My 5 Favorite Posts From Decoding Dadhood's First 5 Years

As I alluded to in a previous post about the blog's five-year anniversary, there are popular posts as calculated by Blogger, and there are my favorite posts. Over the years, you all have told me how much you enjoy some of my posts. Well, here are my favorite posts from the blog's first five years. It wasn't easy to narrow it down to five, because we've had so much fun on here over the past five years, but I did it. Enjoy.

5. Baby Watch 2014: Baby Gracie

Some of the most exciting times for the blog is when a baby is born. Gracie's birth makes the list whereas Augie's doesn't because of one extenuating factor: Twitter. Augie was born in Wisconsin, so it was just Gretchen and I at the hospital. Family came to see him, but not until a few weeks after he was born. By the time Gracie came around, we were living in Michigan near most of our family. So everyone was super excited to come see her. We didn't want everyone at the hospital, though, waiting around for her to arrive. So I live tweeted the birth. I tweeted when we left for the hospital. I tweeted when Gretchen was all hooked up to her machines. I tweeted when Gracie was born. And I tweeted to announce her name. Writing-wise, this wasn't one of my best posts, but it makes the top five because of you. I could feel the anticipation building on Twitter and Facebook as you all waited impatiently for the next #BabyWatch2014 update, and that made Gracie's birth that much more fun.

4. Andy's Online Gift Guide

My gift guide, the original one, makes the list because I had a lot of fun coming up with the items to feature. Looking back, I'm not sure why I didn't think of it sooner. This year, I did a second gift guide, and I made sure to write it early enough that I could use it in the newspaper, too. That's always a thin time of the year for news, and I know people enjoy gift guides, so maybe I'll do it again next year. Perhaps I'll focus on kids stuff. Probably not, though, because it's usually just a list of stuff that I think is cool and hope people will buy for me (or in the case of the jewelry, Gretchen).

3. Augie the Ring Bearer

Augie has been a ring bearer twice now in his short life. That's probably where the list will end since he's getting older and most people prefer cute, young boys for their ring bearers. I guess he'll have to graduate to usher or groomsman. This post beat out his second ring bearing gig (which is also worth a re-read) because he was younger and cuter in his tux (turns out people are right about young, cute boys being good ring bearers). This one also was extra special because Gretchen was in the wedding with him. This night is when we realized just how much Augie loves dancing. I'm not sure where he gets that from.

2. The Night of the Cookie

A long, long time ago, back in the days when I was home occasionally at night and had the energy to be creative, I wrote a poem based on "The Night Before Christmas" about Augie's love for cookies. I wrote it on a whim after watching Augie devour the cookie Gretchen had given him. I think we had read "The Night Before Christmas" that night to Augie before bed, and it inspired me to write my own Christmas story. I don't think it would be nearly as funny without the pictures of Augie in there. He's always had a knack for giving me funny faces.

1. When Mom Is Away ...

It's been close to five years since I wrote this post about making brownies with baby Augie, and it's still my favorite one. I started taking pictures for a straight-forward post about Augie and I making brownies, but about halfway through (about the time I realized I had to crack eggs one handed to keep Augie in the shot) I thought to myself, "It sure would be funnier if some of this eggshell ended up in the brownies because I'm busy trying to take pictures." **SPOILER ALERT** No eggshells actually found their way into the brownies ... because Gretchen would have been mad if I had ruined a whole box of brownies. This post falls under the header, "Don't believe everything you read on the Internet." These pictures aren't even all in the order I took them. After I came up with the idea of adding eggshells to the post, I had to go back and take a couple of extra shots to fill in the holes in my story. I've always told my readers to take my posts with a grain of salt, because what happened in real life isn't always as funny as the thoughts running through my head when I get a comical picture. And let's face it, my altered reality is much more fun to read about anyway.

Honorable mentions

OK, I narrowed it down to five posts, but I thought these others were worth a brief mention, too:

-- When I Grow Up ... still waiting to see if I got any of these right.
-- Sing a Little Song For Me ... there are some good ones in here.
-- Augie vs. The Couch Monster ... another of Augie's tall tales.
-- The Making of a Family Christmas Picture ... gives you an idea of how many pictures I take to get one usable one for the blog.
-- Deer Forest or Augie's Backyard ... for its breaking news and shock value.
-- Augie's Family ... this one nearly made the top five list.
-- I Race You ... because sometimes you have to ride on tiny tractors to be a good father.
-- I Know What You Buried In My Backyard Last Summer ... because I don't see you posting 30 pictures of garbage on the Internet.
-- Geocaching With Aug-Man ... the most fun I've ever had writing a story for the newspaper.