#NOTATASCA16: A little sad but a-lotta stoked!
I will miss you all in New Orleans - but I promise I have a good excuse!New Orleans will have to wait….
When I found out that ASCA 2016 was in New Orleans – I was stoked. I have not spent a bunch of time in the South and really enjoy good food and good music. I feel like I started planning for ASCA 2016 immediately following ASCA 2015 in Phoenix. Sadly, I will not be able to attend ASCA 2016 this year for three big reasons.
- My school said no to funding me for 4 years in a row. Without that funding – the trip cost was prohibitive (expensive flight!! and see #3).
- My speaking submission was not added to the program this year (you can still catch me at a few state organizations this year!).
- And the big one – my wife (Jackie) and I are expecting our first child at the end of June. I feel that ditching my wife and newborn to go hang in New Orleans is a pretty mean thing to do. So I will be spending time with my growing family this summer and following along online (in between sleeping and diaper changes).
Advice welcome!
I know many of you are practicing school counselors and have children of your own. What would you tell yourself when you started now that you know what you do? How does being a school counselor make parenthood harder/easier? Got any favorite tips, blogs, toys, tools, etc? PLEASE comment below or get a hold of me via email or social media! I love being able to connect with you all and this is definitely a growth area for me.
A few people have already asked about a registry already so I am going to post a link below. Please know – I am just happy you are reading and visiting the blog. We do not expect anything, but if you are a gift-giving type — we are using Target and Amazon for our registries.
Take me to Amazon! Take me to Target!
Thank you all for being a great community and I look forward to joining the esteemed league of parents that we get to work with each day. I will still be blogging (maybe not quite as often in the first months) and active online. Likely heavily caffeinated.
Jeff, this is the best. The absolute best. Congratulations! Can’t wait to ‘meet’ Baby Geek.
Wow wow wow!!! Congratulations! What a blessing. I can’t think of a better reason to miss ASCA! ( Besides the lack of funding- I just got the no go for ASCA16 yesterday)
Advice? Start collecting books now! As a H.S. counselor we don’t focus as much on early development and bibliotherapy. But now that I have 2 young boys ( 4 and 1 1/2) I’m all about collecting books with content that I want them to learn. I tried sending you my pintrest board but I’m sure you can find tons online. While they were young and even now we ask for books for birthdays. They’ll always get toys from someone but we really love the books.
As for your wife you can be the best husband ever and get her a matermity pillow- like this one http://goo.gl/el8Uxm. Making people is hard work and very tiring and sleeping with a bump isn’t easy.
My favorite kid products:
1. City Select Stroller ( Convertable from 1 to 2 kids. Awesome if you’re planning on having more than one kiddo with in 4 years) I would buy this over and over and over again. By far the best thing we bought.
http://www.amazon.com/Baby-Jogger-City-Select-Second/dp/B00U0DCTVU/ref=sr_1_4?s=baby-products&ie=UTF8&qid=1454694680&sr=1-4&keywords=city+select
2. Kelty Child Carrier ( Keeps parents active and sharing a love of the outdoors as soon as Baby Ream has neck control)
https://www.kelty.com/product/journey-20
3. Portable high chair ( Awesome when you don’t want to put the little one in the nasty ones at the restraunt or the height means the kids are eye level eith the table)
http://www.amazon.com/Summer-SecureSeat-Chair-Hook-on-Booster/dp/B00F667QGY/ref=sr_1_36?s=baby-products&ie=UTF8&qid=1454694762&sr=1-36&keywords=portable++high+chair
Whew that was alot- sorry! Congratulations again! Make sure to let us know if its a boy or girl and bring pictures to CASC!
Super Brandi – adding all these to my list 🙂
How exciting! Congrats!
Congrats!!! You’ll definitely have enough to keep you busy this summer and for the next 18 years. Hope to see/meet you at ASCA 2017
Best wishes,
Heather