harder than i realized because he dug out his mittens from a drawer yesterday, put them on and asked to go to the snow. Gotta keep that snow=fun association going strong!

Outstanding work there!

[doebedoe]

T-3 weeks til my world changes.

Last minute things you recommend? Things for my relationship (we're trying to eat out once a week before kid)? Things you wished you had on hand immediately (nursery pretty set up, etc)? Things to do for myself?

[Touring_Sedan]

T-3 weeks til my world changes.

Last minute things you recommend? Things for my relationship (we're trying to eat out once a week before kid)? Things you wished you had on hand immediately (nursery pretty set up, etc)? Things to do for myself?

They typically send you home with some self care supplies for your lady's bits. She'll need more. I'm sure her OB can tell you what and how many.

Prep the pets if necessary.

Remind yourself and your partner that long ago we were having kids in caves. You're significantly more prepared than those parents were.

[waveshello]

T-3 weeks til my world changes.

Last minute things you recommend? Things for my relationship (we're trying to eat out once a week before kid)? Things you wished you had on hand immediately (nursery pretty set up, etc)? Things to do for myself?

If you and your partner are both awake in the middle of the night at the same time for extended periods, ask yourself if it's necessary--better to take shifts where you can.

Some amount of crying is unavoidable even when you're doing everything right--remember that. Don't get too discouraged. Or enraged. I think most of us have been there at one point or another! I think babies spent a lot of the first 3-4 months wishing they were back in the womb and being sad that they aren't. Your can rock/snuggle your baby with headphones on if you are totally overstimulated and can't take the screaming at 2am.

If your partner is planning to breastfeed that can be majorly painful and emotionally difficult with the first kid. If there are any difficulties try to see a specialist right away if your hospital has one.

My kids are almost 3 and almost one, so far every new month seems to be better/easier than the previous.

[Hopeless Sinner]

T-3 weeks til my world changes.

Last minute things you recommend? Things for my relationship (we're trying to eat out once a week before kid)? Things you wished you had on hand immediately (nursery pretty set up, etc)? Things to do for myself?

Just be aware that if the kid is hungry there will be no peace. Be prepared to go to the formula immediately if necessary. Wife is most likely to feel like she's failing her child if that happens but No. 1 is to feed the kid, No. 1A support the wife. I don't know if they still push the natural childbirth and breast feeding like they did before the turn of the century, but somehow when they teach that they somehow instill a sense of failure particularly on the bf if everything doesn't go well.


Hope all goes well!!!