Work At Home Dad - Ty Tribble

18th Kid On The Way For Jim and Michelle Duggar

Can they get to 20 before Michelle's biological clock catches up with the Arkansas couple?

Seattle TImes:

It will be another busy Mother's Day for Michelle Duggar, of Tontitown, in northwest Arkansas, who is pregnant with her 18th child. Duggar, 41, is due on New Year's Day, and the latest addition will join seven sisters and 10 brothers. There are two sets of twins. The Duggars' oldest child, Josh, is 20, and the youngest, Jennifer, is 9 months. Michelle, her husband, Jim Bob, and children have been the subject of one series for Discovery Health and another is being filmed.

See Previous Duggar Articles at Work At Home Dad:

Note to Michelle Duggar...STOP!

Michelle Duggar is Back

Lucky Number 17 For Duggars - Michelle Ready For More

Back To School Shopping Boycott

I refuse to participate in any back to school shopping in July!

Doesn't it seem like the back to school stuff happens earlier every year?

It's not like I have to go back to school, but I love summer. I love having my kids around. My wife would probably say that I like having playmates.

Go away retailers...my family refuses to acknowledge "back to school" until August (unless the sale is really good).

The Hawk

Meet the hawk.  Completely his idea.

I suspect that several Dad's are wishing they could pull this off, me included.

Independence Day

Birthday of America, Freedom, and Goofy Hats. Yeah.

School's Out For Summer

Thanks to a couple of delays because of snow and power outages, school finally let out for my 2 kids today.  After the closing ceremony, my daughter went to a Bar-B-Q with some friends so my wife and I took out soon out for lunch. After lunch, we all came back home and I went back to my office to get some work done. As I was trying to come up with some words to finish off an article I was writing, my son decided it was a good time to stand at the door of my office and babble.

I gently reminded him that I had to work and he zipped it for about 10 seconds and then went right back to the babbling. I mean serious babbling, like part singing and part gibberish. After the 3rd reminder, I realized that today is a special day and the adrenaline levels are running pretty high because of the excitement of the last day of school.  I almost went into my loud Dad voice that reminds the kids about food on the table and just because Dad works at home, doesn't mean it's all fun and games, etc., but I held back,  The last day of school is special and I can remember many of my last day of the school year days, so I let the boy babble.

Now that I think about it, my kids are actually less distracting than some of the people I worked with while I was in corporate life.

In fact, many times I was required to listen to babbling that made about as much sense as my son today.

I suspect that the next time he starts babbling, I'll listen with a different perspective and consider the fact that it could be a lot worse.

Refreshing Take on Women and the Corporate Ladder

I just found Penelope Trunk, who describes herself as, author, columnist, former executive and serial entrepreneur.  She has a great blog and I plan on reading her book in the near future. Penelope linked to the Work at Home Dad blog a while back, but I just noticed the link.

Sorry lads, I think Penelope is married, but if she is not married, send flowers now. Heck, send her flowers even if she is married, just sign them, "Your Loving Hubby". That's gotta be good karma.

The post I found at Penelope's blog was outstanding. Here is a snip:

I hate to dis Catalyst because they have provided great research to support women in the work place. But here’s a bit from their most recent study: “Most large U.S. companies have made scant progress in advancing women…to leadership and top-paying positions over the past decade.”

DUH!!!!

It’s clear at this point that women are basically stuck on their climb up the corporate ladder. In general, climbing the corporate ladder to the top requires giving up your personal life in order to serve the corporation. And research has shown that if women are willing to give up having kids, (or at least have a stay-at-home husband,) they can climb as well as men.

But really, why fight to get more women up a ladder that is basically dysfunctional? We should, instead, focus on helping men to get off the ladder. And then helping both men and women to get meaningful and rewarding work both outside and inside the home.

The bold part of the snip is where I come in.  My job is to help men (and women) kill their jobs so that they can work from home and live a happier life. I subscribed to Penelope's blog and I suggest you hurry on over and do the same.

Work At Home Dad Approved: Safeco Offers Device to Keep Tabs on Teen Drivers

Safeco Insurance is offering parents a way to keep tabs on their teen drivers through a customized GPS unit that tracks car speed, distance from home and will even alert you when the car is being driven outside of set hours. Oh yeah. That's what I am talkin' about. My lil' Punkin will be 10 years old in July so I expect that the technology will be even better once she starts to drive but this is a great step in the right direction.

Add in a nice gun collection (I need to work on that) and the private eye tag team of her little brother and I and the first date should go off smoothly.

You can read the Seattle PI article here. The details of the Safeco program can be found at teensurance.com.

Beastie Kids

We did some touristy stuff in our own city last Sunday for my mother-in-laws birthday. While waiting in a parking lot near the Space Needle, my kids and their cousin decided to perform some kind of Beastie Boys-esque moves with their cotton candy. I snapped this shot with my Treo 700...

Baseball Games at 6 Years Old

I keep trying to remind myself that he is only 6 and that winning a baseball game at this age is not the most important thing in the world... then the game starts and my blood pressure must go up a couple of dozen points. I think I might need to pray before I get to the ball fields.

Is winning the most important thing in little league sports?

When I was 18 and 19, I coached my little sisters softball team and the team was really good. So good that during the final game of the season, they had beaten everyone (by a lot) and had wrapped up the best record. So I decided it would be fun to let the players choose the line up and the positions for the game. We had girls that never pitched before, pitching (and walking a lot of people) and everyone played out of their regular positions, but they all seemed to be having a fun time. The team ended up losing by 1 run.

At the post game meeting the girls seemed really sad, so I went into my best "It's not if you win or lose, it's about having fun, learning the game, playing hard and competing" speech. As I was wrapping up what I believed to be an excellent motivational speech (for an 18 year old), a hand shot up. I will never forget the wisdom of skinny little 4th grade girl.

"Coach, we know all of that stuff about playing hard and having fun and we know that winning is not the most important thing...It's just a lot better than losing".

She had me there.

Team Hoyt: A Father's Love

See if you can watch this video without crying...

Good Luck.