Yeah, man, can relate. So much pressure for everywhere on how you should parent it’s ridiculous, which things to strive and work for, and being alienated from the rest for not following the norm.
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Wow just re-read this after a year and a half – life is ticking along quite quickly ! It’s been a busy year or so for me with work, family, friends, music.
Juts a little update:
Family is doing great. My wife and I have a really loving partnership. She’s very supportive of my music. She’s cool with me practicing late nights when I have a show coming up, and doesn’t mind me cabbing it home from the club after a gig. The dust from having little kids is finally starting to settle and we’re getting out more for dates and shows together.
I’m still using my little moleskine notebook to write out my plans and goals. It’s expanded now to helping me plan life goals as well as short and long term music goals. My year has been a really wild wild ride. I started around Jan/Feb 2017 playing live gigs on Elektrons. This started really small, with me promoting and booking my own sets at small bars, and cafe’s. I posted a few videos on insta/facebook and a few people noticed and started complimenting me on my DJ skills hahaha I guess you could call playing live on a monomachine, A4, AR, and Octatrack DJ’ing ? shrug In any case a few gigs lead to a few more and eventually some promoters noticed (mostly because I went to their shows and met them haha) and I started playing in clubs around town. It can be really challenging to keep up especially since family and work life are really busy, but I do my best. Planning my time really helps. I try and have a few new songs every time I play (usually takes me a few weeks to come up with 2-3). Playing very regularly now at clubs and I was just invited to play a 2 hr live set at a private underground rave party in June (we have these here now ! YAY !) Also just had a little EP release celebration at the club I play at. My first ever techno release came out last Thursday (also YAY !)
So I guess reading back at my post from 2016 I’m feeling a deep sense of accomplishment. Also an abundance of appreciation for my family and friends. I wanted to share my happiness. In small baby steps I’ve reached a dream I’ve had for most of my life. Perception of yourself, of your life, of time, and of your goals is fluid and very subjective. It was difficult for me to learn and accept, but my own limitations have become my inspiration and source of passion. I now look forward all day to the time I get to spend making music and relish the opportunity. Every minute is a gift. Actually … most things in life are a gift.
Oh also I noticed a lot of the thread has dipped into parenting topics and life priorities (career, success etc). I would like to say that you can balance it all, but you have to always keep your family as the top of the list. Very next in the order should be your own health, well being, mental clarity, and happiness. If you don’t have that very high in your priority list, then you can’t have the strength to support #1 (see family). Work is up there since you need relative success in most societies to afford survival and the basic luxuries (such as synthesizers hah), but ultimately I measure my success by the smiles on my kids faces. I could work more hours and earn more money, but at the end of the day I want to be home with enough time to play and cook a nice meal and tuck everyone into bed. Now all this is fantastic, but the trick is … keep yourself and your needs up there. Imagine the metaphor of the oxygen mask on an airplane. If the plane is going down you have to put the mask on yourself first or you might not be able to help your kids get theirs on ! This metaphor is true to all life. I might be selfish for going out for a skate session or taking the late evening to practice music, or being nervous or overtired because I have a show coming up … but this is what I do to maintain a sense of self confidence, importance, and most importantly a sense of individual purpose. Stuff that’s “just for me” so I can be the best for them 
Cheers everybody. 
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Man, I was in this same boat. Those days seem easy compared to now (boy now 15 months old)! However, the best thing to do in your position is to make sure your SO has everything she needs to be comfortable (water, snacks, etc.) and let her sleep when she has the chance. Then it’s easier to negotiate for that time that you need. However, mentally prepare yourself that you won’t get much time for music. Enjoy these days though - so much happens when they’re this young, it’s like they change every day (or even hour!).
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When I’m jamming and my son is in the room I give him a volca keys to play on. He can conjure up some insanely complex sounds with it (somehow). His 4 year old brain analyzes the controls differently than I would so he gets interesting tones that I can’t. A while back I sampled one of his sounds into octatrack before we shut off the machine and I used it in a song in my live set It was one of the gnarliest sounds I’ve ever heard from a volca. The squelchy sounds in this song are volca and the deep growly stuff is his voice sampled and mangled with OT.
Can he heard here if you like:
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Yeah, my 6 year old does things with the Volca FM I would never think to get out of it. Occasionally I have to grab it from him and save the patch. 
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4 month old boy, we’ll see how it goes Good thread though because figuring out how to balance it all has been in my head lately. I know it’s more important than ever for me to figure out how to be happy if I hope to teach my son to be happy.
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Imo one thing that is important with little children is to give them kind of cross-stimulation (if you can call it like that). Making Musik with a visual or tactile perceptive aspext I.e. Drums, guitar, Maschine (:)) is better suited for most children than sequencers like Elektron/cirklon /…
I personally don’t want to explain the whole sequencing stuff, so some thing with multisensual feedback is making more sense with my (meanwhile three) children
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Great thread, we share many common challenges with balance! I have three girls, 3,7&9. Youngest is big enough now there is a little more time in the evening. Between my wife and I we have harps, piano, guitars, samplers, synths and drum machines so the girls are getting the best of both worlds. Also got them volcas which seem to be popular choice to give the kids, they bash away. For my own music the trick was to eliminate as much as possible the editing part of composition, which is where I can really go down the rabbit hole.
So I setup a few gadgets and mix on the fly into the desk and just record the summed stereo output. It’s like painting with sound and fulfilling for me and quick. I probably have too much gear but I can live with that.
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Always liked this thread. Interesting looking back at my posts - hasn’t quite worked out how I thought things would but that’s ok, things change and evolve. And really interesting reading others thoughts - particularly around parenting.
Recent development in my household is that we’re now 99% certain my youngest (7 next weekend) suffers from dyspraxia which, for those who don’t know, means he struggles a bit with fine motor skills and can be a little socially awkward. It’s nothing major but if you could ever see him playing football he’s the clear odd one - he just wants to run about laughing and doesn’t give a shit about the ball haha. So that’s taking a lot of physical and mental time up for me as I think of things to do with him. Had considered music as that might help with the hand/eye coordination. Maybe a volca would be good too. Or I could just let him loose on my OT’s crossfader when a tune is playing - he enjoys that! One to ponder though but these are the sort of curve balls life throws at you that keeps things interesting.
As for me, as some will know, I seriously paired things back. I only have an OT now along with some NI controllers and Push. I don’t use my stuff all that often these days. That doesn’t make me unhappy though. The last half a dozen or so evenings I have stolen and sat down with the OT have been such fun. I think I’m just in a more musically creative advanced state or something. That reads wrong. I mean, I don’t waste so many days/hours dicking around and have just been more efficient with my time in terms of tuneful creations. I still get GAS from time to time but I’m quick to put to one side as me and my old Octatrack pal is more than enough for now.
Scotland’s been hit with some sustained lovely weather for once so time to spend some evenings out in the garden jamming on the OT while the boys do their thing with their pals.
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My daughter went to school for the first time this week, the two year old son is lucky to have my full attention now. I actually starter buying some hardware stuff (used to work exclusivly ITB) because it allows me to ‘do’ music in much smaller bits of spare time. Also, smaller size allows for outside and couch use which helps keeps things fun towards my wife. The OT, DN and Blofeld all fit on my Studiologic 88 keys and the whole lot sits nicely in the living room available to the whole family. The kids treat the gear suprisingly careful, even the Blofeld’s encoders all still work 
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Wonderfully positive approach to your life and challenges ! Keep rockin it as a dad
I know what you mean about pairing things back. Some days I just grab one machine at a time and really focus on the music I’m making and keeping things simple. Due to limited time I try not to get sucked into the experimental loops where you can get lost.
Cheers !
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Hey Guys’n’Gals,
just as I thought that we’re out of the worst: Going strong for “Round Two” (read in Mortal Combat Announcer Voice)
Going to box up my gear for a while, as it seems. 
Whish me luck!
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Enjoy the ride! I’ll be out for round 2 next year
Roland / Boss products are for children only.
My son, 2.5 years old.
4 years old.
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Yea, that RC505 is going to happen one day, but I am more waiting for a better multi looper package (like many people … also, that Electro Harmonics 99500 was a bit dissapointing, why oh why 
)
We do need gear that is easy and gear that needs more effort, both work eventually and lead to different spaces.
I figured I’d join the party!
I’ve two kids - 9 and 2. My eldest is disabled to a significant degree which means he needs help with everything in his life; the youngest is dev-typical. Both of them love music. They love to play my guitars, make noise with percussion, and f**k with my pedals while I’m trying to record!
There’s definitely less time (and money) to do all the super-flighty stuff (like being in a full-time band or gigging regularly) but it hasn’t lessened my enjoyment of making music. It’s just focussed it… a LOT. Every hour I get to spend with some toys in my hands creating is appreciated; they know it’s my ‘unwind’ from doing the days.
The Octrack’s been a boon for getting stuff out of my head quickly, as has GarageBand on the iPad. I’ve got a Logic rig on my Mac but to be able to make abstract sounds and track them quickly, without a DAW or having to fire up my computer, is just amazing.
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Began indoctrination of my 8 month old the other day…
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I totally agree - now that there’s a child in the house (besides myself), any moment to yourself is like gold, so I’ve become more disciplined in using those minutes wisely. I’m not always good at that, but at least then it’s my own fault.
Every once in a while I pick up my toddler (17.5 months now), so he can reach some buttons and knobs. He’s at the age where buttons and knobs are the greatest thing around. I think I need to either make or find a rugged midi controller and set it up so he can smash and twist away with me. Start 'em young, right?
@wouzer - You can combine the juggling with music now! http://cdm.link/newswires/its-a-ball-its-a-drum-machine-its-odd-probably-why-they-called-it-oddball/
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We don’t have children, but we do have a summer cabin that we’re renovating, a small puppy that wants to go outside at least thrice a day and we’re both freelance entrepreneurs. Time i get to spend with my synths has diminished a lot from the times I was a single guy.
It doesn’t really help either that my synths are a kilometer away at our studio. I never seem to have time to go there anymore. If I had them at home I could use any spare 15 minutes with my synths, now I need to ”take special studio time” to get there. Luckily I have the Digitakt and iPad-synths that I take everywhere with me. Just today me and my oldest friend drank a few beers at our summer cabin and sampled beer bottles and cans, made a beat out of it and had tons of fun.
After turning 40 you have to take every little free moment you can get and savour it. I no longer have any pretensions of being a recording artist or professional musician. I’m not going to make a living out of this. Those times are long behind me, but I just enjoy fooling around with my gear now and then.
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