As we live in an urban area, it takes some planning and effort to facilitate encounters with animals and experiences of plant life. What nature-themed adventures have you found in your area?

If you can, work towards creating a happy place for your family. Discuss ideas, then start planning and working towards it. Your family happy place could be a screen-free family meal together, a fun bicycle or scooter adventure, or a fancy picnic at your local park.

Fortunate is the father and child who discovers "I Love My Daddy Because…" (by Laurel Porter Gaylord). At last, here is a book that shows the variety of attributes men — and animals — share with their young.

The early years are the most dynamic time of life, producing more than a million neural connections each second. For parents or caregivers, this time offers a wonderful opportunity to impact children’s lives.

Opportunities to seek out adventure are only limited by your imagination and budget, but there are ways to escape inexpensively. An adventure together was exactly what the girls and I needed, and an educational road trip could be a good place to start.

“Children need your presence more than they need your presents,” are the wise words of Jesse Jackson. Both Dads and kids need a purpose to develop the art of presence. To assist you in this art, we have gathered together 40 things that Dads can do with their children. This is particularly relevant over holiday periods. Almost 80% of them don’t require any money, but they do require effort and execution. ...

Here’s some dad-spiration like no other. Mike Trinh, an MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) fighter from Texas, took down a mid-sized alligator in his driveway before dropping his kids off at school. Trinh retold the event on Instagram, saying, he first dismissed his daughter’s alligator alert, because he thought she was messing with him in an attempt to dodge her first day of middle school. Unexpected Visitor After visually checking the driveway, ...

I have an affinity with single parents, especially since becoming one myself. My circumstances have created openings to meet some dads whose whole being is put into being a dad. Of course, there are a few dads who ought to lift their game; however, I tend only to mention the dads that do great things because, for me, they are a starting point for what I might achieve. I like to ...

Working together with your spouse in parenting and disciplining your children makes it all the more effective. Now to introduce our second pup. His name was Chance and he was a very handsome Black Labrador. Chance was a “by the rule book” pup and loved people’s company on his terms. Chance also had a stubborn streak that had him withdrawn from the program, so he became our pet. Lesson 3: Two ...

Prioritising your spouse, especially in the little daily routines, teaches your children how to respect and honour their mother. My wife and I were fortunate enough to be volunteers for the Guide Dogs for the Blind organisation in our local state after all our kids had grown up and left school. Over a period of seven years, we had the pleasure (and to be honest at times the displeasure) of raising ...

Christmas is a blessed season to pause and soak in the loving presence of your family, recalling the quiet joy of the first Christmas in the humble abode of the Holy Family. As the song says, “Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year.” For many families, this is true. You see, kids love family. It’s what they instinctively long for. Christmas is really the celebration of what many in ...

There I was, staggering down the dark hallway at 5.30 a.m., trying not to wake the children. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw movement. What is that, I thought? Maybe a mouse? No, it looks bigger than a mouse. Maybe it’s a rat? Peering down in the darkness, I realised it was a frog. But how did such a large frog get into the house? All of these ...

As a boy my dad used to tell my brother and I stories before we went to bed. We would even sing a song, “Tell me a story” if he was short off the mark. Our favourite stories were Dad’s Snake Stories, most of them real. They would always end with Dad killing the snake and putting the dreaded killer snake on a nearby ants’ nest. The ants then threw a ...

I arrived home from school at about 4 pm one afternoon to find that my pigeons had been stolen, and one of the new chicks had been killed and was dead on the floor of the cage. I was 10 at the time. It was 1952 and we were living at 44 Canning Street, North Melbourne. I loved my pigeons. I had five excellent pairs and they all were good breeders. ...