The Worst Fathers' Day Ever

I found a good card this year.  Daniel doesn't usually get into greeting cards.  He doesn't see the point in them.  But I love the excuse to browse the greeting card aisle at Wal-Mart.  This year's Fathers' Day selection was fantastic!  I decided on this one.  It even looks like us.  Daniel may have even liked it.

Despite the fact that the kids and I made him Rice Krispie Treats...

...Daniel declared, with his feet up at the end of the day, "I'll go ahead and say that this was the worst day I've ever had."  Granted, this was an overstatement, but it may very well have been one of the most stressful days of his life.  Not exactly a man's Fathers' Day dream.

The day began very early, just past 1 a.m., to be exact, when Daniel woke me up to tell me that he was headed to the hospital.  He was himself feeling fine but Philip was trying to pass a kidney stone the size of a Fathers' Day card and he needed a little help from the folks at the emergency room.  Philip's day was much worse than Daniel's.  Not only was he in the predicament that I already mentioned, but at one point, around 4 a.m., a nurse assumed that Daniel (age 30) was Philip's (age 35) son.  We had a good laugh about that one over not-very-good beef stroganoff later in the day (I made the stroganoff, so I can say that).  Philip wasn't laughing.  He was stuck in the hospital overnight, after a day of surgery and strong meds and much pain.  Talk about a Fathers' Day nightmare.

Daniel did not stay at the hospital all day.  He made it home a few hours later, at about 5 a.m., and crashed.  He woke up about noon, ate a Rice Krispie Treat, and took a hot bath.  That was perhaps the highlight.  The flavor of the day quickly soured once again and stayed that way until dusk.  The kids were MONSTERS.  That is not characteristic of them, I'll say in the humblest way I know how.  Our kids are really good kids.  Not yesterday they weren't.  Holy smokes.  We really almost didn't make it through the day alive.

In fact, we spent our evening reading Parenting with Love and Logic, the new parenting book that dropped into our lap last week.  I think we might have a game plan.  Whew.

One overpriced Panera lunch that we had to bail on due to our screaming children, one hot and over-busy afternoon, one mediocre dinner, and a very bumpy and tearful bedtime later, we finally got the kids shut behind their doors and we collapsed.

Its a good thing Daniel is a father every day.  Its a good thing we have a lifetime to express to him that as far as dads go, it doesn't get any better than him.  Its a good thing I snapped these two pictures (pardon the chestiness) before the proverbial poop hit the fan.