Daddy Daze

I vividly remember as a child my father, who smokes a pipe, would play with his lighter ... he would hold it near my foot and pull it away just as he flicked the wheel so I watched it flame just inches from my toes. This was a fun game for me and dad. Not so much for mom. Well it was fun until the day I was wearing acrylic socks. Luckily they were pilly and fuzzy - or maybe unluckily. Because suddenly my foot was engulfed in a "whoosh" of flame that burned out as quickly as it came. That was it for my mom. While I was sitting in shock making sure my toes weren't crispy my mom was letting my dad HAVE IT! He never did play that "trick" again. (I was just fine for the record - the flame just caught the loose fuzzies on my sock).

Fast forward to this weekend. Cora was baptised this weekend and so we had a lot of family in town staying with us. This always means cleaning like a madwoman. Hubby was really supportive in helping out as well. Saturday morning Daddy decided to watch Cora while vacuuming our living room. I told him, I could watch her but he said he had it under control. From across the room I saw her reach for the plant stand and knew this was not going to be good. Daddy wasn't looking right then so I darted up and over, but too late. When Coco tried to pull on the unsteady stand, the potted plant went tumbling. By the grace of God, it fell the opposite direction and didn't harm Cora at all. The only fallout was a little dirt and a few leaves left on the carpet.

Ok so one daddy-crisis averted. Daddy grabbed the vacuum hose and we made a game of sucking up the dirt and leaves much to Cora's fascination. Of course once a baby is fascinated by something, they want to touch it. So Daddy let Coco reach for the vacuum hose. It sucked up her little thumb right up to palm faster than you could blink. My dear hubby decided it would be fine to just let it stay there and see if she could get her thumb out. Meanwhile I'm trying to loudly explain to him that the blocked suction could give her a really nasty bruise (trying to use an analogy he'd understand - the hickey). I grabbed her little thumb and got it out. Crisis number two averted.

Not to end on a bad note, Daddy started using the hose to suck the front of Coco's shirt away from her body and then let it go. Apparently this was supposed to be entertaining the child. (ok ok so it *was* entertaining the child but that's not the point!) Getting bored with the shirt, daddy decided to go for her bangs. Her little tiny fine wispy hair. No sooner had he put the hose up there then most of the hair on her head came flying forward like a bad Flobee commercial - including the new little bow she was wearing in her bangs. Again it all happened in sped-up slow motion... too fast to stop but slow enough to watch it blow by blow. The bow wriggled for just a second and then was gone. Daddy had sucked the baby's bow right off her head. *sigh*

At that point Mommy had had enough. Daddy was left to fish the bow out of the vacuum (let me not mention that he wanted to then put it back in her hair - after it just came out of the vacuum canister...) and Mommy took the baby into the family room to play.

What is it about Daddies that makes them lose all common sense around their children? Why at times do I feel like I'm raising two toddlers? *sigh* But of course - for those very reasons - Daddy is the preferred playmate of the household. Mommy is great for comfort or snuggles, but Daddy is the human jungle gym. I guess there's room for both our parenting styles in her life. As long as she lives through them both...