This Father’s Day, may fathers everywhere receive a big bundle of love from their children. May healing and reconciliation take place where required, and may fathers step up to their calling as loving dads and role models for their offspring. The team at Dads4Kids wishes all Dads, all over Australia, a happy Father’s Day. It is always a busy time for us with the release of our new Father’s Day TV ...

Editor’s Note: Last weekend, Tony Miller attended the Dads4Kids Men’s Leadership Summit, where he was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his lifetime service and sacrifice for the men, families, and children of Australia. See the photo above. He did not know it was coming. It was our secret. He was happily surprised. Tony’s 27-year-old son Cassidy Miller had encouraged him to come. We are so glad he did. ...

‘Shhhhh,’ I whispered. ‘Don’t spoil the surprise.’ ‘Okay.’ He whispered back, conspiratorially, as we tucked hubby’s Father’s Day present away in the storage room. ‘Remember, it’s our secret, okay? Don’t spoil the surprise.’ I continued, shutting the door. Only to hear his excited footsteps on the stairs before I’d even had time to turn around! Letting Loose ‘Don’t spoil the surprise, Daddy!’ he called out, running as fast as his little ...

Language is a wonderful thing. Through the power of language, one person can translate the most complex and nebulous of ideas into terms that another can understand. Thus, not only the understanding but also the realisation of a new or different concept can be transposed from one mind to another. It’s really a miraculous process. Powerful and adaptable tool that it is, language is not the basis of communication, just a ...

I was driving to a playdate with the two-year-old twins in the car, having just dropped off my four-year-old at kindy, when ka-klunk! Something was wrong with the back passenger-side wheel. I knew it was looking dodgy beforehand, so suspected it had gone flat. But I wasn’t really sure. After a quick, illogical thought process, my decision was to slow down my pace and carefully drive 2km to my local service ...

When I was a few years younger, I would ride my push bike to work regardless of the weather. I did a full season of bitterly cold Hobart’s darkest winter mornings that gave me the full spread — thumping rain, a dusting of snow and dodging tree parts from a storm the night before. My biggest discovery of that season was that whinging did not ever make it easier. The situation ...

Our culture pressures us to keep working and consuming. It takes a conscious effort to step back, take a breather and re-prioritise, but doing so is really worth it for good health and peace of mind. “We have more ‘things per person’ than any other nation in history. Closets are full, storage space is used up, and cars can’t fit into garages, having first imprisoned us with debt. Possessions then take ...

We have all no doubt heard the statistics regarding separation and divorce in this country — something like 30% of marriages end in divorce, and a huge number of Australian children are forced to cope with life after marital breakdown. The typical divorce scenario in Australia today is that mum gets custody of the children and dad (hopefully) gets access and an obligation to pay Child Support. Children from broken marriages ...

Deciding to home-school can feel like a massive undertaking, but it is worth it. Here are some gems from a father’s firsthand experience. As the primary educators of their children, stable parents are best-placed to form their offspring, and have access to many resources today. Merriam-Webster’s base definition for homeschooling is “to teach one’s child at home.” Whether you’re a parent who is new to homeschooling or you’re a parent against ...

Homeschooled children can enjoy a more holistic, grounded and in-depth education than their peers in school. Here are several factors behind their lifelong success. Look across a spectrum of homeschooling success stories, and you’ll come across the words freedom and flexibility. Homeschooled children tend to be more successful in life because home education is elastic. This scholastic elasticity makes homeschooling a parental powerhouse packed with potential. In practice, homeschool curricula and ...

My life as a dad is whatever you get when you tumble excitement and pride and joy and sweet-sadness and wholeheartedness together. The heady mix of emotion had me blurt out an “I love you” to my girls on their mum’s voicemail and spontaneously add: “I am just so proud to be your dad!” My thoughts turn often to my earthly angels when they are not in my care. While there ...

Believe it or not, any victory for mothers is also a victory for fathers, and ultimately for children. Sall Dover, a new young mother, after protesting on Twitter about the forced use of the Orwellian phrase “birthing parent”, has scored a victory for motherhood. It takes a man and a woman to create a child, and a mother and a father to raise a child. All the social science research shows ...

We’ve been listening to Mike and Alicia Hernon’s podcast called Messy Families. One of their recurring messages for parents is: stop worrying about getting your kids to heaven — parenting is about helping you get there! When we first heard them say this it stopped us in our tracks. Mike and Lisa go on to explain: the reason motherhood or fatherhood is a vocation, is not to make our kids into ...

A concerned mother reflects on how she can best protect her young sons from the lure of internet pornography. I don’t have a blueprint for this brave new online world, where just typing ‘breastfeeding’ into a search engine produces a minefield of lurid possibilities. Steve Biddulph, author of Raising Boys and Raising Girls, wrote an article in the Sydney Morning Herald that really resonated with me. He highlighted the fact that ...

May this list of brilliant homeschooled scientists, mathematicians, inventors, writers, poets, musicians, sporting greats and politicians throughout the centuries serve to inspire parents to take the plunge into home education. Homeschooling is parent-facilitated education. Gandhi once said, “There is no school equal to a decent home and no teacher equal to a virtuous parent.” His words epitomise the power, beauty, and duty attached to the vocation of home education. From hands-on ...

All right, all right… I admit it… I’m a perfectionist. I take pride in a job well done. I’m a mum, I’m a wife, I’m a worker, a house cleaner, a seamstress, a medic, a teacher — the list is a mile long. And somewhere in amongst all of these roles, I need to find the one that magically helps me to find balance… and then I need to excel at ...

Fatherhood is a journey full of unforeseeable developments, but if you gather like-minded friends around you who can provide support along the way, and practise humility while learning how to best love and care for your family, you can triumph over the challenges which come your way. “Life is strange with its twists and turns”, is a quote from a famous poem written in 1921 called ‘Don’t Quit’ by Edgar A ...

Remember when that song first came out, Butterfly Kisses — the one about the father watching his daughter growing up? How soon the days, the months, and the years go by. My daughter is approaching 10 years old (going on 19). It seems just like yesterday I was kissing my daughter goodbye on her first day of kindergarten. My baby girl is growing up, and I don’t like it! Independence One ...

We may become overwhelmed by our family responsibilities and job expectations. Recall the adage that less is more, and prioritise your main role, in which you cannot be replaced. “You can’t have it all,” used to be a saying to describe women juggling careers and motherhood. Mothers are caught in the conundrum of trying to be present for their children while having a successful career, all at the same time. It ...

Being a mum can be a challenging role, but we parents have been entrusted with the vital task of raising the next generation, and it is totally worth it. Here are 5 life lessons about parenting and family life. 1. Tomorrow is a New Day! Cue little red-haired, ringlet-topped Annie singing, “The sun’ll come out tomorrow… so ya gotta hang on tïll tomorrow… I love ya Tomorrow! You’re always a day ...