For almost the last two years I've had coffee every Tuesday morning with a couple good friends of mine - other dads who each have 2 or 3 kids about the same age as mine. These guys really have it together in my opinion, and I've learn a lot from each of them about what it takes to be a "real man".

We've talked about raising kids, being better husbands, holding it together on the career front, and about every other topic you could imagine. Meeting with these guys is one of the highlights of my week!

We go through books together too. We've read Heaven by Randy Alcorn (who I went to church with through high school and college), A New Kind of Christian: A Tale of Two Friends on a Spiritual Journey by Brian McLaren (a very controversial book, which was the reason we chose it), and now it's my turn to pick our next book.

I heard Tim Kimmel speak at a marriage conference that my wife and I attended a few years ago through Family Matters, and I really liked his down-to-earth perspective on raising kids. His book titled "Grace Based Parenting" really challenged many of the guilt-based legalistic parenting habits I had picked up from my own childhood, and helped me get away from the "Helicopter Parent" mentality. You can read more about his book in my Recommended Reading section.

Tim recently published a book titled Raising Kids for True Greatness: Redefine Success for You and Your Child and it's going to be my recommendation for our next men's group book study. Here's the editorial review:

Sometimes greatness is measured by possessions or power and parents become preoccupied with raising "resume" and "pedigree" children. Yet true greatness is an internal evidence of attitudes and a heart known for humility, compassion, graciousness, and enthusiasm.

Raising Kids for True Greatness will give parents a road map to guide their children toward rich lives of eternal value and significance.

What do you think guys? Would you be willing to make this the next book we read through together?

Summer vacation has started, and parents across the nation are scrambling to find entertaining activities to occupy their children.

It won't be long though before all of the movies will have been watched, all the parks and swimming pools visited, and boredom will start to settle in. Not that our job as parents is to keep our kids entertained, but planning meaningful activities throughout the week definitely helps reduce the amount of sibling bickering and fighting.

After the small fortune that my kids made recently picking cherries and selling them on our sidewalk, they were eager to spend their hard-earned profits. My folks gave one of my kids a Webkinz toy for her birthday a few weeks ago, and so my son wanted one as well.

My kids have fallen in love with Webkinz. They frequently come up and tell me what they did with their pet online, what they learned, what they bought, what they taught their pet. It's as close to really owning a pet that I have seen yet.

I have never been more impressed with a toy as much as I am with Webkinz by Ganz (even more than Nintendogs). They're little stuffed animals that each come with a unique ID that can be entered on webkinz.com to create a personalized and secure pet management account.

Your child can give his pet a name and do all kinds of fun activities that will do more than just entertain. Ganz claims that more than 2 million units have been sold to retailers and 1 million users have registered on the Webkinz site, where kids can create lively domiciles for the virtual versions of their animal, shop for pet paraphernalia, and chat with fellow Webkinz owners.

I asked my kids what they liked to do the most with their Webkinz, and here's what they said:

"I like to dress my pet."

"I like to play games with my pet, and she tells me when he gets tired and yawns so I know to let her rest for a while."

"I like to play games with my pet and win money and cool stuff for my pet's room."

As a dad, I love the interactivity they built into these pets, and the fun that they have with them online. But I also dig that they actually get tired after a while and you have to let them rest. That's like having a built-in timer feature, which helps ensure that your kids don't spend too much time in front of the computer screen.

I also like the online safety factor. The only way to communicate with another Webkinz owner, is if you already know someone with an account, which limits the prospect for interactions with new people. And more importantly, you're limited to pre-defined things that you can say to other Webkinz users. That way I don't have to worry about someone saying something inappropriate to my kids while they're playing online.

You'll probably find that Webkinz are already sold out at your local toy store, but you can still get them online. Amazon has a good selection of Webkinz, and they're also available at Jake's Dog House. In fact, here's a coupon for 15% off your Webkinz order from Jake's Dog House (just use code first15 during checkout).

Looking for the online shop for dads?

This page has moved to http://www.dad-eblog.com/deals

Last weekend I had one of the best bicycle rides in my entire riding career (which started last October, 2006). It was a 45 mile ride in pouring down rain, but I didn't mind at all because I was able to keep up with the best rider in the group for most of the trip.

In fact, I was feeling so good about my riding improvements as I pedaled each mile away, that I started to get a little cocky and careless. The old saying "Pride goes before a fall" became a reality for me at the 42nd mile.

While waiting for a couple slower riders to catch up, I was circling in a holding pattern on a single-lane road. It was still pouring down rain and I didn't realize that my brakes were completely gone (rain acts like oil when it's running along a bike rim). I had built up a little too much speed as I made that last swooping turn and suddenly realized I was heading for the ditch.

I slammed on the brakes but they didn't slow me down at all, so I was forced to turn sharply. That's when I fell flat on my shoulder - and just as a car started approaching in that same lane! I was still clipped in to my racing pedals, so I had to flip myself and the bike over into the other lane to avoid being hit.

I landed harder than I realized, and felt sharp chest pain both Monday and Tuesday before finally hauling myself in to the doctor for X-rays. Fortunately there were no rib fractures, but they're definitely bruised and I'm home this week doped up on Percocet and Ibuprofen. My doctor said I'd need to rest for 2 weeks and avoid driving due to the sedatives she prescribed for the pain. Every breath I take is met with a sharp pain in my rib cage (probably from all the humble pie that's stuffed in there).

On the bright side, I'll have plenty of time this week to finish reading my new book "Wisdom of Our Fathers: Lessons and Letters from Daughters and Sons" by Tim Russert. There have been some real gems already in the first half of the book, with some amazing stories of the impact that fathers have had in their son's and daughter's lives.

I've already noticed a change in the way I interact with my kids, because I'm starting to realize how important my words and actions are to them. Many of the stories that Tim published were written from grown-ups who remembered things their dads said and did to them as a child that forever changed their lives (in both good and bad ways).

I sure hope my kids will remember the positive experiences more than the negative ones, and I'm blown away at how fortunate I am to be their father!

A traditional summer right of passage for many kids is the Lemon-aid stand, where kids get a taste of sales and marketing at an early age, and have fun making a few extra bucks along the way. It's something I think every family should encourage their kids to do at least once.

We put a spin on this tradition last summer while trying to figure out what to do with all the cherries that were growing on the huge cherry tree in our back yard. They were ripe and juicy Bing cherries, and were starting to fall off the branches and into the back yard.

On a whim we pulled a ladder over and picked a few buckets full, stuffed them in sandwich bags and sold about 30 bags for 50 cents each. That was a sweet deal - Bing cherries sell for about $4 per pound at the fruit stands, and those bags had to each have been at least a pound and a half. It didn't take long to blow through the bags, and the kids made about $15.

This year we planned ahead and started picking this morning at 8:30 a.m. We had two kids in ladders and me on the roof, and by 9:15 we had picked 8 buckets full of berries and started making signs for the neighborhood. We filled 40 bags about 3/4 full and decided to charge a dollar a bag this year.

By 9:30 we had signs up and by 10:00 they had already sold 13 bags and were grinning from ear to ear (and I was too). I picked a couple more buckets and by the time we called it quits at noon they had earned a grand total of $42 to split among the three kids!

Man were they pumped, and very excited to start dividing the money between the three of them. My wise and beautiful wife suggested that we give them half of their earnings and ask them to save the other half for their college funds.

At first I wasn't on board with the idea because it seemed like too small of an amount to be splitting in half, but she convinced me that it was important for the kids to learn the principle of saving part of what they earn. I'm glad I married this woman!

Today's adventure reminded me of the many entrepreneurial experiences my parents exposed me to as a child. My dad would let me use his lawnmower to mow lawns in our neighborhood. I made about $10 to $15 a lawn, and he paid for the gas. It was a great way to earn some extra money, and I started learning the value of hard work and good customer service at an early age.

We also used to drive a van and an 8-foot trailer over to Walldrug, South Dakota where we'd pick Ponderosa pine cones. My grandparents owned a greenhouse at the time, and they paid us a nickel a piece for the prickly cones (and helped us pick them too).

Picking pine cones wasn't all that much fun; it was hard work in the hot sun, but the parts I mainly remember are the stories that grandma would tell about grandpa's childhood. Like the time he was almost struck by a rattle snake out in the farm field because he couldn't hear very well, and didn't hear the snake's rattle until it was almost too late. I also remember camping in tents at a nearby KOA campground, and wrinkling my face at grandma's runny scrambled eggs.

Those are priceless memories that I'll cherish forever, especially now that my grandpa has passed away and my grandma suffers from Alzheimer's. It's the memories of the time we spent together that will stay with me forever.

If you have any kind of fruit-bearing plant in your yard, you're sitting on a gold mine of an opportunity to create some memories for your kids too. Blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, and even apples can be picked together and sold together. You'll build some great memories along the way, just like the ones I built this morning with my kids.

Speaking of memories, I started reading Tim Russert's recently published book titled "Wisdom of Our Fathers: Lessons and Letters from Daughters and Sons", and was impressed by a comment he made in the introduction:

When my life is over, I know that the most important thing I'll be judged on is what kind of father I was.

My wife gave it to me for Father's Day and I gave another copy to my dad for Father's Day also. We're both reading through it and I'm looking forward to the childhood memories it will remind me of as we read through it together!

My wife had a night out with her girl friends recently, and it was my job to handle dinner that night. Being the skilled chef that I am (NOT), I whipped out the Mac and Cheese mix and cooked up a batch of one of my kid's favorite meals.

As I was scooping it up into their bowls, one of them slipped out of my hand and slammed down onto the counter on its side... spilling the noodles onto the kitchen floor. The kids started busting up laughing, and our dog Otis rushed over to see what the rucus was all about.

I figured no harm no foul and let him chow down, while my kids made certain I knew that "Mom would definitely not let Otis do that!" By then I had the camera in hand to take this cute shot of Otis cleaning up the kitchen floor for me, and it took all of about 30 seconds for him to lick away all traces of the Mac and Cheese.

Sure enough, my kids all made sure Mom knew what I had done the next day, and they tattled on me first thing in the morning. I was busted, but it still makes me chuckle thinking about it.

Amazon's new Grocery program sure would have come in handy on a night like this. Did you know Amazon offers over 22,000 non-perishable items including some of your favorite brands, shipped to your door, just like any other Amazon.com purchase? You can even sign up for routine convenient delivery of products such as coffee pods, shampoos, laundry detergent or diapers and receive a 15% discount and free shipping. Now that's what I'm talkin' about!

You should at least let your wife know about this if she's the primary grocery shopper in the family:

At the Portland Beavers vs Salt Lake Bees baseball game last weekend, the American Red Cross honored a woman for her amazing contribution of 400 blood donations.

But even more amazing was when the woman rolled onto the baseball field in a wheelchair. She was handicapped but still gave far more blood than I could ever even imagine giving!

The last time I tried to give blood was about 3 years ago, and the experience was a nightmare. I hadn't eaten any breakfast and the only thing in my stomach was 2 cups of coffee. My vein closed up after the first test vial, and the gorilla behind the needle did a horrible job of trying to find the vein before I finally asked him to stop. I almost passed out and had a nasty bruise on my arm that turned multiple colors over the next week or so.

Not a fun experience, and I get sweaty palms just thinking about getting poked with a needle.

I'm always challenged when I see heroic acts like this woman's 400 blood donations. It makes me want to shrug of my pathetic needle phobia and step up to the plate to help people who are badly in need of blood. Maybe my kids will need me to give blood for them someday too.

Those of you who know me or have read a few of my previous blog entries know that I'm not a natural-born sports fan. It's not that I don't like sports – I do… it's just that I didn't have many sports-related influences growing up and I lean more towards bicycling, computers or a good drama-action movie rather than footballs these days.

I love watching the Super Bowl (more for the commercials than the game at times), but I rarely watch the games during the season... especially not if a rerun of The Matrix or Lord of The Rings is on cable. In fact, I can probably count on one hand the number of official ball games I've been to in my entire life.

That being said, I want the situation to be different for my kids. For me that's meant making some intentional choices to be more involved in my kid's sports events. I've coached soccer for a couple of years for my daughter's teams, and was very involved this year in helping with my son's T-Ball team.

So for Father's Day this year I chose to take the family out to a baseball game. The Portland Beavers were playing a home game in PGE Park against the Salt Lake Bees, and Comcast was sponsoring the event with free Beaver's hats for the first 1,000 dads who showed up.

The hats were gone by the time we arrived, but we still had a lot of fun. The Beavers made some good plays and led most of the way through the 6th inning. I say through the 6th inning because that was about the point where my two youngest kids were bored out of their minds, and we decided to call it quits. They had a lot of fun through the first two innings, but after that it was "Dad, how much longer is the game going to take?" every three minutes, and I didn't want them to be miserable on Father's Day.

Two innings were plenty though to explain a few things about the game to my kids sitting next to me (when the VERY loud guy behind me stopped hollering for a minute here and there), and to see several good plays by both teams. They watched the pitching speed monitor like a hawk, and saw a few foul balls fly up over our heads. We had a great time together!

We had in-field reserved seats right behind home plate on the right side of the field, in row R, which gave us a great view of a home run from the Beavers out into left field, and several line drives right up the third base line.

Next time we go I'll reserve tickets online ahead of time though at WebTicketStore.com or a similar service – it would have been great to be a few rows closer to the action and also sitting on the aisle side. Bathroom breaks are inevitable with kids, and then there's the beer run for mom and dad, and licorice and popcorn for the kids. With six people to crawl over each time, and... well, you get the idea. Aisle seating would have been a big plus.

I'll bring my mitt next time too, and hopefully will be lucky enough to catch a foul ball.

I hope you had a great Father's Day yesterday too!

If you're a dad then I extend a virtual Hi-5 to you, and I hope this Father's Day is a meaningful recognition for the hard work and love you've invested in your family!

Father's Day is translated "King for the Day" in my family, just like Mother's Day is "Queen for the Day". I get to choose whatever I'd like to do with the family that day, and the wife and kids make a big effort to show me their love through gifts, cards, hugs, and attention. I look forward to these days far more than even Christmas!

Father's Day was first observed back in the early 1900s, and is celebrated worldwide by numerous countries. It celebrates fatherhood and parenting by males; honoring and commemorating both fathers and forefathers.

Electronics, tools, sports equipment and apparel are usually happily accepted gifts for dads, and this year I'm looking forward to choosing a new lawn mower. Another great gift idea is a camera cell phone, like the black Motorola Razr that I rated my favorite dad gadget in an earlier post.

What's on your gift list? Does your family ask you for ideas, or do they completely surprise you?

Five For Fighting sang about it in their track titled "It's a Nice Day, When you Wake Up in Disneyland", and it truly is a dreamy vacation spot. Kids love the rides and characters, and parents get to be kids all over again. In fact, I think I even had more fun on rides like Space Mountain and Tower of Terror (California Adventure) than my kids did.

Going to Disneyland was a childhood dream that I was never able to experience until I was in my late teens, so I wanted to make sure my kids were able to visit as soon as possible. We took them two years ago when my youngest son was only 3, and again last year when he had just turned 5.

One of our closest friends took their kids to Disneyland just last week with their 5-year old and 9-year old kids, and had a complete blast as well. It was really fun to chat with them afterwards about their vacation, and I started jotting down a list of tips and tricks that made both our trips as enjoyable as possible.

Chances are good that your wife may already have thought of these tips, but at least they'll give you some ideas to bring to the table, to make it look like you put some effort into the planning process yourself.

• Get Good Shoes

  You will walk and walk and walk all over Disneyland, and the last thing you want is a painful blister. Invest in a good pair of walking or running shoes, and far enough in advance of your trip to break them in. I chose running shoes for their lightness and high cushion factor.

• Pack your wallet with $20 bills

  I found myself peeling $20 bills out of my wallet left and right to pay for meals, snacks, drinks, and souveniers. You can plan on about $6 per kid per meal, and about twice that for adults with a beverage.

  Don't bother trying to save money by eating outside the park. The outlying restaurants have their prices jacked up just as high, and by the time you walk across the huge parking lot, find transportation (or walk to your restaurant), you'll have wasted close to an hour - and then you'll have some very tired and cranky kids in tow. Not fun in a restaurant.

  Besides, I wanted my kids to remember the times we had together on the rides; not the time we spent wandering around trying to save a few dollars on meals.

• Bring a backpack

  Each day we crammed the camera, bottled water, granola bars, and other snacks into the pack that I carried around the park. It gave us a single place to store sun glasses, character signature books, and every other imagineable miscellaneous item we could think of. All of the rides have places to store backpacks, or will allow you to set it to the side behind the public waiting lines where the attendants can keep an eye on them.

  Be sure to get a pack with outside pockets like the one shown from Luggage.com, which make it easier for your kids to grab water bottles. Otherwise you'll be taking the pack off every few minutes to keep them hydrated.

• Invest in a dual-screen portable DVD player

  We drove to Disneyland on our last visit, and brought plenty of books, games, and Highlights magazines for the kids. But those only last so long. Our dual screen DVD player really helped fill in the boring stretches of highway, with one screen behind the front seat and one behind the middle row of seats in of our Toyota Sequoia SUV.

  There was one time in particular where the electronic babysitting these screens provided was priceless - when we were driving around Redmond, CA looking for a hotel and discovered there was a conference that weekend. All the hotels were booked, and we tried several before deciding to press through and keep driving that night.

  Imagine 3 tired and hungry kids arguing with each other in the back seat while mom and dad try to find there way around an unfamiliar city. Switch on the DVD player, and presto - it's quiet! Definitely priceless. I found a dual screen DVD player complete with carrying case and car power accessories for only $179 at Shop.com.

  If you decide to fly instead of drive, then hopefully you'll be able to save some money on a package deal. The first time we went we found a "Kids fly free" package from Alaskan Airlines that cut the travel bill in half. If you're planning a trip to DisneyWorld, Wyndham Vacation Resorts has a deal that'll save you a lot of money: Orlando 3 Nights for $189 includes Hotel Stay + Park Tickets

• Pick the off-season times

  There's nothing worse than standing in a line for a half hour or more, especially when your 5-year-old has an attention span of about 30 seconds. Add the heat factor of the hot California summer sun, and we're talking complete meltdown!

  I'd much rather travel to Disneyland after the first week of school or the week before/after Spring Break. Line times were no more than about 15 minutes each time we went in the off season, and there were many times where we just walked right up to the entrance and hopped on with no waiting.

  The weather was still in the mid-70s to mid-80s, which was just right for us. There was one day that it rained, but nobody seemed to mind. After all, many of the rides are indoors - like Space Mountain and Souring Over California (part of California Adventure).

  Your kids won't mind missing a week of school either, and their teachers considered it an educational experience (especially since we combined Sea World and the San Diego Zoo in our plans).

• Choose a hotel with a pool and continental breakfast

  There's no point paying $30 to $40 every morning for breakfast if you can find a hotel that includes breakfast, and it's also one less restaurant experience you'll have to deal with each day. You can stroll over to the breakfast buffet line in your slippers with your kids, while your wife takes her time blow-drying her hair and putting on make up. You can even score points with your wife by bringing her breakfast back to your room, along with hot coffee and a bagel.

  Your kids will love the pool too, and it'll make a great way to kill a couple hours on travel days (e.g. when you arrive to the hotel but it's a little too late to go to Disneyland that day). If it's a hot day in California, then it might be smart to take a break after lunch and cool off in the pool, or to take a dip in the evening to relax before bedtime.

• Give yourself time to rest afterwards

  Even though Disneyland is a complete blast, you're going to be dead tired when you get back home. You'll have walked many more miles than you ever thought possible, let alone any time zone changes you may have to pass through on your way there and back. Try to plan your trip so that you arrive back home on Friday and have the weekend to rest up before heading back to the daily office grind.

I hope these tips give you some good ideas for making your Disneyland trip a memorable and enjoyable time. Please feel free to post any tips that you've found helpful as well.