Dad Spotlight - Helping You Be The Best Dad, Father and Parent You Can!

This week in the Dads Toolbox we are bringing back Drew Bennett of Benspark to talk to use about technology, gaming, toys and more to help you get ready for the holidays.

Disney Infinity

The news from last summer to no longer carry Disney Infinity was a shock for Drew Bennett. As he had told us in the past the Disney Infinity 3.0 was his favorite, but alas, it was not meant to be.

Drew Bennett mentioned that Disney stated that they were closing the line due to the lack of results. Drew Bennett inferred that the influx of other toys to life gaming systems such as Skylanders and Lego Dimensions.

You probably have already found that the playsets for the Disney Infinity are drastically reduced in price. Drew Bennett mentioned that this will probably continue for some time to come.

Since we recorded this episode, they released their last two playseys

* Alice in Wonderland Through the Looking Glass

* Alice 

* The Mad Hatter

* Time

* Finding Dory

* Finding Dory Playset

* Nemo

 

Skylanders Imaginators

The newest Skylanders, Skylanders Imaginators you are given the ability to create your own character. Meaning you can create your own character, weapons, etc. You can even pick a catch phrase and music for your characters. There are new figures called sensei’s and they train your characters. This even includes The Golden Queen and Wolfgang.

In the new platform the old Skylanders characters will be able to be played on this new system as well. There are new characters as well as creation crystals. The creation crystals can be used to place your characters that you create into the worlds of your friends by bringing them with you to their homes and their game system.

There will be 31 Sensei’s and 10 elements and 10 creation crystals for people playing the new Skylanders Imaginators.

intThe Toys to Life world cam become expensive so for many you may have to focus on one brand and system for your family.

We talked about Lego Dimensions, but at the point that the interview was recorded Drew Bennett had yet to try this set for himself but with all of the new character with the themselves.

If you have not yet gotten your free guide: 15 Low Cost Ways To Engage With Your Kids – Pick it up today

As always, please swing by to visit us on iTunes and Stitcher to stay connected to the most up-to-date happenings with the podcast. Also, if you are on iTunes  and you are a listener, please leave us a review as this helps other people find us too!

This week on the Dads Spotlight podcast we have Doug Kisgen, father of five and author of the book [amazon text=Rethink Happy&asin=1630477346] and finding happiness in your own life.

In his own life as a father and husband he had some very low points, especially at the beginning they went through a period where they had some miscarriages for their first two children.

As a part of their experiences in life, he and his wife had the experience of working with Boys Town, an organization dedicated to saving lives and  giving at-risk children and families the love, support and education they need to succeed. They became family teachers with Boys Town and they had their second and third children while working with eight at-risk kids. 

Boys town was a critical point for himself as a man and as a father. One of the things that he learned as a part of this experience related to the medications that some kids are on. He stated that over the time that he was at Boys Town he had numerous kids on numerous medications. Eventually they weened kids off of most of the medications. Working with the Psychiatrist at the camp they learned that there were three types of attention that kids can get:

* Positive

* Negative

* None

What they found was that kids would rather have negative attention than none. This was tremendous to learn, especially with many kids.

In regards to the book that he found that he wanted to write. He found that it was not all about him and that he needed to look outside myself and look inward.

In Doug Kisgens’ book he has his main character examine the idea of “What is happy”. The main character in the book is made to look at this and determine what happiness was for them and through the book you are challenged to do the same. In the end Doug Kisgen came to find that through everything you need to understand that:

* You are here to serve, not to deserve

There have been many studies on happiness and it always comes down to that it is never about the money, but it is about all of the other things in life that surround this that create happiness in ones’ life.

As fathers sometimes you have to clear your mind to be able to be a great father. In the writing of his book Doug Kisgen found that he was writing the book not only for you but also for him. He found that you have to take the time to think, pray and be at peace everyday to be able to do this for yourself.

Through this he found that you do not have to be an expert in this concept but instead you can work on this incrementally and become more proficient at this daily.

If you have not yet gotten your free guide: 15 Low Cost Ways To Engage With Your Kids – Pick it up today

As always, please swing by to visit us on iTunes and Stitcher to stay connected to the most up-to-date happenings with the podcast. Also, if you are on iTunes  and you are a listener, please leave us a review as this helps other people find us too!

This week on the Dad Spotlight podcast we are celebrating our 100th Episode. For those of you that have been listening for some time you will know that we asked you to call in and answer two questions:

From this request we had 24 dads take up the call (Thanks guys!)

In today’s episode we are letting you learn from their experiences to help you be a better father!

The dads that join us in today’s episode include:

* Tshaka Armstrong of Tshaka Explains it All

* Drew Bennett of Benspark and part Toolbox Guest in EP’s (10, 18, 42, 84 )

* Justin Bechtold of 40YrOldDad.com and Justintertainment.com and past Dad Spotlight guest in EP 91

* Denny Bubrig – Associate Dean of Students, University of Texas-Austin

* Trey Burley of Daddy Mojo and past Toolbox guest in EP’s (8, 22)

* Adam Cohen of Dadarocks and past Toolbox guest in EP’s (38, 58, 70)

* Ryan Daniel Culp of the From, Dad. Podcast

* Mitch Chaitin of Gay NYC Dad

* Phil Corless of Idaho Dad

* Jerry Dugan of the Family Time Podcast

* Benjamin Eichler, Financial Advisor with Whippletree Financial

* Shane Hilyard – Attorney at The Gallagher Law Firm, PLC

* Whit Honea of Whit Honea and author of [amazon text=The Parents’ Phrase Book: Hundreds of Easy, Useful Phrases, Scripts, and Techniques for Every Situation&asin=1440570744]

* Jeff Jackson of Daddy is Best and past Dad Spotlight guest in EP 63

* Brad Lawless of Simple Lifeworks

* Duane Lewis, retired school administrator and Chris’ Dad!

* Joel Leoj of 3 J’s and 1 S

* Jim Lin of the Busy Dad Blog

* Seamus Magee of Dadinating

This week on the Dad Spotlight podcast we had the pleasure of having Ryan Quincy on our show to talk about his new show Future Worm as well as his own journey as a father.

Emmy Award-winning director and producer Ryan Quincy is creator and executive producer of Disney XD’s animated comedy adventure series Future-Worm which can currently be seen in short form on the Disney XD YouTube Page! Quincy is best known for his work on the long-running animated series South Park for which he won two Emmy Awards in 2008 and 2009 and was nominated in 2010 and 2011, all for Outstanding Animated Program. He also created IFC’s animated series Out There for which he also voiced the lead role of Chad.

 

Future-Worm! is an animated comedy adventure series about an optimistic 12-year- old who creates a time machine lunch box, and then meets and befriends a fearless worm from the future (with titanium-enforced abs), premieres MONDAY, AUGUST 1 (11:00-11:30 A.M. EDT), on Disney XD. Created and executive-produced by Emmy Award-winning director Ryan Quincy (South Park), the comedy follows Danny and Future Worm as they embark on adventures through space, time and study hall. The characters were introduced last year in a popular Future-Worm!" short-form series on Disney XD and Disney XD’s YouTube Channel.

Quincy currently resides in Los Angeles, California, with his wife and young son and daughter. His hobbies include playing basketball and fishing.

In creating Future Worm Ryan Quincy mentioned that he tapped into his 10 year old self and “disgusted out”.  Ryan Quincy was a HUGE Hulk Hogan and Randy the Macho Man Savage fan when he was young so he incorporated this into the character of Future Worm Himself.

He worked for many years on South Park and also on a show called Out There, but in both of these shows he found that the audience demographic was for adult males from ages 18-35 primarily. The problem with this was that he was creating a show that his own kids could not watch and he really wanted to be involved in a show that would be one that could be shared with his kids and working with Disney and creating Future Worm has done just that!

In Future Worm they offer three distinct episodes of different lengths so they cannot create an episode as quickly as they did when he was on the South Park creative team. Thus, they work hard to create memorable episodes in each episode that viewers will love. Ryan Quincy mentioned that growing up he always wished to have a sidekick or a person that would be with him through thick and thin and he is able to create this type of relationship in Future Worm.

To get more information on Future Worm check out the following sites:

* Disney XD

* Disney XD App

If you have not yet gotten your free guide: 15 Low Cost Ways To Engage With Your Kids – Pick it up today

As always, please swing by to visit us on iTunes and Stitcher to stay connected to the most up-to-date happenings with the podcast. Also, if you are on iTunes  and you are a listener, please leave us a review as this helps other people find us too!

 

This week in the Dads Toolbox we are bringing back Dai Manuel (Coach Moose) but this time we are bring him and his daughter Chardonae Manuel on to talk about Chardonae’s experience being one of the main emcees at TED EX Kids BC . British Colombia and we asked Chardonae how she was selected for this honor. She mentioned that she was picked out first after being recommended by a community daycare leader. She was able to audition for a part in the show. 

While Chardonae did not get a part in the main show as a performer, she was to emcee the entire show which in her words gave her “way more face time on stage.” Once she found out that she was one of the emcees she was able to head to California to meet the other emcee and they worked on the script together. She loved being able to write this and add in humor, stories and more.

Chardonae Manuel mentioned that being the emcee for this event was an amazing experience. She met so many people and made a number of new friends that were of all different ages. By the end of the event she felt inspired and wants to be the emcee again in 2017 and plans to audition for the role.

Chardonae Manuel mentioned that there was one person that really inspired. The girl’s name was Jesse Costucci-Phillip and she overcame a lot after the death of her mother and best friend. Watch her speech below and be inspired.

Dai Manuel said that he was very proud of his daughter when she said she wanted to audition for this. Chardonae and her sister had been attending the local toastmasters group that Dai and his wife Christie had started so he knew that they had it in them to speak on this level, but seeing Chardonae step up and have the interest and the passion to do this inspired him too.

We talked a bit about helping your own kids find their own voice and sharing this online. Dai Manuel mentioned that he and his wife have had the pleasure of working with a company called TELLUS and their platform called TELLUS Wise to get great information and resources about creating a safe online experience for their kids.

You can see Chardonae and a number of the speakers on Youtube. We highly encourage you to check them out!

 

Chardonae writes as fairytailfantic on Wattpad and has written a fan fiction novel entitled

* Forbidden Love With a Dragon Prince

But she also has a few other things too such as a roleplay entitled:

* Eternal winter flames of love ROLEPLAY

Find out more about Dai Manuel and his family at any of the below links!

* DaiManuel.com

* TheLifeEnhancers.com

* The Adventures of CBS (The girls’ youtube channel)

Instagram:

* https://www.instagram.

This week on the Dads Spotlight podcast we are bringing you Joe DePaulo, the CEO and Co-Founder of College Ave Student Loans.

Chris has been working in the College Admissions field for almost 20 years and because of this experience he is always working to help families see the benefit of planning and saving for college early.

Joe DePaulo said that much of his team came from the consumer lending end of the financial services world. Being in the student loan industry they saw that there was a need to provide much better products and services to consumers and because of this they decided to create College Ave. Student Loans. At the most basic level, with their company they wanted to be very very clear at what they were providing the lender. Simple, clear and personalized was the mantra that they developed as they developed their company and this remains today.

As you are thinking about college and thinking about paying for college, Joe DePaulo first said that you need to fist find a school, or schools that offer strong academics and that will offer you what you are looking for in a school. Have a few options, with varying cost points to be able to have options for yourself.

Second, fill out the FAFSA or the Free Application for Federal Student Aid to see what kind of aid you are qualified for. Once you find out how much you are eligible for, make sure to also apply for any school based scholarships that might be required to assist you as well.

WE asked Joe DePaulo aboout how you can help your kids to better understand money in general. He stated that for him, the most important thing that you can do is teach them about basic budgets. This is especially true for any child that will be going away for college but really any college student needs to understand this.

It’s back to school time and some parents out there are trying to figure out how to best prepare their kids as they go off to college. Starting them on the right track can help them make good choices about spending, saving, and borrowing. Smart choices right now can help yoang adults avoid unnecessary financial stress in the future. Here are some tips from College Ave Student Loans CEO and Co-Founder Joe DePaulo on things to consider when preparing your kids for going off to college. As your kids are starting to understand basic budgets and you start to talk about borrowing for college, the thing that kid have to understand is what that loan will cost them by the time that they get out of college.  Students need to understand what their monthly costs will be with student loan costs built in as they try and truly grasp what they need to be able to get by month by month.

As a company College Ave. Student Loans works to make sure that all lendees know what they are getting involved in and helps you plan for your future. For them it is important for you to understand that starting to pay for your student loans in college will help you greatly in lowering your overall costs in general.  In all as a company they want to help students to borrow as little as possible and have the lowest interest rate as they can too!

Th FAFSA form is the form that you will have t be filling out every year o prepare you for receiving college student aid. Jow DePaulo said there are a few things you want to remember:

* Apply for the FAFSA as early as possible

* Do not wait to fill it out as many colleges are pushing up their deadlines for letting you know about scholarships.

                                  

Tip #1:                  Talk to your kids about financial basics, like creating and sticking to a monthly budget.

 

This will help your student make better choices about spending and saving money. Here are some basic steps to take with your college student to make a budget they can stick to.

This week in the Dads Toolbox we are bringing you Amanda Stafford, a real estate agent from New Mexico to talk to you about purchasing a home and things to look for when you are starting this home search.

Amanda Stafford entered the real estate market about two years ago and this past year she has seen a large resurgence in the market.

We asked Amanda about mistakes that people make when buying a home and she mentioned that many people start the home buying process online, without even knowing what they are prequalified for. She recommends finding a real estate agent early and having a buyer consultation with them. In this meeting they will help advise and guide you through the whole process of buying a home. During this meeting the real estate agent should be able to walk you through the process, but also give you a better understanding of the expectations that you should have and gain an understanding of what you are hoping to find in the home that you wish to purchase. Also, the real estate agent is there to help you better understand that there is no “perfect house.” Amanda Stafford usually tells her clients that they can expect to find about 80% of what they are looking for in a home.

The buyers consultation is also important in setting the relationship between the buyer and agent. You want to be comfortable with your realtor and if you are not, you need to find an agent that you are comfortable with as you will be spending a lot of time with them through this process.

If you are looking for a quality real estate agent, Amanda Stafford recommends that you ask around for referrals.

Amanda Stafford also recommends that you find a lender early in the home buying process to identify what you are prequalified for.

Amanda also mentioned that the market has shifted and we are now in a sellers market. This means that there is less inventory on the market which many times means that the better down payment that you can make makes your offer a stronger offer and with a strong offer you may be able to come out on top in a multiple offer situation.

Some real estate agents are also suggesting that you write a letter to the seller as a part of the offer and Amanda Stafford agrees that this may help to strengthen your offer in general.

If you have questions for Amanda Stafford, you can email her at [email protected] or call her at 505-720-2182.

 

We Want Your Opinion

We are coming up on our 100th episode and for this we need your help! We would like for you to answer 2 questions and we will share some of your answers on upcoming podcast episodes:

*

Share a story that solidified for you that you were a dad

*

Share your proudest dad moment with us!

To leave your responses dial 877-Dad-Dadz or rather 877-323-3239. When you get there go ahead and leave your message!

Thanks to our friends at LifeonRecord.com we have a new way for you to share with us your comments and answers to our questions.

Never heard of this company? Well… Imagine giving a loved one a unique gift of recorded voices from their friends and family. Voices that talk about the recipient’s favorite qualities, shared experiences, and memories. Friends and family of the recipient will receive a toll-free number to call, and as the recordings come in you’ll listen to them online and gain a new appreciation for your loved one.  The recordings can be presented in a variety of ways including podcasting them onto a phone or tablet, or receiving a keepsake CD or speaker with the recordings in the mail. You can learn more by visiting LifeOnRecord.com

This week on the Dad Spotlight podcast we are bringing you Michael Lissack who is the Executive Director of The Institute for the Study of Coherence and Emergence (ISCE.edu) on the issue of consent. “Consent is confusing, because consent is the wrong word.  Students should be taught that sexual relations require mutual license from both participants not ‘permission’ from one of them. This is not an easy topic to talk about so we brought on the expert to discuss this with you today!

Michael Lissack is working on changing the discourse when it comes to the idea of consent in sexual relationships. Some of this is through the applications that we will share later in the interview, but also though his We-Consent website.

To start Michael Lissack made it clear that he has an issue with the work consent. Michael stated that consent refers to the old standard that “No means No” Consent refers to a behavior that you do to someone else or on someone elses’ behalf and this is not how we engage in sexual relations. Sexual relations is something that you do with someone else. He believes that the right words include that we do things with license, meaning that we give each other permission to do things and we do things out of respect. Respect os something that we need to break down for our kids. Respects can be broken down as:

RE = again

SPECT = To View

So when you respect someone you are saying that you are going to view them again and again and again and we behave differently when we know that there will be repeated interactions.

Thus, instead of getting consent, Michael Lissack likes to see that people are doing things with license and out of respect

Below is a good video that Michael Lissack says explains the idea of consent in an easy way.

The Apps. The We-Consent™ App Suite currently consists of four apps: We-Consent™, What-About-No™, I’ve-Been-Violated™, and The-Party-Pass™ App.

The We-Consent™ App:  This app is designed to record evidence of consent and, more importantly, to trigger discussions by prospective partners about whether they have consent. Each partner is prompted to state his or her name, the name of the other partner, and to state explicitly “yes” to sexual relations. If the second partner is feeling coerced, he or she can state “forced yes” and the app creates a record of the coercion. If either partner says anything other than “yes” or “forced yes,” the app will abort and no video is created. The We-Consent™ App records video and audio, which are encrypted, sent initially to cloud storage, and then stored offline. The recordings are only available to law enforcement, university disciplinary proceedings, or by subpoena. They are NOT available directly to the users.

The What-About-No™ App: This app creates a powerful delivery of a “NO” message and gives the user the option of recording someone watching a video of a policeman stating “NO” in clear terms. The person who wants to communicate the “NO” message activates the app on his or her phone. After a few seconds delay (to allow time for the phone owner to show the phone’s display to the other party), a policeman appears on screen and states “You were told NO! A video of that no message has been recorded and saved. What is it about the word no that you do not understand? No means No!” Thereafter, a stop sign appears notifying the viewer: “A video of you watching this ‘No’ message has been safely uploaded to the cloud.”

The I’ve-Been-Violated™ App:  This app is designed for those unfortunate times when an assault occurs and the victim is unwilling to immediately speak with appropriate third parties (i.e. legal, health, or school based) about that event.

This week in the Dads Toolbox we are bringing back Creed Anything from Balcony Dads to talk about some of the great movies you may or may not have seen this summer.

Civil War was amazing. Secret Life of Pets was funny but reminded him a lot of Toy Story but with pets. He saw this movie at a Drive In which was a great value for the family. Along with this movie he saw Ghostbusters and he and his family loved this too.

We talked a bit about Drive-Ins and he said that his parenting hack for drive-ins is to bring the kids in their pajamas. Also, try and go to the movie on a day when you do not have  anything planned on the next day so you and your kids can sleep in!

Ghostbusters was a lot of fun. Creed said that when he loved about this movie was that it was a reboot and a new story. The characters did not run over one-another and they lived up to the expectations. There had been some criticism from others that there was not enough humor in the film when there was so many great comedic actresses but Creed said it was well done and that the humor was great!

One other movie that he saw was The Killing Joke, an animated Batman movie that was based on the comic series. He stated that the movie, while rated R, did a great job at staying true to the comic series.

We talked a bit about some of the films that Creed was looking forward to seeing including:

* Suicide Squad

* Doctor Strange

* Rogue One

* Pete’s Dragon

Drive In Movies were something that Creed mentioned as something that he and his family enjoys to do together as a family. Some of the things that he recommends when it comes to going to drive-ins is to dress his kids in pajamas before going to the film and also planning a movie night on a night when they do not have anything planned on the next day so the kids can sleep in further.

We Want Your Opinion

We are coming up on our 100th episode and for this we need your help! We would like for you to answer 2 questions and we will share some of your answers on upcoming podcast episodes:

*

Share a story that solidified for you that you were a dad

*

Share your proudest dad moment with us!

To leave your responses dial 877-Dad-Dadz or rather 877-323-3239. When you get there go ahead and leave your message!

Thanks to our friends at LifeonRecord.com we have a new way for you to share with us your comments and answers to our questions.

Never heard of this company? Well… Imagine giving a loved one a unique gift of recorded voices from their friends and family. Voices that talk about the recipient’s favorite qualities, shared experiences, and memories. Friends and family of the recipient will receive a toll-free number to call, and as the recordings come in you’ll listen to them online and gain a new appreciation for your loved one.  The recordings can be presented in a variety of ways including podcasting them onto a phone or tablet, or receiving a keepsake CD or speaker with the recordings in the mail. You can learn more by visiting LifeOnRecord.com

If you have not yet gotten your free guide: 15 Low Cost Ways To Engage With Your Kids – Pick it up today

As always, please swing by to visit us on iTunes and Stitcher to stay connected to the most up-to-date happenings with the podcast. Also,

This week on the Dad Spotlight podcast we are proud to be able to bring you Craig Dubitsky of Hello Products. Hello Products is a company that is working to change the game of oral care for families and Craig Dubitsky has a long history of working to create an environment that supports this!

 

In speaking to Craig Dubitsky he stated that  he started to create products through companies like method, EOS  lip balm, and popcorn Indiana. Craig Dubitsky was continuously told that he couldn’t do this,  that it would not work and people would not care. However, Craig’s theory is that people do care about everything. As Craig Dubitsky states “ there’s nothing that can’t be better,  more natural,  more beautiful.”

 

Craig Dubitsky kept noting that an oral care everything was about killing and fighting. Everything was very masculine and very threatening. In many companies you saw  ads that talked about everything being caught or killed in your mouth. Also, everything in the industry was based on fear and shame as if you did not use that product you would have a bad dentist visit the next time. As Craig Dubitsky said, the mantra was  for many companies “ if you’re not whitening, you’re frightening, the interview won’t go well, the date won’t go well, the dentist visit won’t go well.”

 

It seemed that the big win in the industry was that if you let it hurt in your mouth for 30 seconds you would know it was working. or rather, if it burns and stings then you know you’ve done something good for yourself.

 

Craig Dubitsky  also looked at the packaging insert images of extracted teeth all over them which again led to the fear and shame that he saw and the advertising too.

 

Finally, Craig Dubitsky examine the ingredients of oral care products and found ingredients that have been banned in diet soda many years in the past things like saccharin and other ingredients that you would not want to have in your mouth or in your body.

 

the more that he examined this the more that he found that the truth is that you are not supposed to kill everything in your mouth. even the micro beads that are reported to be so good for you are actually tiny pieces of plastic and in many cases are having to be removed from people’s gum lines.

Craig Dubitsky examined all of this and thought, what if he could make a product that was beautiful, tasted great it was good for you and that was how Hello Products began.

 

Craig Dubitsky  said that in all of the things that he has made his kids have been inspirations for the products. With Hello Products this continues. He stated that he feels that through the way he looks at the world he’s teaching his kids that it’s okay to question things. he is also trying to teach his kids that there is no fear in Failure. There is only fear is not trying. Also, that there is not losing, there is just learning.

Craig Dubitsky  is also a very big proponent of positivity. “ if you put positive stuff out, you’re going to get positive stuff in return. If you put negative stuff out, negative stuff comes back.”

As I stated earlier Hello Products is natural, and having a natural product was important to Craig Dubitsky.  It was also important that the company was always transparent, telling people whatever ingredients does every step of the way. thus, with aloe products you will find that the ingredient list tells you exactly what every ingredient does.

 

Now you might guess that some of the big brands do not like Hello Products products because they are a company that is doing things differently, but they are staying true to their mission.

 

I inquired with Craig Dubitsky about what the future holds for Hello Products.