I’m coming to the conclusion that one of the most stressful jobs currently out there is the full time stay at home parent..
I’m already highly strung, a natural worrier, habitually lazy, prone to exhaustion and a bit obsessive about parenting..

So trying to maintain a safe and nurturing environment for two boys under school age is becoming very hard to achieve..

any pointers..?
anyone in the same boat..?
did that STW dads group in East Devon ever come to anything..?

go down to a 4 day week next week so part-time stay at home dad.

adventure fridays are go.

I take my little girl out on her balance bike first thing in the morning, she then refuses to take her helmet off for the rest of the day.

Much safer 😀

Set, and keep to a routine
Be out of the house a lot: stops you going mad and prevents kids making a mess
Don’t rely on kids to amuse themselves. Set them up with activities, drawing, jigsaws, adventure games etc.
Stay at home Dad = MILF magnet. Get yourself along to the local Milf Parent and Toddler Group

routine and delegation. i appreciate the boys are under school age but they can always help doing stuff. i couldn’t do it so hats off to you but when our two were preschool my better half worked shifts so i had a reasonable amount of time with the kids.
i learned so much from the better half about setting out routine and getting the kids involved in stuff. baking is a god send, gardening when the weather is ok and loads of walking. there are stacks of little activity books and lego/blocks building stuff will be useful.
as for the aim of safe and nurturing, you have two boys, nothing is safe! nurturing, you’re already doing it asking what completes strangers can do to help! no really you are doing it because you care enough to find ideas. i see plenty of kids who’s parents idea of nurturing is making sure they have crisps to eat while watching telly.
make sure they tidy stuff up and i know it sounds a bit anal retentive but one set of toys/activity stuff out at once and get them to help tidy it up and put it away. the hours you put in now will pay back in the future, hundred fold.
good luck

My rest days (emphasis on REST) have for the last 2 weeks coincided with my wifes working days. I’m exhausted already, mind you, I finally got him to go to sleep, which was a bonus and we’re off later to a jungle gym type place, £1.50 per child, cheap coffee and stay as long as you like!

go down to a 4 day week next week so part-time stay at home dad. adventure fridays are go.

Have been doing this since 2007 it’s most excellent

Playdates are great, invite their friends over, with or without parents. I found this meant I had adult company for a while and if the parents weren’t there it was no more difficult to add a couple of extra kids to entertain. Payback comes when favours are returned and your kids go to a playdate, cue pointless internet surfing time or occasional bike rides.

If you dont know any local parents and their kids, join some parent toddler groups, soft play or music schemes. Usually it’s easy to get chatting to people as a lot of stay at home mums enjoy chatting with a man who talks about things other than parenting and how little our partners do around the house. Likewise the occasional fulltime or part time dad’s enjoy the male company.

Good luck, it only gets easier with practice and as they get older.

Yep, get them help you do stuff:

“Get cleaning boy!” 😛

Defo get a routine, I look after mine on Fridays and it helps if you have a set of things to do as it breaks up the day. Otherwise you spend the whole time watching the clock which is not what you should be watching 🙂

Get them into playschool / pre-school / nursery a couple of days a week. Good for them and you.

I am not very good at doing it myself, but you (and me) have to learn to accept that they do daft things and will try your patience.

So the next time they stress you and you raise your voice, stop and think. Then speak to them in your normal voice.

And accept they will make a mess and break things.

(Father of twin 3 yr old girls that have just started to really push boundaries).

Shove them out the back door and lock it behind them. Let them back in when the wife gets home.

We’ve two boys under school age (coming up 2 and 3) and live in a small house. If the missus doesn’t get them out most days it’s bedlam by the time I get home! She’ll generally take them out twice a day, for example walk to the park in the morning, home for lunch, out to see friends in the afternoon.

Ours are at the age now where they do entertain themselves quite a lot so a morning or afternoon at home is OK, but they still need a lot of input to get them started as attention spans are quite short. As above, lots of colouring, stickers, jigsaws, train tracks, etc if weather bad and they’re indoors. They also love bundling, so sofa cushions on the floor, jumping off the sofa onto the cushions and bundling each other can last for hours. Bedsheet camps also go down well now.

If the weather is good then they’re out in the garden playing with cars, snails, etc. We just got one of those plastic table things with a sandpit on one side and water thing on the other – they’ll spend hours round it. She’s wanted to get one for ages, I kept insisting I’d make one, eventually we went 2nd hand on ebay, well worth it.

How old are yours?

Let them back in when just before the wife gets home.

FTFY

I’m already highly strung, a natural worrier, habitually lazy, prone to exhaustion and a bit obsessive about parenting..

That’s my boat!

Off out in the pouring rain now, a morning inside and cabin fever is setting in! Well, that and it might help wash some of the paint out of (3 year old) Ms Markie’s hair…

I quite enjoy taking mine out for walks in the rain. Sunday morning after breakfast, missus having a lie in, wellie boots and raincoats on then it’s out jumping in muddy puddles for a couple of hours. We usually come back soaking wet (one or both will end up falling face down in the deepest puddle we find) and freezing cold but it’s all good.

I’ve been doing it for five years now. Obviously the kids aren’t pre-school age any more. They’re creating some mayhem upstairs as I type and drink tea! 🙂

I remember that on the tough days it is very, very tough indeed. As someone mentioned, routine and getting them out of the house early, even to hit the park or just walk around the shops, made a big difference with my two.

Young kids can smell parental weariness and misery, and generally take this as a signal to raise hell, so raising a shield of fake infectious enthusiasm seemed to work quite well.

Just wait a few years and they will argue the toss about the day’s activities, which is even more infuriating.

my oldest lad is 3 next month, and the little ‘un is just six months

Ah, OK. My eldest is 3 in November and his brother is 2 in December. I think having them that close together helps in the long run as they just bounce of each other. It was pretty tough to start that’s for sure.

I’d imagine the eldest is hardish work because you have to do all the playing with him, and the youngest is hard work because they just are up to and around that age. He’s probably wanting to get moving too so getting frustrated and angry eh? Tough time I’d guess, but in 6 months they’ll be easier going I reckon.

Playgroups would be my first port of call so the eldest can make friends and wear himself out.

hard drugs for all is the only way

My 3 year old cleans the bike wheels/tyres whilst I do the frames etc. 8)

my oldest lad is 3 next month

Pre-school then. Sorted.

You lucky B****r
No one suggested MTFU yet?

Would love to have done this when mine were small, luckily did 50-50 with Mrs Cat – set up business locally so I could do it – big drop in family income but fab time and strong relationship with boys now.

My top tips for Boys:

LEGO is you saviour – Legofests were the antidote to wet days, if you need to do a job, set them a task and judge it, then award prizes (NOT SWEETS!)

Newspaper all over floor – Paper Mache Baloons, make them one day, paint them another

Bug Hunts – catch, spot, name, record, release – then draw or paint them.

Story swaps – make up a story in turn, tell it to each other, use LEGO etc to make models from the story

If it’s not raining the great outdoors is fab – but if wet wellies & waterproofs and don’t worry about them getting muddy/wet

Giant Jenga on the the kitchen floor – had mine laughing for ages

Making dens inside or out – inside use blankets, chairs etc then camp in them. Outside – garden canes, tarps, anything.

Cardboard boxes – we built helicopters, double Kayaks, racing cars, tanks, planes, a Tardis

Just regress and have a great time, as has already been said, doing jobs helping Dad is a massive adventure when they are small and it sets a precedent – mine just join tin to help without a single moan and they are teenagers.

Don’t over protect, life is supposed to have risk. Teach them how to evaluate it and minimise it (where possible) and they will be streets ahead of their contemporaries.

all good inspirational motivational stuff there..

thanks..

tonyD has my predicament spot on though.. and 10kg of fighting mad baby is getting hard to lug around..

while it’s all character building stuff, it’s the sleep deprivation that’s having me over at the moment.. patience and motivation are thin on the ground, and just staying awake is becoming a serious challenge..

roll on next month when they both go off to playgroup and nursery for a few hours each week

Other thing, for the six month old, get a decent child carrier rucksac thing. We live out in the country and I can honestly say that getting a littlelife kid carrier changed my life. Meant that everything that is off limits to a pushchair suddenly in available again. Walk inwoods and hills, hoping over styles etc.