Flashback Friday: Happy Birthday Dad

It's my Dad's birthday this weekend. He's turning 15 and a half...a leap year baby. Gosh they grow up fast.

Here he is back in the day, trying to win my Mother's affection.

It worked, and here we all are.

A few memories about the man I call...well mostly Dad:

My Dad always built the best living room forts. He would even staple the sheets to the furniture. None of that tucking in stuff and hoping it stayed, his forts were serious business. He also built the best jumps in the snow.

He makes a mean spinach souffle, and always melts a little butter in the maple syrup.

Every Valentine's Day he would make sure to leave something for his girl's to find in the morning when they came down for breakfast.

My Dad is also the absolute best camping/backpacking partner. He always brought a hammock, and made us french toast and cocoa, and would start the campfire before we woke up. Once when we were backpacking on the coast, he brought butter and garlic and we picked mussels off the beach and steamed them over the fire. Another time in the mountains, he mixed crystal light powder in snowballs and made us snowcones (you're right, that doesn't seem safe. Thanks for not killing us Dad).

He used to call me "Bug", and when he called home and I answered the phone he'd ask "have I told you I love you yet today?"

After I had surgery, he went out and bought me a TV with a VCR so I could watch movies in bed. He also took me on numerous shopping trips. What a guy!

Whenever he drove me to the dentist, he'd let me shift. He also taught me how to drive backwards, round and round the circular driveway and told me "guys think it's cool when a girl knows how to drive a stick shift." Turns out he was right.

One day when I was home sick from school, he was out doing some yard work and was quietly sneaking up on a mole hill. I asked my Mom what he was doing and she said "trying to kill a mole." I got upset, so we closed the blinds so I wouldn't see it. After a while I was really worried that he had killed it, so we opened the blinds to see....and there he was standing proudly in the sliding door with a dead mole on the end of his pitchfork. I cried pretty hard.

And the most damaging memory....

I am deathly afraid of aliens, specifically ones with almond shaped eyes. One night I was pleading with my Dad to let me sleep in their bed and he wouldn't budge. Giving up, I asked him to check to see if my window was locked. He said to me "Nik, if they're going to come for you, they'll come THROUGH the wall anyway.

Happy Birthday Dad! Thank you for making it so hard for any man to live up to our expectations ;) I love you.