I love Father's day. Probably because we get to do extra special things for Max and he really is so easy to please. Generally I just plan on cooking some of his favorite food. This year, I had a pretty exciting gift that I started months in advance...but more on that in a second.
In preparation for church, Max wrote his talk. He spoke this year on Father's Day and I spoke last year on Fathers day. I also baked a pie as we were going to pass out pie to all the men at the end of church. Max requested Lemon Meringue!
On Father's day morning we pulled our kids out of bed nice and early which has been more of a struggle since they are already used to sleeping in since school ended.
Anyway, we thoroughly enjoyed church and listening to Max's talk. He shared some stories of his dad, two of which I should share here.
1. His dad was always up early in the morning (old farming habit) and would often bring Max breakfast in bed, it was always the same breakfast, toast, scrambled eggs, and hot chocolate. As he brought the breakfast to Max he would sing "For he's a jolly good fellow..."
2. Max's dad was in his 50s when Max was born, so much older than all his friends' dads. One day in Max's PE class, they were working on climbing the rope, no one in the class could do it. And for some reason, Max's dad was visiting that day, and he showed all the kids how he could climb the rope, all the way to the top, without using his legs, while in his 60s. Max was so proud!
It was a beautiful and uplifting talk. At the end of church the pie was passed out and it turned out that there were so many pies that every single person at church could have some and there were still leftovers.
In the afternoon, we got our house ready for Father's day dinner. We invited my Dad and brothers this year. We had lasagna, steak (Grilled up by my brothers), salad, Martenellis and a dutch oven lava cake. (My little brothers gave me the dutch oven 1.5 years ago so I had to show them I use it! haha!) There were zero photos taken at this event except for 1 cell phone photo of my lava cake that looked like tar, yet tasted pretty good. So, I'm just gonna leave the photos out of this.
So for Max's gift... Remember how a couple years ago we stumbled upon some notebooks that we thought were high school homework and we realized they were Max's journals that he kept pretty much all through high school. These journals are absolutely priceless because it was at that time when we started to become close friends, started dating, and had our first kiss. But more importantly, at that time, Max was deciding what kind of person he wanted to be, he was discovering his relationship with his Heavenly Father and learning to recognize promptings from the Holy spirit, he realized he needed to make his own choices to build the life he wanted, he worked to align his life with the choices he believed were right. Well, As I'm reading his journals I'm thinking of all the valuable insights that our boys can have when they go through those teenage years. So I wanted to go through the journals and highlight or write down the "things I want my teenage boys to know coming from their teenage father" (If I was a real blogger, I could probably think of a better title) So I started by just reading the journals and writing down the things I wanted my boys to know, but then I ended up transcribing it. It is written in fancy (and sometimes sleepy) cursive, in a shoddy spiral bound notebook, so I realized we would want this better preserved. As I was typing it out, I highlighted some portions that we would love to share with our boys, some funny, some informative, some spiritual, and others showing major struggles. It turns out that this is a really big project and I'm not even 25% of the way done, but I certainly am enjoying myself as I go through his journals and remind myself over and over of what and amazing person he is.
Since his journal is quite personal, I'm only going to share a couple of the silly things written like...
11-2-01
Some people would argue that I’m too old to go trick or treating. I don’t ever think you’re too old. I mean when it comes to free candy. There is no age limit.
5-11-02
I wish I didn't give up piano.
6-20-02
We are going horseback riding, kayaking, and eat corndogs. I think I’m really excited.
(I just like that corndogs are in the same category of horseback riding)
The first time Max mentions me in his journal is when he is 15 and we went with a group of friends to the hot air balloon festival, he said...
6-15-02
I’m really tired because Tammy, Rebecca, Jeffery, and I went to the Tigard Festival of balloons. It was great! Although we didn’t get to do very much because it was already late, plus we were poor. We wandered around the place getting all the free samples that we could, It was all really good fun.
This made me laugh so hard because it kind of is a theme for our marriage...always doing what we can to get the best discount and save the most money....haha
Anyway, it was kind of an awkward gift because who would really want to go into their 15 year old mind, but Max is grateful and excited about the idea and hopes our boys don't justify doing stupid things because "dad did it"
I, on the other hand, believe that my boys would be amazing if they ended up just like their dad. Obviosuly each of my boys is their own person and will have their own struggles and make their own choices. But how often is it that a kid gets a glimpse into his father's teenage head?
Maybe more of the personal parts of the journal will end up in the future book we write. haha!
So the point is, kids need fathers and my kids are super blessed to have Max as a father. He works so hard for his family and has incredible energy and drive to create the best environment for our family.
And is totally an everyday hero!
