Welcome to a weekly feature on my blog – Ben’s Zone. Written by husband… Ben. A foodie, coffee obsessed, ex-smoking, ex-drinking and Ridgeback loving Dad. Who is also seriously into his fitness.  You can find him on the blog (most) Sundays. Enjoy 🙂

Ben’s Zone Does the Dad Dance

I’ve talked before about how much music means to me but it really took on a whole new dimension when I had children. Children are amazing creatures, capable of learning at a rate no adult could hope to achieve and changing daily before your eyes but they can be frustrating too.

One of the toughest things about smaller children is the time between them becoming aware of themselves and you and being able to talk in coherent sentences and communicate that awareness. I discovered how precious music could be in that time with my son. Just as teenagers moving in to adulthood use music as a tool to connect, so Logan and I did also. I’d always played music around him as, well, because I always play music, but I began to realise that different music had different effects on him. His favourite has always been drum and bass. He’s happy with experimental artcore, will just about tolerate hard house and gets out and out naughty when I put techno on, but drum and bass gets his groove going. The first time he and I danced together was a very special moment indeed. The time we spent recording all my vinyl to digital (to allow his soon to be born sister to have a room of her own) was one of our first real shared experiences as I played him through all the records that I’d loved through the years. And now he and I are both using it to form a connection to my daughter, Aria. She understands speech and knows certain words but only really talks when it suits her, but our music sessions always get her attention and in that time, she, Logan and I are all connected and happy. While she does like trance music (he’s less keen) I don’t think Logan would forgive me if I didn’t make sure she had a solid diet of his beloved drum and bass.

For those of you who haven’t heard of this before Al from The Dad Network has started a campaign called Do the Dad Dance to help raise money for Unicef (great cause and I’ve donated). I haven’t nominated anyone, but if you want to join in please do and let me know, I think I’ve shown it can be fun to look a bit silly.

The rules are simple:

1. Dads, film yourself dancing to your favourite song, with or without the children.

2. Upload it to social media using the hashtag #DOTHEDADDANCE and then tag / nominate some of your dad friends to do the same.

3. Donate £2 to UNICEF UK via a unique text code or by visiting www.justgiving.com/dothedaddance

So without further ado, here’s my #dothedaddance video of Logan, Aria and I dancing to some very heavy beats (Amtrack by Trace and Nico if anyone cares).