Fatherhood²: Want to Hear From Other Dads? Be My Guest!

I’ve been “daddy blogging” for almost 10 months now, and am slowly finding my feet. I’ve got some lovely regular readers as well as some lovely guest posters – some of whom don’t get half as much praise as they deserve. So I wanted to go some way to correcting that here, by highlighting some of the great posts that people have contributed so far.

I also wanted to make an appeal for more guest posters – and I have a bit of an incentive for you, to make that more appealing! But before I get on to that, here are some of the lovely guest posters that have featured on the blog so far:

Ben Ayers wrote about how technology has changed and improved the experience of being a father, in his post “Being a technodaddy has never been more fun” back in January
Merryn Smith pondered what the future had in store for his children, in his post “Planning ahead, or not“, also back in January
Dan Bowsher told us about the dreaded (or not so much) NCT classes, and what they taught him, in his post “Fright Club” earlier in the year.
Rob Jones gave an alternative view on NCT classes, and how he found support elsewhere, in his post “NCT? Of course not.” back in February.
Iain Gilmour gave a very moving account of his feelings as he became a father for the third time, in his post “Thoughts on the arrival of baby no. 3“
Chris Duck faced a challenge putting up a loft bed with his daughter – you can read about it in “The Battle of The Loft Bed” from earlier this year.
Adrian Smith found himself as “The Only Dad in the Park” earlier this year, and wrote a very amusing account of how that feels.
Andy Merchant wrote a very useful post for us when he came back from his holidays – “Tips For Flying With Small Children” will prove useful for all family fliers!
Stuart Witts has a very similar problem to me – he loves LEGO as much as his son does. Read his account in “The Pleasure and Pain of a Shared Passion“
My first female contributor was Andrea Devenney – who, despite being one of the funniest people I know, wrote a very moving account of her early motherhood, in “My Mother Superiority Complex, or How I Learned to Let Go and Let Dad“
Mark Wall has written me two posts (so far!) – the excellent “Why a fish does, in fact, need a bicycle” and the equally-good “When a Part of a Dad Dies“
My first anonymous guest post came from the cryptically-named “Marine Wife”, who wrote her post on being “Married to the Military” last month

As well as thanking all the people who have written me guest posts so far, I of course want to remind them that they’d be MORE than welcome to contribute again.

I also want to appeal to other parents (or even non-parents) who might want to contribute but haven’t so far – I would LOVE to host some more guest posts on here. It’s always nice to read about other parents’ experiences, and I’m sure it’s nice for you readers to hear someone other than me droning on once in a while!

PLUS, as an added incentive – and to thank you all – I’m going to be giving the top 3 posters (based on how many post views their posts have had) at the end of 2011 a large crate of beer to thank them (or something suitably equivalent if beer isn’t your thing!). So hopefully a small incentive if you’re thinking about writing something!