I know a few of these 'mom' moms, they are terrible and when they are asked to keep up with an adult conversation usually the best that you'll get out of them is how many words the kid said that day or if he made a doo-doo in the right place. I cant ever have a woman like that. FWIW the kid talk so far makes me pretty positive about what could potentially happen when I make someone a preggo.

On a lighter note...

Thanks to "Chopstick's Craps Strategy 101". I will be participating in another craps tourney today. 100k up top and we're down to 300.

If I win my first table and so does my blind 70+ year old, ex pool shark, we will be splitting our monies.

Buy chopstick's book fellas. It's mainly geared towards "bubble craps" but the same principles apply.

Here's a pic of a 1 of the 3 hundo promo chips I won in the first round.

The tourney was invite, or 100$ entry.

I am dissapoint.

lol reddit

Oops... I meant to delete that post.




Edit... I went slow cooker and roasting pan. I talked my wife out of the cupcake tray.

Insane promo chip close up...

For a brief moment there, I thought you won a bunch of carrots.

Our man with the vibrating leg is digging himself into a super deep ****hole over in the degen stories thread in BBV.

wtf?

LINKS, WE NEED LINKS, STAT!

Any advice on when to start implementing the Treesong method. My older kid is 2.5 and I know some say that it's too early to start at that age and others don't. What did you do?

It seems like an obvious 'it depends'. I guess it really depends on how your kid reacts to it and most of all whether or not its able to understand what you're going for.

I think they'll only understand what you're going for when they're 20

It has to do with the theory of mind and can differ per person and comes in different stages, its a pretty interesting subject;
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_mind

.

$20K is a for an employee, not an au pair. An au pair is a girl who stays in your house and gets free food and pocket money (e.g. up to 340 eur in Yakmelk's country) while they learn the foreign language in return for light work and occasional childcare duties. It's kind of the same in any country - an employer can't just have "volunteers" who get paid - for example - $75K pocket money instead of actual employees for whom you have to pay social security, get visas if applicable and so on - there is always going to be level above which the authorities call BS.

It's true that they often are expected to do a lot more work though. My friend's mother ran an au pair agency in London (that's how I eventually ended up leaving the UK) and the way it usually happened was they would be an au pair with a family on the first year (of 2 max) of their visa, and use the reference to get a "better" au pair position for the second year (better meaning receiving 1000 under the table per month).

Really often it went the same way. The parents were both working 10 hours plus 1 hour commute each way, the child would bond to the au pair, not the mother. The fathers would frequently fall in love with the aux pairs - basically the beautiful woman who lives in your house and looks after it and your kids and whom you support financially is supposed to be called your wife - though being upper middle-class Englishmen they didn't generally do much about it, but it (and the affection of the children) was a source of tension between the wives and the au pairs (they often said "he's really nice to me but she is horrible").

Basically, if you think it is a good idea for your child to go through a series of foster mothers in all but name then get an au pair but otherwise find a wife who is willing to bring up the children or design your working life in such a way that enables you to do it - e.g. my brother is a contract programmer working from home.

But like most things it comes down to values. If you need consumer items very much then you need two incomes. I am far from what others would consider as rich but my wife (actually a former au pair in Paris) doesn't have to work - simply because we prioritise time with the kids that over new phones and foreign holidays and driving a car back and forward to work. When she worked the kids were in school from 8 am to 5 pm every single day even though lessons finish about 1pm.

Also, I don't know much about the US visa situation but in the UK the system was designed in such a way that they could only stay if they got married - and not transfer to any other visa category - so it wasn't really a way to immigrate, but to acquire language skills that would be useful back home (in Slovakia all the CEO's assistants and English teachers aged between about 30-45 are former au pairs and were in heavy demand at the time they were returning). So anyway, the visa isn't really part of the sell.

For me personally it isn't that much about the consumer items. Im not fond of holidays and hate Apple so whats left ? I just really enjoy my job and so does my gf. Working 8 hours a week with an au-pair isn't just for the kids, its also for you. You dont have to use the precious time that you're at home to clean the bathroom and whatnot but could be bonding with your kids instead.

Damn, that guy has completely lost it

Literally. Or halfway to literally anyways.

I think it entirely depends on both you and your children. Lame answer, I know, but I'll explain with an anecdote. When LT2 was right around 2 -- certainly old enough to walk comfortably but not really very strong yet, and younger than yours is now -- we came home from dinner one night. We took her out of her car seat and she walked into the house on her own until she got to the stairway. I was right behind her. She turned back and whined at me "Carry me up the stairs. Now." I looked at her and said "No. Not until you ask like a big girl." She promptly melted down by sitting down on the bottom step and screaming. I sat down next to her. "I'm not going to carry you up the stairs until you ask like a big girl. It's just not going to happen." Twenty minutes later, she managed to squeak out "Dad, would you please carry me up the stairs?" I instantly said "Sure" and did just that.

In thinking about it afterwards, it seemed to me that her tragedy was real. She was genuinely upset that I wouldn't do what she wanted. At that point, it's a contest of wills. Key point: she was perfectly capable of asking politely by that point in her life, and she knew exactly what I was asking her to do. She was tired, yes, and upset, yes. At the same time, I knew that what I was doing was causing her genuine pain -- and as a father, that's unpleasant. But I don't think children should be protected from all pain or upset, as should be obvious from my general tone on this issue.

So, I'll put it to you this way: start now, assuming that your child is capable of doing what you insist. Insist on what is fair and reasonable; don't do it just for the sake of doing it. Also understand that it's easier said than done -- I was more than a little unhappy that my stubborn behavior in that spot caused my child to melt down. Finally, be sure that you have unanimity with Mrs. Melkerson. In the middle of LT2's eruption, Mrs T asked me in pig latin "do you think this is really the right time to do this? She's tired and already miserable." My response: "Hell if I know. What I do know is that I'm already committed to it, and if I back down now, I'm screwed." Pretty much the worst thing that could have happened is if Mrs. T had picked her up and taken her upstairs; that a) encourages whining and b) teaches the kid that one parent can be played off against the other. That second point is of course always true, but it should take rather more sophistication than a two-year old has to execute on it.

Hope that helps at least a little.

Random thought: I wonder if (and when) the LTs are going to read all of my 2p2 posts. They definitely know about the "Howard Treesong" alias, and certainly know or know of a number of my poker/gambling/2p2 friends/acquaintances.

LT2 doesn't remember this particular incident, by the way, although I've definitely told both kids about it before.

I wish Howard was my dad

Yak's wiki link raises some interesting questions. Both LTs, if they saw me behave the same way now, would immediately and absolutely know that I was being stubborn to make a broader point. I do not believe that LT2 understood that at the time -- I'd say there was zero chance of that, except that I can never know for sure. I'm quite sure she was sufficiently mature at the time to have passed the Sally-Anne test.

just anecdotally replying to your last sentence, but my mom stayed home full time to raise me and my sister while my dad worked. My grandma did the same for my mom and her 3 siblings. My 2 aunts did as well and we spent most of our summers at their houses playing during the day. So basically I grew up around nothing but women taking care of their kids and the house and didn't really know any moms who werent stay at home moms all the way till I was basically in high school. My dad (and my grandpa when talking about my grandmother) always made it very clear tho, that what my mom did was incredibly important and that it was in fact a job. So I never really thought of it as "that's what women do, they keep the home". I viewed it as a job, and one that just happened to be filled in my life by women.

I have some friends who are all consumed my being a mommy tho, so I definitely think its great that you are doing something else for yourself. I was dating a lawyer a number of years ago, and if we had gotten married and had kids, the plan was she would keep working and id take care of the kids and play poker. Now that I have a bunch of friends with kids, jesus, I think I would have gone crazy. So I don't envy you