The City Dads Group blog has again been cited by peers in the parenting world for providing informative and entertaining information for moms and dads.

The City Dads blog is one of six nominated for “Group or News Blog of the Year” from the Iris Awards, a parenting and social media recognition program sponsored by the Mom 2.0 Summit parenting conference.

Several other City Dads members and blog contributors have also received nominations in other parenting award categories.

The Iris Awards program annually recognizes “individual achievements, collective creativity and impactful work to honor the art of modern parenthood,” according its website.

Attendees of recent Mom 2.0 or Dad 2.0 parenting conferences submit blogs, podcasts and social media influencers for the awards. A select committee then whittles down the submissions to a handful of nominees. Past attendees then vote for the winners.

The 2021 Iris Awards winners will be announced Oct. 14.

City Dads Group’s blog and its Modern Dads Podcast have been nominated multiple times for an Iris Award as best group/news blog and parenting podcast, respectively, since 2016. Neither has ever won.

However, several City Dads members and blog contributors have won for writing, photography, and philanthropic work over the years.

Individual City Dads nominees this year include:

• Brent Almond, a blog contributor, for “Best Sponsored Content” for his “Parenting During A Pandemic” series for the Foundation for Advancing Alcohol Responsibility on his blog, Designer Daddy
• Johnathon Briggs, a Chicago Dads Group member and blog contributor, for “Dad Blog of the Year” for Fatherhood@Forty
• Mike Julianelle, a NYC Dads Group member and blog contributor, for “Dad Blog of the Year” for Dad and Buried
• Aaron Gouveia, a Boston Dads Group member, for “Dad Blog of the Year” for The Daddy Files, and for “Author/Book of the Year” for “Men and Miscarriage: A Dad’s Guide to Grief, Relationship, and Healing After Loss,” a book co-written with his wife, MJ.
• Andrew Knott, a blog contributor, nominated for “Dad Blog of the Year” for Explorations of Ambiguity

The City Dads Group website has been nominated for a new award that recognizes excellence in and commitment to creating parenting content.

The Richard and Linda Eyre Family Is Awards were established last year to recognize social media influencers whose online content best celebrates commitment, popularizes parenting, bolsters balance and validates values. The Family Is awards are scheduled to be presented in early February at the I Am Mom Summit, an online conference on parenting.

City Dads Group’s website was chosen as a finalist from among hundreds that were nominated and screened by an expert panel of judges. Two awards — a judge’s selection and a “people choice” selection will be given in the following catagories: Blogs, Websites, Podcasts, YouTube, Instagram and Facebook.

“The Family Is Awards were created to recognize those who are promoting strong families.  Parenting may be the most important thing we do to affect society yet there is little public recognition.  We want to change this and celebrate people like you for your family-centric content,” said Jamie and Mike Taylor, chairpersons and founders of I am Mom summit in the letter announcing City Dads Group’s nomination. “The whole point of the Family Is Awards is that recognition can spawn more quality content online that will help an ever-growing number of marriages, families, and parents to build strong and lasting relationships.”

Richard and Linda Eyre, authors of 50 books and honorary chairpersons for the wards bearing their names, have been at the forefront of a movement to strengthen families amidst cultures and societal norms that are moving in opposite directions, according to a press release accompanying the nomination announcement.

City Dads Group, along with its predecessor NYC Dads Group, has received several honors over the years for it chapters’ work, website/blog and podcast.

When our youngest son turned 13 a couple of weeks ago he was officially engulfed in teen spirit, embracing it wholly, eye rolls and all. Granted, the smell of it had moved in several months before, body spray in a hoodie, and the attitude arrived even earlier.

His birthday completed the set: two teenage boys sharing a bathroom and little else, save their love of pets and parents. They are, for the most part, free to choose their own adventures.

There was a time that I would chronicle all of it — the love and the loss, the raw and the perfectly flawed. I would put their stories to the wind and let the lessons fall where they may.

For over a decade I maintained a website, the critically acclaimed and financially non-existent Honea Express, upon which our lives were spread from putty to brushstroke and back again.

I published my last piece there nearly four years ago, just after our oldest son had turned 12. I no longer felt ownership of the tales I told, and perhaps I never did. The boys deserved their privacy and ample room to make mistakes. Pausing my pen seemed the thing to do. Life in real time has no need for a narrator.

Since then I have continued to share a bit here and there, but limiting looks into our world has made the words easy to curate. Milestones have given way to keywords, moments to topics and honesty to hashtags. That isn’t to say I haven’t retained my integrity or been authentic — I believe that much is obvious. I’ve never avoided the ugly and uncomfortable or spun in coats of sugar. However, there is a difference between characters and children, and my loyalty is to the latter.

All of which brings me to a crossroads. There is no shortage of parenting prose, no lack of ample advice, unsolicited or otherwise, but the overwhelming majority of it is centered on younger children. There is very little in the way of teen drama this side of The CW. Yet, the fact is that parents of teenagers probably need pings of reassurance more than anyone.

And while several publications and websites, including this one, do address parenting and teens, it still feels like a large hole in need of filling. Real stories of family life with teenagers tend to be purposely vague, broad and academic, dry bread with the crusts cut off.

I suspect, much like my own experience, that it isn’t a lack of material, but rather a healthy respect for privacy that keeps parents, even those who once ran rampant with personal anecdotes, from divulging too much. After all, our obligations to the internet are inflated and self-imposed, but we owe our offspring everything.

The truth is, raising a teen is hard. Each next thing is the most important one ever. Arguments appear from anywhere and emotions are a blur of hugs and door slams. There is an emoji for everything.

The other truth is, raising a teen is wonderful. Teenagers are becoming clearer versions of themselves, defining their humor and heart, trying on interests and exploring opportunities. It is a dance of trust and worry.

Ours is now a home with two teenagers in it, and their stories are everywhere. The telling of which is always tempting and sometimes possible, but even more importantly, perhaps now is a time best spent listening.

Photo of teen angst at the breakfast table: Whit Honea

City Dads Group will be recognized by its online parenting peers tonight with nominations for two awards for its social media work.

The City Dads Group blog has been nominated for Group or News Blog of the Year and The Modern Dads Podcast for Best Parenting Podcast at the third annual Iris Awards.

The Iris Awards honors “the art of parenthood,” according to its organizers. The awards recognize “the finest expressions in art, commentary, commerce, philanthropy, ideas and connections, all the while celebrating the emerging industry created by its pioneers and leaders,” according the Iris Awards website.

Nominations and award winners are determined by votes received from past attendees of the Mom 2.0 Summit and Dad 2.0 Summit parenting conferences. The awards are scheduled to be bestowed tonight in Dana Point, Calif., at the 2016 Mom 2.0 conference.

The competition in both categories is strong. In the blog category, for example, City Dads Group faces much bigger, more popular and better-financed entities such as Buzzfeed Parents and The New York Times “Motherlode” (recently renamed “Well Family”).

Three City Dads Group blog contributors have also been nominated for Iris Awards. The Modern Dads Podcast will go against the Poppin Bottles Dad-Cast by Philadelphia Dads Group members Benjamin Mullen and Nick Browne. Jeff Bogle, another Philly Dad, is nominated for Best Photography.

Chicago Dads Group member Jim Higley also received a nomination for Philanthropic Work of the Year for his work with Camp Kesem, an organization that supports the children of parents with cancer.

In Greek Mythology, Iris is the messenger of the gods who linked all humanity with the heavens. She travels with the speed of wind from one end of the world to the other, and into the depths of the sea and the underworld. She is a parent and is associated with communication, messages, and new endeavors.

I recently had a misunderstanding with a member of my family over blogging, something I wrote about my son and posted online in particular. I tried to convince this relative that it was pure satire, tongue-in-cheek, like “A Modest Proposal” but with Star Wars references peppered throughout. Needless to say, the conversation turned ugly and things were said that we both regret. But, in retrospect, he had a point.

This relative was furious that I would post anything negative about my son or that I would make it appear I resented my own child or would seek to harm him in any way. I meant no harm to my 4-year-old, but at least one person out there thought different. What if others made the same mistake?

What if one of them was my son?

If something tragic happened to me today and, years down the line, my son found online some of the stories I had written about him, would he also misunderstand my references without me around to explain or defend what I wrote? What would my son think of me? How would he remember me from that point on?

In the grand scheme of things, what I wrote was not that terrible but I have read other bloggers and parents on Facebook who often employ foul language and satirical humor in “complaints” directed at their children or spouses. Some of it is not very pretty. Sometimes I ask myself: Why would anyone tell such potentially embarrassing stories or make such comments about the people they love?

As an American, I deplore most kinds of censorship. I believe creative thought should never be squelched. However, I would hate for my wife or son to read my posts and interpret them as anything but humorous or tongue-in-cheek. I came to wonder if telling the whole blogging world everything that goes on in my child’s life might come to embarrass him some day. Maybe he wouldn’t want all of those stories to be spread outside of our home.

So what do I do? While I wouldn’t want others to censor my writing, in this case it’s my family and I have to think about their feelings. While some of my potential writings about my family would make for great stories, I feel I have to be more selective in choosing what I write. I have to stop and think how it may be interpreted by others before writing it, let alone before hitting the “publish” button­ because I don’t want my son to think I resent him. I love him.

So this time, I went back to that post and hit “delete.”

We were attending the Mom 2.0 Summit. I don’t want to say that I was behind enemy lines, or a spy, because that implies a war between the sexes, and that is devoutly not to be wished. (Not the least of the reasons is that these ladies had some serious firepower!) Let’s just say I was a stranger in a strange land, and leave it at that.

We were there checking out our sister conference and promoting our conference The Digital Family Summit (in case you were unaware, that’s our brand spanking new conference for teens, tweens, and their families who blog, vlog, or otherwise share stories and creativity using digital means, coming to Philadelphia at the end of June)   Mom 2.0 has a similar idea, although clearly it’s primary focus is on mom bloggers (or bloggers that are moms).

This year’s theme was What’s Next.  We were there without our son. We had dropped him off at his grandmother’s house in the Villages, the world’s largest retirement community in the middle of the state, about 1.25 hours from Orlando. We got there late at night, and took off in the morning. It was the first time that he was going to stay without both of us, and we were expecting some separation anxiety, but there was none to be had. He couldn’t wait to see us out the door, for an action packed 3 days of hanging at the pool, riding in the golf cart, watching crazy cartoons, eating chicken nuggets, and Sea World! We were more nervous than he was by a long shot.

First thing you need to know is that the Ritz Carlton is in a beautiful gated community, and the views and the grounds were pretty luxe. High end shopping, marble foyers, paintings everywhere, pools and manicured gardens everywhere, and also lots of friendly and helpful staff. Everybody has a smile, and a question, “Can I get you anything?” It was delightful.

The conference was also pretty delightful as well. Lots of women speaking about blogs and blogging (although there was much less technical content and hands on content than I expected– it was much more on the rah-rah/big ideas end of things.)   I did feel a little on the outside there, although my wife most decidely did not (she seemed to know just about everybody on the stage and off, and quite frankly, I think I was cramping her style a little bit.) It was her second or third Mom 2.0 conference, and it was my first.  I knew a few people, and definitely connected with a few others (both men and women) but continued to feel a little bit on the outside.   I’m still trying to figure out why I felt on the outside: Men were welcomed, and nearly every speaker acknowledge that a lot of what they were talking about applied to men and women bloggers. Here are maybe a couple of reasons.

• Maybe it’s me. (I tend to be on the periphery of lots of social groups, but not really feel like I’m on the interior of any particular one– although this might be more fodder for my therapist)
• Maybe I was taken aback by the sheer amount of estrogen in the room. I estimate there were 90-95% women, and 5-10% men.
• Maybe there is a vast feminine conspiracy, of which the Mom 2 Summit is the tip of the iceberg.
•  Maybe despite the undisputed fabulousness of the people in the room, I haven’t quite found MY peeps.

It wasn’t like I was the only Dad in attendance. There were a few of us brave souls— Doug French & John Pacini of the Dad 2.0 Summit, Adam Keats of Weber Shandwick, and Pedro Velloso of Limetree. I’m sure there were a few others, (Rob Candy, who is part of the Dove Team of Sponsors ) for sure, but those are the guys I mostly hung out with there. And I’m sure if queried, those guys would have different feelings and thoughts.  And I really enjoyed hanging with the people I met.  But somehow, for me, something was slightly missing. As a report, I’m not going to re-hash the schedule. Rather I’m going to share a few choice tidbits of what I learned this weekend. This isn’t everybody, or everything, but it’s a start.

Card Munch — it’s an app from LinkedIn that allows you to take a photo of a business card, and then a short time later, their info is digitized, and if they have a linked-in account, that info also appears. Thanks to Betsy Cadel ofhttp://www.thinkingcapnyc.com/ for the hot tech tip.

Brené Brown – she’s a researcher from U.T. Houston that researches shame in girls and boys. One of the things she said that really resounded with me was talking about the practice of gratitude– really appreciating all of the good things you have in your life. (and telling those people that) I don’t do that enough, recognizing and telling the people that I am grateful for in my life that I am grateful. She also talked about realizing which friends you can call to “move a body” and they will respond without judgement (at least not too much judgement) Later, we did something very similar, where we tried to break a Guinness World Record on behalf of Dove soap by tweeting out who inspires you. (we didn’t end up making it, but it was a noble try)

Gabrielle Blair – of Design Mom and Altitude Summit – gave a very nice presentation on where she was 6 and 2 years ago, and how she couldn’t possibly see herself where she is now then. The idea being that, things change, and you need to stay flexible and do things that seem crazy but will somehow work out in the end. (She was in NY 6 years ago, and now she’s living in France with her 6 children, with a sojourn in Denver)

Versace was a hedonist. We had a party at the Versace mansion for the closing night. I’m not much of a party guy, but his mansion was very impressive, especially the gold-painted shower big enough for 10 people (with 6 shower stalls) The interior pool was beautiful, but I could not imagine myself living there (and I can imagine myself living in lots of fabulous houses, just I don’t think I see eye to eye with Versace on fashion or style) Which might bring us back to why I was feeling a little on the outs.

Stacey Ferguson of Blogalicious gave a great talk about being multi-passionate, not scatter-brained or unfocused. Really struck home.

Karen Walrond of Chookooloonks. She was great at talking about being creative and about risking everything to do your work. I’ve seen her speak twice now, and loved it both times. She’s a talented writer and photographer, and is very genuine in her creative search.

Serious coin. Some of the bloggers there are making a fair amount of cash and getting serious gifts by writing sponsored posts, being brand advocates, and otherwise “selling” their services as bloggers/writers. The week before Mom 2.0 Summit, was something called Disney Social Moms, in which Disney World gave mom’s a seriously discounted rate (along with their families) to experience Disney World in the hopes that they will write about it.  I’m not sure how I feel about that– on one hand, I’m all for corporations paying for advertising, and writers getting paid for work.  But there is another part of me that starts to wonder about the authenticity of bloggers who are CONSTANTLY getting paid for their sponsored posts. I guess if the shoe were on my foot I wouldn’t turn it down, and I haven’t read a lot of those sponsored posts, and I’m sure they are all handled responsibly.  This is shrift for a different thought process.  But Walt Mossberg at the WSJ also gets paid to write about stuff. The difference is that the WSJ pays his salary, not Apple.  (well, at least not directly)  Grist for a different mill, I think. There was too much to really talk about and take in in one sitting, and I feel like I’ll be chewing on some ideas that I got from here for some time to come.

And here are some other views of Mom 2.0:

• http://loulousviews.blogspot.com/2012/05/whats-next.html
• http://www.baptistwineclub.com/?p=374
• http://www.momtrends.com/2012/05/mom-2-0-summit/
• http://smartypantsmama.com/2012/05/mom-guilt/
• http://www.thedailydoty.com/2012/05/mom-20-in-slightly-crappy-photos.html

There’s also some great coverage of the individual sessions on the Mom 2.0 blog http://www.mom2summit.com/blog/  The next Mom 2.0 Summit will be next year in California.  I’m pretty sure I’ll go again, and hopefully feel less on the outside. Maybe there will be more dads next year.  Will you join me?

UPDATE: We’re very sad to report that Andrew Aidan Legar has passed. His story will forever live in our hearts and we send our love and condolences to Roi, Michelle and the rest of the Legar family. Please consider a donation to this family as they recover from this tragedy and try to put their lives back together. See link below.

Josh struck a nerve with his post on Friday, Comical Misandry and the Involved Father; How Not to Screw up the Conversation About the Modern Dad. The piece was picked up by one of our favorite websites, The Good Men Project, and it was spread far and wide on the various intertubes. Lisa Duggan, co-founder of the terrific new website, The Parent du Jour, sent in this thoughtful response and agreed to let us post it here.

This is my husband, Frank Linkh, responding:

My wife made me look at this video; she was clearly annoyed by it. But I just thought it was a case of the media controlling the message. This is not a format for serious discourse — we know at a glance that this is going to be a “catty chat.” Adam is in on the joke, and he’s not going to break form. So be it.

I’m not mad, I’m amused. Men can’t handle logistics? Step off, sister. We mastered logistics long ago — so we could have our many, intercontinental wars.

Lisa speaks:

I agree with my husband, everyone here is sticking to a pre-determined script. Adam too, which I think is unfortunate, because he’s selling himself, and the involved-dad community he’s part of, short. One listen to Adam & Josh Becker’s Late Night Parent Show will reveal how important parenting is to them both. They may not take themselves seriously, but they do take their jobs as fathers seriously.

Like many contemporary dads, neither one of these men need or asks their wife’s permission to have a relationship with their kids.

Amy and Victoria’s remarks remind me of the way other women spoke to me when I first had my daughter and was staying home with her. A derogatory remark made about their husband, or dads in general, followed by a knowing sigh or eye-roll.

I was supposed to nod and sigh in agreement, and at first, I did. But eventually, I stopped. I realized that it was only natural that I was better at taking care of Alice—not natural, as in biologically predetermined—but as in you can’t become good at something you never get a chance to practice. I spent way more time with Alice than Frank did, therefore I knew her better and was better at being her parent.

I decided that the only way Frank would become as ‘good’ a parent was for me to get out of his way. So when Alice was two I took a trip to see a friend in Chicago. Nobody died. I learned that my husband and I were interchangeable as parents.

That wasn’t easy for me to accept, but the alternative was a life of owning the entire responsibility for her emotional health and physical well-being, along with a lifetime of resentment against my husband for not knowing her as well. We differ in style, yes, but we’re both equally able to take care of Alice. The bond he and my daughter made that weekend continues.

Perpetuating stereotypes may be comforting—it’s easier to assign blame to a group, rather than deal with individuals—and it certainly makes great TV.

But we’ll never move the cause of women’s equality —or the equality of all people—ahead if we continue to perpetuate and promote negative stereotypes about fathers and men. Would iVillage have aired a show whose topic portrayed women in a negative, stereotypical light? (Like, “Stay-at-home-Mothers: How Much of Their Husband’s Money Can They Spend?”.)

Here’s something else. When I became a mother just eight years ago, staying at home was still predominantly a woman’s game, even in our “progressive” community. After a lifetime of working alongside both women and men, I was suddenly, almost exclusively, surrounded by women. At the store, at school, in Starbucks. I was soaking in estrogen. My friend Betsy called it mommy-world.

It was a lopsided world. I missed my male friends and colleagues. I didn’t understand why, once I became a parent, these men — who were funny, smart, competent and great to work and play with — had become the enemy. I thought it was sad that more of them couldn’t follow me home; we would have had a ball together, tackling the challenges of parenthood, just as we once worked together to get a newspaper out.

I’m glad to observe that more and more men are able and choosing to stay home, either part-time or full-time and that even those that work traditional full-time jobs are intimately, actively, involved with their kids’ lives. In fact, my current business partner is a stay-at-home father of three. (He tells his story on our new website.)

It’s great to be able to talk openly to both men and women about being a parent. There are so many benefits to having a variety of points of view at hand; more resources and more solutions. Chief among them is how it frees women to excel and engage in other areas, and to not exclusively shoulder the blame when the kids turn out bad, too.

If I could, I’d tell Amy and Victoria and the rest of the iVillage to take another look at their husbands, and the fathers they know. Are they really that one-dimensional, or does it serve you to continue to think of them that way? I’d ask them to think about the example they are setting for their little boys when they speak about dads in this way. If you start with the notion that boys are less equipped for parenting, you’ll raise them to fulfill that promise.

Thanks to active NYC Dads Group member and frequent guest blogger, Josh K., aka The Angry SAHD, who watched this video clip and was “ANGRY” because as the first dad ever on iVillage, we had the opportunity to shatter some stereotypes about fatherhood. Unfortunately, we did not. This entry is cross-posted on The Angry SAHD site as well. We would appreciate your feedback or comments.

That said, we still get the stereotype of being the “Mr. Mom,” trying and failing at replacing a mother.  Except perhaps around Fathers’ day, we are presented as bumbling, laundry-forgetting idiots who can’t manage as well as our wives.  Speak to most of us, however, and you find these stereotypes don’t hold.

With more notoriety coming for the involved dad, comes more media coverage. With more media, comes the opportunity to correct the stereotypes.  A friend of the NYC Dads Group, Adam Cohen, from Dadarocks.com, got such an opportunity at iVillage recently. See this recent clip from their video segment The Conversation Thread.

Now, while Cohen gets a great opportunity to set the record straight, the interview was set up in a way to reinforce the stereotypes, and we think we all can do better.  We’ve put together a list of a few things to think about when being an involved dad, and especially when discussing it, whether it’s on TV or the playground.  We hope
these will move the conversation forward and help us move away from 1950s clichés.

1) Don’t be the boob.
Listen, just because expectations are low, doesn’t mean you have to live up to them.  We get a lot more credit for simple things just because people expect us to fail.  Everyone wants to make Mr. Mom jokes about burning clothing while ironing, burning dinner, and burning your kids up because you forgot the sunscreen. Don’t let this be true, and don’t let other people get away with accusing you.

Saying that after you “mess up that laundry 3-4 times you don’t have to do it again” might get a laugh, but it makes us all look like an idiot.  Most of the dads we know are excellent at managing their households, cooking, and making sure everything that needs to get done, gets done.

Victoria Perico, of Savvymommy.com, says that “if we leave anything up to a
dad that’s major, most likely it will fall apart.”  Not only is this complete nonsense, but it makes me wonder why she would tolerate her husband being like that. Our responsibility as an involved father is two-fold.  One, don’t be that useless guy.  Play your part and take control of these things. Make sure things get done. Two, when someone calls you incompetent, don’t laugh.  Correct them.

2) Be involved in everything — not just major discipline.  

Don’t just be there to back mom up when “it gets escalated.”  Being involved with the
discipline (and education, entertainment, and everything else) of your children is your job. You want your kids to respect you? Be there from the beginning.  When posed with the question about fathers’ parenting skills, it’s not best to start by explaining that you let your wife do the “baseline” parenting.

To kick this reputation, we can’t be the Don Drapers of the world or even the Ward Cleavers.  We need to make sure that we are there for school events, scraped knees, and the time-outs.  We are not just the nuclear option for our wives when they get overwhelmed.

3) Be on top of your stuff.

One of the more offensive points in the video is when Amy Oztan, of selfishmom.com,
says “Let’s face it, I think that in most relationships, men just suck at logistics.”  She describes it in the context of her husband.  Points like this need to be challenged.  While
this may be true in her household, perhaps some of it is because she tolerates it.  She says “there’s always that extra layer of stress,” but she says nothing about trying to get her husband involved in doing those things.  When we allow negative behavior from our
partners without trying to address it, it is also our fault.

For starters, handling “logistics” and the small details is not a trait unique to one sex.  I’ve known plenty of amazing male and female project managers, which is essentially what parenting is.

Just because in one person’s household, such as Oztan’s, the woman is better at it, does not mean the rule holds true for all couples. In our community of active fathers, we have men who run all of the details of their homes while others take a more shared role.  That said, part of being involved is being on top of the things your kids need.  Be a
counter-example to Oztan’s point, and then correct people when they make such assertions.

For better or worse, part of the “job” of being an involved dad is helping to change the incorrect impressions people have of all dads.  Set an example, live that example, and correct people when they are wrong.

I began my journey as an at-home dad in NYC about 18 months ago. There was little in the form of resources geared toward involved dads – in parenting books, websites, and local parenting classes or support groups. When I first reached out to the internet in my new role, I found humor and engaging content on reading Rebel Dad. The founder of Rebel Dad, Brian Reid is “a former at-home dad who remains interested in the question of how modern fathers can maximize their connection to family.”

Some of you might have noticed that the “well” of blog entries on the Rebel Dad site have started to dry up. Blog entries on that site used to come out frequently, with fresh content, honest perspective, and covered an array of relevant topics on fatherhood. No entries for over a month on his site. What happened to Rebel Dad?

Rebel Dad has been keeping busy. He has been writing daily posts for “On Parenting” at The Washington Post. If you didn’t get the memo about his new gig, you should really tune in sometime. The writing from his perch at On Parenting has certainly cast a wider net than just focusing on involved fathers. I have been enjoying his take on parenting topics ranging from having a holiday card with your kids on it (I am sure your mailbox has been flooded with them), whether you should lie to your kids about Santa, or if allowing dads in the delivery room is a bad idea. Sure, I am a bit selfish, and would like more content from Rebel Dad on at-home dads & involved fathers…but, why shouldn’t all parents benefit from his writing. Brian Reid has enabled me to reflect and take heed, that many of the topics that I am most interested in as an involved parent are not just topics “for dads.” Thanks Brian for broadening my lens on parenting!