Jay Payleitner: Dad, you can use competition between your kids to help shape and motivate them. (And to get things done.)
Fathering Is Worth Doing Badly
Fatherhood is hard for many of us, but it’s very much worth the struggle. Growing as a dad is a lifelong process.
Questions to Help Dads Connect Heritage & Legacy
As dads, our present and future are critically linked to our past. Use these questions to gain perspective on your fathering.
Tension with Our Kids’ Mom Deeply Affects Our Fathering
We aren’t alone in this fathering task. Disagreements with our children’s mother can’t help but spill over into how we relate to our kids.
A Dozen Activities to Help You Win Your Daughter’s Heart
Dr. Michelle Watson Canfield: Dad: give your time, energy, and creativity to communicate to your daughter that she’s worth celebrating.
Winning and Losing in Father-Child Contests
Should we let our kids when we’re competing against them? It can be difficult for a dad. And it might require an attitude adjustment.
One Way to Restore Hope to Your Fathering
All dads feel hopeless sometimes, and a great way to become a positive, confident father might seem simple, but it definitely isn’t easy.
Birthday Reflections: A Father’s Legacy
As I “mature” as a dad and granddad, I’m more and more aware that my time is limited, and I want to do all I can to leave a strong legacy.
Game Time! Have a FUN Family Christmas
The holidays should be fun! Don’t settle for less. Organize activities that everyone can participate in and enjoy.
3 Fathering Insights from Joseph
Jeff Zaugg: Sometimes our dreams and expectations fall flat, and we can all learn from the dad in the Christmas story.
Perfume Day: A Powerful Dad-Daughter Holiday Tradition
Dr. Michelle Watson Canfield: Why not adopt a new tradition and create lasting memories of positive interaction with your daughter?
What’s Your Plan for the Holidays, Dad?
Think of thanksgiving as a test or a warm-up, dad. Start planning how you’ll be fully engaged during the Christmas season with your family.
Categories
Welcome to the fathers.com fathering library.
On the left you will see how our blogs and articles are categorized. Choose your stage in the fathering journey under Your Kids, click on a specific situation that applies to you, or browse through the items in our hot topics and fathering fundamentals. Also, check out Tools for the Journey – short downloadable pieces with tips for specific challenges.
Dad: Harness the Power of Sibling Competition
by Jay Payleitner Competition between siblings (or cousins) is a great tool for dads. While you can still outsmart them, there are all kinds of ways you can shape and motivate your kids and they won’t even know it. Got a pile of bricks that need to be moved from here...
Fathering Is Worth Doing Badly
Here at fathers.com, we want all dads to do their best. Be devoted to your children. Make them a top priority. Commit yourself to being there for them through all the ups and downs of life. Give them lots of encouragement and affirmation. Teach them skills and...
Questions to Help Dads Connect Heritage & Legacy
by Ken Canfield, Ph.D. Becoming a father is life-changing in many ways, as all dads know. At some point, often during the first few weeks or years of fatherhood, there is a kind of nexus between the past and the future in each man’s journey. Regarding the past,...
Tension with Our Kids’ Mom Deeply Affects Our Fathering
When there’s tension with your child’s mother, it impacts everyone. That might be an odd message to convey so soon after Valentine’s Day, but we all know what real life is like all the other days of the year that aren’t our anniversary or a special date night. And for...
A Dozen Activities to Help You Win Your Daughter’s Heart
by Michelle Watson Canfield, PhD, LPC With Valentine’s Day less than a week away, here’s a reminder that the holiday isn’t reserved only for romance between sweethearts. It’s also an opportunity for a girl to be treated in an extra special way by her dad, thus...
Winning and Losing in Father-Child Contests
by Ken Canfield, Ph.D. Bob’s two teenage sons were challenging him in many ways physically—arm twisting and wrestling and so on—and they talked about racing him to see if they were faster. It leads to a common question for dads: What’s the impact of winning or losing...
One Way to Restore Hope to Your Fathering
by Ken Canfield, Ph.D. What keeps a dad motivated and hopeful? That’s a key question that I’ve been pondering and researching for some time, and I’ll have more on this in the coming weeks and months. I’m more and more convinced of this: Hope is a powerful force and...
Birthday Reflections: A Father’s Legacy
by Ken Canfield, Ph.D. I recently gathered with many of my children and grandchildren to celebrate a birthday: my 70th. It was a wonderful and sometimes wild time together. During the days before that celebration, I came up with a sheet of reflections that I handed...
Game Time! Have a FUN Family Christmas
Are there gamers in your family? Actually this isn’t the kind of gaming you’re probably thinking of. And it has very little (if anything) to do with phones, computers or keyboards (unless you come up with one that involves a piano). This is about playing games with...
3 Fathering Insights from Joseph
by Jeff Zaugg Have you ever had dreams or expectations that fell flat or didn’t materialize the way you hoped? That happened to my family and me a few years ago when we were on an RV trip in Texas. We had plans to spend a few days at a lake that looked beautiful on...
Perfume Day: A Powerful Dad-Daughter Holiday Tradition
by Michelle Watson Canfield, PhD, LPC Per·fume [pərˌfyo͞om] · a fragrant liquid typically made from essential oils extracted from flowers and spices, used to impart a pleasant smell to one's body or clothes. Day [dā/] · a period of twenty-four hours as a unit of time;...
What’s Your Plan for the Holidays, Dad?
It’s the week after Thanksgiving, and in case you didn't know it, dad, last week was a test—or maybe a warm-up. How did you do? It’s good to ask yourself questions like: “Did I help make the celebration all it could be? Or did I just kind of show up and let things...