Last weekend I had the prospect of looking after my kids (boy 3 3/4, girl 1 3/4) from Friday afternoon till Sunday morning, my wife was going on a woman’s retreat with women from our Church.

I knew I had to make the weekend fun, one to remember, this kind of thing doesn’t happen often right! Mummies out of the house for 2 nights!?! I wanted to make it a weekend of joy so that they would not be thinking about Mummy not being around – how many of you know every kid misses Mummy especially little Boys!

My first thoughts were to have some adventures with them, go for dirty walks in the woods, if wet a Disney marathon, lots of cake and ice cream, but all these things felt like they would be better with my wife around .

There was the real option of meeting up with some friends who also had lost their wives for the weekend who were trying to look after their toddlers as well, I really wanted to do this as it would be a great bonding time.

But instead I decided on packing them in the car, driving 2 hrs south west and visiting Gran and Grandad!!! What is the best replacement for Mummy? Granny!

My son especially adores his Granny – when he spent a week with her in the summer (which they do every year – while Mwaka and I help host a Youth Camp) he came back saying he loves Granny more than anyone!!

For the kids this got rid of the tears of saying bye to Mum fairly quickly and I have to say permanently once we arrived.  I want to be very careful to alleviate any emotional pain in their young hearts, yet help them be adaptable and know that people like the wider family love them enormously as well.

So for this reason for me this trip worked better than us staying at home.

Other benefits were that I saw my Gran who I hadn’t seen for a few months,

Plus it happened to be the weekend of the Barnstaple Carnival and Fair which my parents loved introducing their grandchildren to (not sure about the kids though from pic above!) and the main benefit to me was a small amount of quality time with my own Dad.

I’ll admit one of the main pulls for me to head down to North Devon for the weekend was the thought of a morning in the Surf, I had been checking the forecast all week and it looked promising, Saturday morning I drove to Saunton Beach and nothing! Flat Flat Flat. The huge upside was that I arrived home in time to go with my Dad to clean up his Church’s gardens/graveyard.

We spent a really enjoyable hour pulling ivy off of the wall of the old Church together and chatting about who could be their new Vicar, his business and life in general. I had not realised the potential of going along and working alongside my Dad for some reason that morning I was focused on ‘my’ surf.

But the reward for going to help was enormous to our Father Son relationship. Father Son relationships really need those times of quality on a regular basis, especially when you live in different cities.

What about you? Have you had a weekend or night with the kids? What did you do?

Please comment below and think today about what is best for the next chunk of time you have with your kids?  (This should be the most important planning session of your month!)

And how can you invest some time with your own Dad, to add some quality to the relationship?