Stay-At-Home Dad: It’s good to be the dad

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Updated: January 26, 2012 8:06AM

It’s good to be a parent in the days leading up to Christmas.

I preface this by saying my family is Catholic. I also have two young boys — ages 4 and 5. For the Ludwigs, the days before Christmas included breakfast with Santa, a holiday concert and a kindergarten nativity play.

When I learned I was going to be a dad, these were the sorts of things I had in mind. Here are a few highlights.

Breakfast with Santa

A wild herd of well-dressed children and camera-toting parents converged in a church basement two weeks before Santa was scheduled to slide down the chimney.

There was nervous anticipation in the air, as the already electrified crowd was further fueled by a pancake breakfast. With maple syrup running through their veins, families formed a long line to see jolly old Saint Nick.

When Bubba and Peter sat down on Santa’s lap, I studied their faces. I could tell they had no doubts that this meeting was legit. The Wife snapped a photo capturing the moment. The shot became our Christmas card.

Holiday concert

A packed house of parents and grandparents did their best to reserve seats using winter coats and purses seven days before Christmas. Students from kindergarten through fifth grade took the stage. The crowd beamed.

The kindergarteners were cute without even trying, while the older kids did their best to hide the awkwardness that comes natural to preteens.

Parents became paparazzi as the show began, holding their cameras above the crowd to get the best shot and kneeling in the aisles to get an unencumbered view.

I arrived early — waaayy early — and secured a seat in the second row. Bubba was about 10 feet from my chair as the concert began. He performed wonderfully. I didn’t cry during the opening song, but my eyelids were certainly burning.

Nativity play

I wasn’t proud of Bubba’s shepherd costume. We were told not to spend any money on the outfit. So, I sent him to school with a Jedi robe, a shoelace belt, an old towel previously used to wash car tires and The Wife’s worst headband.

To make up for it, I fashioned a shepherd’s staff out of PVC pipe, capping both ends and making the bend out of 45-degree angles. I spray-painted the whole thing brown and used hockey tape for a grip.

When the play began, I spotted my little shepherd. He looked more like a homeless drifter than a shepherd, but he wasn’t alone. All the boys could have been mistaken for a hobo drum corps. Meanwhile, the girls were dressed in white and looked like darling angels.

Bubba’s shepherd’s staff was intentionally left in the classroom. Apparently, it was so cool that all of the hobos/shepherds were fighting over it.

Still, Bubba knew all of his lines, as well as several corresponding hand signals. It was yet another pre-Christmas moment that stretched my cheeks to their limit from smiling.

There are a lot of things I wasn’t prepared for upon becoming a parent. Other things weren’t nearly as good as advertised. But the buildup to Christmas 2011 was about as perfect as I could imagine.

I’m glad I took plenty of pictures.

Howard A. Ludwig is a former SouthtownStar business reporter who traded his reporter’s notepad for a diaper bag, becoming a stay-at-home dad. He can be reached at howardaludwig@yahoo.com