What have we come to when kids encourage other kids to kill themselves?

I wish I could go into the details of just how absolutely overloaded I am right now or what I'm feeling. I'm trying to wind down but it's not working very well. I'm trying hard to find a balance here that allows me to share what I think is important without crossing a line. The problem is that I can't really see the line anymore and there a part of me that literally has zero shits left to give. At the moment, I'm dealing with a child who's being bullied and its escalated to social media. It's reached a level where he's fucking being told to kill himself. I'm so over kids being assholes and it's taking everything thing I have not to make some very bad decisions right now.…

2 Comments

A fun Q&A with Monique Banks and Ariel Banks Baker of BLUEPRINT

I recently did a Q&A with Monique Banks and Ariel Banks Baker, Co-founders of Blueprint. The holidays caused some delay but here we are and I'll let them explain what Blueprint is and why it's such a cool idea. Rob: Tell me a little bit about how you got started and a bit about both of your backgrounds. Monique: For many years I was an editor at Women’s Wear Daily, the well-respected fashion industry news outlet. I had a passion for events and paid attention to every detail.  When my children were growing up, I decided to open a kids’ party space and create custom parties that were high-energy, inclusive, and magical.  This formula worked well, and we created over 3,000 parties for more than 60,000 children! Ariel:  I worked…

0 Comments

It doesn’t have to be perfect

I've totally been dragging today. I didn't really accomplish anything and I'm okay with that. We're going to call it a mental health day. Elliott's been having a rough time and I've been up with him the last couple of nights. I definitely have a nap calling my name after I get some work done. I'm waiting on more paint before finishing the living room and I'm looking at Saturday before I can get started again. Aside from the first floor being torn apart, it's given me extra time to get caught up at work. The podcast production side of things is getting busy, and is time consuming. I've learned so much since starting this new venture and I've been able to connect with so many amazing people. I've got…

1 Comment

I made so much progress today

Major progress was made today. I'm laying in bed, about to call it a night, and feeling accomplished. I'm currently managing three projects for work and I released one of them today. You can find it at listen.theautismdad.com. I encourage you to take a listen, it's only about 30 minutes long and the message is important. I'm also starting at least 3 more projects for work this week. They just seem to keep coming in and that's not a bad problem to have, at least as far as problems go. It's been a long, but productive day for me. My dad came over after work and helped me tackle the walls. We got the first coat up and it looks really good. It's a big difference but some of the…

0 Comments

You don’t know what it’s like

I pulled this request from one of my autism parenting support groups a few days ago. I'm just getting around to sharing it here, it's been on Facebook for a couple of days. Here's the actual topic request: This mom basically asked me to explain why even the simple things in life aren't so simple when you're an autism parent. I totally get this and I hope I helped.. ☺

3 Comments

Some days are harder than others

I've had better days and I'm not feeling exceptionally motivated but I have a living room that's not going to paint itself. I'm almost done with the all the trim. I have to cut in along the floor and then the rest will be super easy. It's just very tedious and I'm not really in the mood for tedious today. My original goal was to have all of this done before the boys get home but that's not likely to happen. I'm going to choose to be okay with that because there's not much I can do about it, and beating myself up isn't going to help. The current plan is to make a list of everything I need to finish up today and get after it. Lists are really…

0 Comments

Working with myself rather than against myself

I'm getting a little frustrated and overwhelmed with everything I have to do in the living room still. I've been at it pretty much nonstop for the past three days and I'm tired. I was able to get half of everything second coated before I started getting sloppy. I've decided to take a break, order some lunch (cause I'm also a little hangry) and work on something else for right now. I need to clear my head so I can get back at it ASAP. I owe it to the kids to disrupt their lives as little as possible, and right now, the entire first floor is unusable. Thankfully, the kids are at their moms until tomorrow, so I have some time. As far as my break is concerned, I'm…

0 Comments

The progress continues

Just a quick update cause some of you were asking about how the living room was going. I feel like I've been fairly productive. Yesterday I wasn't able to get started until mid-afternoon because I've had several new projects come in over the last few days and I'm trying to balance my time. I managed to get a first coat of paint on the windows, front door, and entrance way before running out of daylight. The plan is to get a second coat on the everything and then start on the baseboards. I have to get this done soon because the kids are not enjoying the house being torn apart. My goal is to get to the walls tomorrow, if not today. Wish me luck. I'm feeling motivated and ready…

0 Comments