November Pics

 

 

 

Huron's 2008 Distinguished Civic Service Award....

Congratulations to my dad for his upcoming award. The Distinguished Civic Service Award is presented to a Huron resident who has given a lifetime of service to his community and has truly made a difference. An award that is truly deserving and although very meaningful to my dad would never have been his intent.
From as long as I can remember my dad has been involved in everything. He has been involved in Kiwanis, church boards, Huron School and James Valley school boards, hospital boards, greater Huron development board, the Huron chamber board , Mennonite foundation board, crossroad hotel and convention board, Griffith foundation board, bank boards, South Dakota Banker’s Association, South Dakota State University, Federal Home Loan Bank board, and Huron University boards. That is just to name a few. Not only was he on these boards he was the president of most of them.

When I got out into the world and realized the importance of serving my community I got on a few boards myself. I told my dad that being on boards was kind of boring and there isn’t much to do besides meet and listen. He told me right then and there that you can’t just be on a board you need to be the president. That is how you make things happen and keep things interesting. I know that I will never come close to participating in as many community organizations and boards as my dad has, but I respect him for what all he has achieved.

I could go on and on about his achievements and how worthy he is of this award, but as I know my dad he is more satisfied that he raised his kids to be good people and men of God. As many of you know, he made each of us three boys work manual labor jobs when we were growing up. Not your park and rec or mall jobs, but Trussbilt, and Dakota Pork, tough manual labor jobs. He taught us the meaning of hard work and that things weren’t going to be given to us, we had to earn it. The other silver lining was that working those jobs helped keep our heads in the books and strive to be our best. I can say without a doubt that we all look back on those experiences and thank him for putting us through that. Life is hard and we were taught that lesson before we got out on our own.

So even though my dad is receiving this special award from the city of Huron, I would like to present my own award to him. For all you have done to make me who I am today, you have been awarded the lifetime achievement award for being the best dad I could have ever had – thank you. Just like the city award, it’s about time!

Thanks Mimi!

This is to Mimi Gloria for coming and helping dad with the kids while mom was in Utah for work. Thanks Mimi!

Congrats to Sydney

This is Sydney tieing her shoe for the first time.

That is Owen in the background still picking out what he wants for Christmas.

What do you want for Christmas?

Do you know what you want for Christmas yet? Owen does!

Halloween

 

 

 

Morning full of Poop

Well, this morning was one to remember. Today was dad's day to sleep in while Ann got the job of getting up to take care of Cooper. Usually he is up around 6 or so but with day light savings time it was acutally 5. So around 8 or so Sydney and dad were awoken with mom's terrifying howl of "Owen, how could you."
To give you a little background, Owen has ben waking up dry for quite a while now, so when he takes his morning whiz it is a diaper full. So much so that he will remove his diaper by himself, usually without one of us knowing about it. Well, today was one of those mornings, so he removed his diaper, pulled his jammies back up and went about his morning. Even though I was still in bed I heard him running sprints out in the kitchen and family room, but then the sound stopped and that is when he went to find his dark hole (Cooper's closet) to take care of his business. According to Ann he then noticed he was without diaper and summoned her into the room to take a closer look. She was busy with Cooper but Owen was adamament that she come take a look. Well, before she saw anything, she felt it on her foot. She had stepped right in it. Dad and Sydney heard the yell and then we knew it was time to get out of bed. Needless to say it was all over the carpet, all over his jammies, all over his butt and leg, and not to mention all over the bottom of Ann's foot. It was quite a site to see my wife limping around with a scowl on her face holding an infant and yelling at our 2-year old.
We were then off to church and in our small group we started a new class entitled Grace based parenting. As Ann would say nothing about the events this morning were graceful.
When we arrived home from church after we ate, Cooper was crying and of course filled his pants. This was one of those blowouts in which you end up using 10-15 wipes. It was so bad that we actually ended up throwing his shirt away. I asked Ann why we would throw his shirt away when it could be washed and she just said, "trust me." So I threw it away without looking it over.
The last bit of poop news came a short time later when Sydney and Owen were outside playing with Sydney's best friend, Luke who has a dog. We both heard Owen crying as hard as he could coming back up to the house. We both expected something pretty bad and as we saw him come up the stairs we saw him holding his hand with what looked like blood. Nope, he just got himself a handful of fresh dog dodo.
So, with getting up early with Cooper and all of this commotion Ann and I are pretty pooped-out today.