Daddy Duty

I really have to laugh when I hear Dad’s saying that they are babysitting their kids…heads up fella’s, it’s actually called parenting. In my household, as I imagine it is in many, Daddy duty is SOOOO different to Mummy duty…

One morning recently, Mat was leaving a little later for work. It was such a rarity that I decided to let him tend to the kids running amok in the play area and I enjoyed lying in bed listening to the news. When I turned the radio off, all I could hear was Mat talking on his mobile phone and the muffled cheeky giggles of the kids. I jumped up to investigate what the kids were up to and discovered that they were very easy to find…all I had to do was follow the trail of tampons. The kids had raided a box of tampons from my bathroom and were now gleefully pulling them apart whilst sitting in my car in the garage! Naturally, Mat was completely oblivious to the events unfolding and simply said to me “I was on the phone” as though it was a legitimate excuse. I politely reminded him that it was a mobile phone he was speaking on!    

Then there was the time when I was outside mowing the lawn and asked Mat to keep an eye on Sophie (this is before Elliott’s time and side note: I LOVE mowing the lawn and happily trade an hours parenting for an hour mowing the yard). Anyway, I came back in to discover Mat in the office playing solitaire and Sophie, my bedroom floor, my mirror and her toy elephant covered in red lipstick. I drew Mat’s attention to the situation and no legitimate excuse stumbled from his mouth so I simply said I will clean up the mess but he has to clean Sophie. “Yeah, no worries” he said, so we went our separate ways to tend to our jobs…or so I thought. Mat went back to the computer and let Sophie go into the lounge room to spread the lipstick joy further! I was furious by that stage as you can imagine. It amazes me how few Dads have the foresight to see “Hmmm, a child covered in lipstick that will stain anything she touches…ah she’ll be right, I’ll just finish what I’m doing and worry about that later”. What the?!?!

Another Daddy Duty incident that comes to mind is recently when I was at Church, Mat was home with the kids getting them off to bed. I came home, had a chat to Mat who was playing in his shed. His reports were that the kids had gone down fine, no dramas at all. I went in to tuck the kids in and saw that Elliott had launched his cot away from the wall and thrown all blankets, pillows and toys onto the floor. I then checked on Sophie and here she was, sound asleep but wearing my togs with a cushion, 2 toys and a book shoved down the front. Sigh, Daddy Duty strikes again…they went down peacefully because Mat was in the shed and couldn’t hear them!

Finally, on Sunday night just gone, I went off to Church and Mat was left to complete the bath and bedtime routine. He had trouble getting the kids to sleep so his solution was to give Elliott toys in his cot and allow Sophie to get up and watch a movie. What the?!?! The end result was overstimulated kids and Mat falling asleep on the lounge room floor!

Yep, there is no doubt Daddy Duty is completely different to Mummy Duty. I am not saying it is worse, but the risk of injury and the clean-up are always more significant when Dads are involved. But you know what, I wouldn’t have it any other way because it makes the kids happy and no doubt, the dads happy too. Memory making at its finest J