Just about any day now, my lovely wife and I will welcome a baby girl into our family, our first child (not counting the dog) in what will be the beginning of a lifetime of … well, I honestly have no idea.
As a first-time parent, I’m terrified as we count down until May 4, my wife’s official due date, wondering what the future will hold: Will I be a good dad? Will I be able to give her everything she needs? Will I do a good Barbie voice? Will I leave her at Pizza Hut like my parents did to me when I was 6?
Everyone says having a child changes your life. I have no doubt about that. My feeling is that as a parent, you end up learning more about yourself than anything else, something I’ve already realized after nearly nine months of pregnancy.
For instance, I’ve already learned I’m good at taking a box of unassembled items and building them into something that actually looks like the picture on the box. So far, I’ve put together a crib, a changing table, a mobile, a glider, a lamp and hung a border. I also painted a door, installed a new doorknob, installed a car seat and read the instruction manual on the Diaper Genie cover-to-cover. All things I never thought I’d do.
I also learned it was a bad idea to call my petite wife “rotund.” Yes ladies, I did that. I thought it was funny. Several tears later, I learned it was not. Send hate mail to david.stegon@fedscoop.com.
Over the coming weeks and months, I hope to share my experiences being a first-time parent on this blog, giving the parenting veterans out there something to laugh about as they watch my mistakes or the expecting parents something to look forward to, but also a mini-diary for myself to look back at one day when she’s older and dating some guy I hate.
So, with the due dating ticking down, I wanted to take the chance to write 10 things I hope for my daughter in her coming life.
Oh, and we plan to name her Samantha Jean, but you can call her Sam.
- I hope she likes sports, both playing and watching. I love baseball, basketball, golf and football and want her to as well. I want to coach her softball team and watch her strike out the side and then rip a bases clearing double. I want her to call me excited when one of our teams pulls out the last second victory. Better yet, I want her sitting next to me on the couch ready with a high-five.
- I hope she likes dogs. Dogs are the best. This should be an easy one.
- I hope she has my curly hair, my wife’s blue eyes and a quick sense of humor.
- I hope she lets me walk her down the aisle.
- I hope she’s a girly girl who likes dresses and tea parties and butterflies. I also hope she likes the color purple, because her room has a lot of purple. I mean a lot. Like, it’s everywhere.
- I hope she’s kind and sweet, says “please” and “thank you” and never tells a lie. Not even once.
- I hope she’s my wife’s best friend. I think she will be.
- I hope she calls when she’s going to be late, doesn’t develop an addiction to texting and refuses to date until she’s 35.
- I hope she becomes a lawyer or a veterinarian or a CEO or an astronaut or a writer or a professor or the winner of Top Chef.
- I hope she loves me.
