I read this yesterday and was reminder about how important it is to watch all that I say and do around Zachary. He’s a sponge and will soon be a parrot, showing and telling me what he sees me doing.

This specific period of fatherhood is really a trap when many fathers soon become acutely aware of how much a child sees, hears, and mimics. It’s a trap in that it’s incredibly easy to assume that since my child cannot yet talk or does not have complete control of his motor skills that he won’t pick-up things to do or say from his daddy. Most definitely, it’s a trap.

It’s not that I’m one person when he’s around and a different person when he’s not present, it’s that there are habits and things that I may say to which he shouldn’t be exposed. Whether he repeats my words or actions doesn’t change that he was exposed to something, and that something is going to be added to his picture of me. That’s a sobering thought.

The great thing about all of this is that it’s helping me file down a few rough edges to a smooth finish, changing me more into the person I want to become.

I consistently find that if I try to do this day-in and day-out I become tired from the effort, but when I look for God’s guidance in any situation I receive the direction on what I should be doing. It’s a bit like a pop-up video reel going on inside of me. I find myself spending time with Z and being reminded of how my actions really do speak louder than words.

Both my words and my actions will be repeated through my son. I’ll do my best to have him understand early in life that daddy makes mistakes, and that he’s at his best when he’s in tune with Christ. Then, and only then will I have the proper order set in my life: God, my wife, Zachary, and then me. Apart from that order of priorities is chaos.

Okay, so 5 1/2 months into his life, Zachary has clipped me a few times with his stream, but nothing like two nights ago…

We learned a good lesson when we started putting Z in his bath, but the water temperature was a little off. I then pulled his wet little body out of the [warm] water and held him as my wife adjusted the temperature in the bath.

Suddenly, I realized that there was some warm water outside of the bath as well, and it was supplied by Zach. Thanks buddy…

He was just a baby being a baby, so it’s not like we would get mad at him. We laughed; it was what it was.

The idea of “It is what it is” has become an important part of my daily approach to life. I don’t always get it right, but I now more often than ever am able to shake off things that happen that cannot be undone. This never would’ve been so deeply set in me if I hadn’t been hit by a big truck almost a decade ago.

My dad was the one who told me that, and showed me how he approaches each day with his Parkinson’s Disease. There are things you can still control and things you cannot control. Do what you can and accept what cannot be corrected.

This is something I want Zachary to learn early in his little life. This element of his growing worldview will serve him well…

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• Potty Training Humor (legallyinsanemommy.wordpress.com)

We’ve been VERY fortunate to have a little boy who’s been sleeping through the night since he was about 2 months old.

My wife was the one to wake-up and go to him while he was learning how to get through the night without needing Mommy. My role was to make sure everything was ready (clean bottles, etc) for the next morning and the rest of the day while I was at work.

Sometimes he gets overtired and can’t fall asleep for awhile. Changes to his routine usually does that. I’ve learned that it’s hard to watch him and listen to him when he’s so upset. I want to fix everything, but I can’t.

Fatherhood sometimes is about doing everything you can do and then let your child go through the unpleasant experience. There will be hundreds of instances of unpleasant times that I’ll need to bear on my end. It hurts me to watch, but sometimes that’s fatherhood.

Prayers for Zachary aren’t the least I can do for him, it’s an essential element in my fatherhood shed of tools. So I make time for this. I love my little boy…

This blog just woke-up from a big long nap, so we’re a little groggy.

We had Zachary just over 5 months ago and I’m ready to get back to regular blogging again. So much has happened.

Keep an eye on this blog and I’ll also let my Facebook friends know when new posts go up. Stay tuned…

“Where does he get those wonderful toys?”
— The Joker

Every once in a while I come across a toy that I enjoyed as a child. It’s usually a discovery, or a rediscovery, made on the Internet. It happened again tonight with this “Water Powered Space Rocket.”

This toy, whenever it’s brought up in a conversation, will always be connected to my cousin Joe. [Stephanie: If you're reading this, ask Joe if he remembers this.]

My brother and I were in grade school and Joe and Stephanie were there at our house. Tony and I weren’t able to pump up the toy much since we were pretty young, but Joe had no problem with it. It shot so high in the sky that we still remember it today. It was impressive.

The reason I’m even mentioning this story in a blog post is because I’ve been thinking lately that all the new high-tech toys of today are great and all, but I think I’d like to watch my boy enjoy playing with many of the same toys I enjoyed as a kid. Many of them will need to be replaced, since they’ve disappeared over the years.

I went out to find a few more of my favorite toys and here are a few that located:

• Evel Knievel Super Stunt Set
• Plastic Army Men (but, I sure didn’t have a video game like this)
• Big Wheel (although I had a slightly different one)
• Matchbox Car Track

I think there will be a shared enjoyment that I could understand from his point-of-view by picking up some of these toys over the next few years.

Fortunately some of these, like the water rocket (only $5.99), are still pretty cheap to purchase.

Related articles

• 15 Things You Never Knew About Evel Knievel (motorcycleinsurance.org)
• Evel Knievel on His Legend Scooter (laughingsquid.com)
• Matt Cohen: Toy Theory: What Toys Can Teach Us About Business (huffingtonpost.com)

Image via Wikipedia

Carson Austin Herman

I’ve never known either a Carson or an Austin, so I really don’t have any experience from which to draw. As far as if I like the names, I like both…perhaps Carson a little more.

A while ago I asked my wife about names that are also the same as cities. I rattled-off a few, including Austin, but she didn’t hear anything she particularly liked. That’ll most likely take Austin off the list. Sorry Texas, it’s nothing personal.

Carson is a fun name, similar to Carter. I like that it’s not an overly used name, and isn’t a strange name that would be fodder for teasing a decade down the road. Carson is that kind of name that would work well in the phrase, “Carson’s my best friend,” or, “I’ll be with Carson, so you know I’ll stay out of trouble.” Yep, Carson can work.

What do these names mean?

• Carson: “son of the marsh-dwellers”
• Austin: “venerated” (Note: the meaning of venerated is, “to regard with respect, reverence, or heartfelt deference”)

So…I guess, though Carson would one day want to go live in a marsh, he’d at least be respected by others there in the marsh with him.

Well, you can’t always choose a name by its meaning.  :)

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• Our Favorite Johnny Carson Moments (omg.yahoo.com)

Coby Junior Herman

I apologize for the silence over the past few days, but I’m back. Today’s name is pretty interesting for a few reasons.

“Coby” is a cute name for a little boy, but does it translate well for a grown man years from now. It’s not like (but it would be cool if) you can designate a name for the first 5 years of life, then another until they become a teenager, when they’d get a new name to get through the teenage years, then choose a final name to possess for the rest of their life. All that said, Coby isn’t a bad name. Like anything else, you just get used to calling someone a name and you eventually see that it fits that person.

There’s also the inevitable comparison to Kobe Bryant’s name. That could lead to people spelling it wrong, a lot, so that’s something I don’t particularly want to put my boy through for the rest of his life. Well, name should still in the game, and it will.

Also of note, I don’t want my boy to be mistaken for a cut of extremely tasty cuts of steak. I had a $15/oz kobe steak a few months ago and it was soooo good. I believe my boy will be soooo good as well as an upstanding citizen…but not in any kind of tasty, ridiculously expensive kind of way.

“Junior” is a name that I haven’t thought about until now. It would be a fun way to work my name into his name since my name is Michael J. Herman, Jr. Hmmm…that name really could work.

Now for the part of my posts that we all love, let’s ask it together, “What do those names mean???”

• “Coby” (or “Kobe,” “Koby,” Cobey,” etc.) is simply a made-up name w/o any recorded meaning that I could located (oh wait…do we get to make-up the meaning ourselves??)
• “Junior” simply means, “the younger one.” That works well as he is the younger one between him and me.

With all that said, I’ll definitely take these names to my wife. I’m thinking that “Junior” will be preferred over “Coby,” but I’m not always right about these kinds of preference questions.

Until next time…

Cash Brandon Herman

I’ve like the name “Cash” every since I heard it years ago from a musician whose son has the name. As for “Brandon,” I really haven’t known many guys with that name so I really don’t have a draw toward or a push away from it. It’s one of those fairly neutral ones for me. I suppose a “Brandon” would often be called “Brendon” since that’s been sort of a trendy name over the past decade or so.

What are some of the potential ways kids could use the name “Cash” against my son? Other than occasionally being called, “credit card” by some boys who think they’re clever but aren’t, Cash is probably one of safer ones. The only trouble I can see, off the top of my head, would be “Rash.” “Ash” could be a possible nickname, and depending on his personality and gifts, some of these nicknames could work:

• “Dash,” if he’s fast
• “Crash,” if he’s clumsy
• “Bash,” if every room he enters turns into a party
• “Gash,” if he visits the emergency room more than 3 or 4 times in his first 5 years
• I’ll leave the rest of the possibilities up to you, my readers.

Interesting: This name wasn’t used as a first name until 2003 when its popularity went wild. Many people have used this name because of their affinity to either Johnny Cash or to money. (Strange, people seem to like this “money” stuff. I need to look into this trend.)

It’s name meanings time:

• Cash = “vain” as it is the short form of the Latin “Cassius.”
• Brandon = “broom, gorse hill” (whatever.)

I’ll hold onto “Cash,”  and I believe my wife likes “Brandon,” so that’ll stay in the bucket as well. Until next time…

Carter Brock Herman

All right! The name generator hit a home on a couple of strong names. But, the question remain…what do these names mean?

Here we go:

• Carter means, “one who transports goods.”
• Brock means, “badger-like.”

PERFECT!!! “Badger-like!!!”

Wow, okay…Brock has definitely moved way up on my list.

Now, off to convince my wife…

We obviously don’t know what Little Man Herman will look like (although, I’m hoping he’ll have my wife’s looks…but in a handsome, masculine way. I now see that I didn’t explain very well…).

But, I do have an idea, actually 25 examples, of what my boy will NOT look like.

The list starts with this little guy (below). You can check out the rest of these precious little ones here.