When I was in first or second grade, my teacher asked the classic question:

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

The other boys said firefighter, astronaut, police officer. Big heroic jobs.

When it was my turn, I said, “I want to be a dad.”

That was it. No backup plan. I did not know what a mortgage was. I just knew that having a family and kids was what my heart wanted most.

Fast forward to now. I am married. I have kids. I have a career with meetings, emails, and deadlines. From the outside, it might look like work is the main act and family fits around it.

From the inside, most days feel like this: I leave my dream job to go to work, then I get to come home to my dream job at night.

That does not mean I am a calm, always present dad. I get tired, stressed, and short. There are nights when I am absolutely counting down the minutes until bedtime.

But even on those days, I know I am living the thing first grade me hoped for. That feels like a gift and a responsibility. I do not want to drift through it. I want a life where my calendar tells the truth about what I say I value.

Your calendar is your real set of values

We can say “family first” all day long. Our schedules will tell the truth.

If work gets our sharpest attention and family always gets whatever scraps are left, that is our real priority list. Seeing that clearly is uncomfortable. It is also useful.

So I have tried to build simple anchors into our days and weeks that reflect what matters most.

Most nights we eat dinner together. Not every night. Life happens. Practices run late. Frozen pizza happens in shifts. But the default is that we sit at the same table, eat the same food, and talk.

After dinner, everyone helps reset the kitchen and living room. No charts, no stickers. Just, “We live here together, we clean here together.” Underneath that is a simple idea: we take care of our space because we take care of each other.

Most nights we take a short family walk. No headphones. No screens. Just a twenty minute loop around the neighborhood talking about school, friends, random thoughts, or what someone saw online that day.

At bedtime, I read to the kids and try to give each of them a few minutes of attention. I ask what was hard, what was funny, and what they are looking forward to tomorrow.

Do I always feel like doing that? No. By bedtime I am tired too. Sometimes they are wild or whiny and my patience is thin.

So I keep coming back to one question: does my time match my values?

If I say my kids matter more than anything, but I am always “too tired” for the one window where they actually want to talk to me, something is off. I will not get this perfect, but I want my habits to point in the right direction.

Part of why this matters so much to me is that I had two different dads growing up, my birth dad and my uncle who raised me later. They were imperfect, but both showed me that fatherhood is work and time and presence. You provide, you show up, and you invite your kids into your world instead of keeping them on the outside. That picture has shaped what “success” looks like for me more than any job title ever has.

The Disney World trip that reset my priorities

Years later, when I was running my own law firm, we decided to take the kids to Disney World.

I wanted to do it a specific way. I did not want to swipe a credit card and hope it worked out. I wanted to pay for the trip ahead of time.

So for a couple of months I pushed hard. Extra hours, extra clients. Eventually, we hit the number we needed. That gave me confidence that I could sprint for a season when our family needed it.

But the more important part came later.

When the trip started, I put a clear out of office message on my email and voicemail saying I was on a trip with my family and would respond when we got back.

Then I actually unplugged.

No “quick checks.” No bathroom inbox sessions. I was just there. Riding rides. Watching my kids’ faces. Eating overpriced treats. Getting tired and laughing and making memories in real time.

What did I lose? A week of fast responses, maybe a few minor opportunities. What did I gain? Presence, peace, and a reminder that my kids will remember that week far longer than anyone will remember how many emails I answered.

Gretchen Rubin says, “The days are long, but the years are short.” That trip reminded me my kids will not always want to travel with us, match shirts, and pose with characters. That window is brief. I want my choices to reflect that.

What success really means to me

My wife and I talk a lot about promotions, raises, side projects, and new roles.

At the center of all of that is a belief I keep coming back to: if I lose my family in the pursuit of success, then it was not success in any way that matters to me.

David O. McKay said, “No success can compensate for failure in the home.” That line hits me every time.

You can have the corner office and big numbers in the bank. If you come home to people who feel unseen or resentful, what did you actually build?

The pull of “one more project” is always there. I feel it. So I ask myself, “What does success look like if my kids do not know me, like me, or trust me?” That question changes how attractive certain opportunities really are.

Saving the best for last

If my kids overheard one sentence about how I see work and family, I would want it to be, “We save the best for last.”

Most of us give our best focus, patience, and creativity to work. We are afraid of losing the job or the income, so we pour everything into it. Family gets whatever is left.

I want my kids to see me trying to reverse that.

That means I try to leave some emotional energy for them. I say “no” to some evening work so I can say “yes” to a walk or a board game. I leave margin in my day when I can so I am not always snapping because my tank is empty.

I do not always pull it off. Some nights they get the grouchy version of me. The goal is that the pattern is clear. They are not an afterthought.

Simple scripts and small rituals

Dream job parenting is not about grand gestures. It is about consistent, ordinary choices.

Two practices help me: boundary scripts and tiny rituals.

A boundary script is a short sentence you can use at work to protect a family moment while still being respectful and reliable. For example:

“Yes, I leave at 3:30 on Wednesdays for the next couple of months. I am coaching my daughter’s volleyball team and that time is important to me. I will check in later that evening and handle anything that cannot wait until morning.”

Or:

“I do not answer emails after 7 p.m. so I can be with my kids. If there is a true emergency, here is how to reach me.”

Short, clear, honest. You get to decide what is realistic in your role and what is non negotiable at home.

Then there are the tiny rituals. These are 30 to 60 second moments that tell a big story over time.

A quick note in a lunch box. A hug before school. A short “best and hardest part of your day” question at bedtime.

One of my favorites is the garage door moment. When I walk in from the garage after work, my kids often run toward me yelling “Daddy” and trying to knock me over. I once watched a dad come home to a house where none of the kids even looked up. That image stuck with me. I decided I want my kids to know, deeply, that I love them and like them, and that my arrival is good news, not neutral or scary.

At bedtime, I have a simple script with each kid.

“Guess what?”
“What?”
“Love you.”

Then we add a couple more lines like, “Mom loves you,” and “You are my favorite you.” I want those words burned into their minds so that when life hits hard someday, they have a track to play that says, “I am loved, wanted, and good inside.”

Building strong kids, one choice at a time

Frederick Douglass said, “It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.”

Most of us know what it is like to be the broken adult. We spend real time and effort trying to untangle the messages we picked up as kids.

If you are doing the work to heal that, I am proud of you. It is hard work.

As parents, we cannot spare our kids from every hurt. They will still have things to work through as adults. The goal is not perfection.

The goal is to do the best we can with the tools we have now so they do not spend their whole adult life cleaning up avoidable messes.

Parent as a dream job looks like this in real life:

You let your calendar tell the truth about what matters.
You plan sprints at work, then unplug for trips and key moments.
You build what flexibility you can so you can show up for games, assemblies, and sick days.
You write boundary scripts that protect important family time.
You pick small daily rituals that tell your kids, “You are seen and you are loved.”

You will blow it. You will snap, get distracted, miss things you wish you had made. You can repair. You can say, “I am sorry,” and try again.

You do not have to change everything overnight. Just take one next step.

Write one boundary script.
Choose one 60 second ritual.
Move one block on your calendar.

Make it clear enough that your kids can see, without a speech, that for you, they are part of your dream.

It’s gonna be great!

– Drew