What I LOVE about my dad

Lately my husband has been saying that I am becoming more and more like my dad every day. I think he means this as a jab because he says it when I do things that are a little odd-- like saving a small scrap of food in case I might want to eat it later or talking to our waitress and telling her my life story as she blankly stares off in the distance. People have always said I look like my mom and act like my dad which makes me super proud because my mom is a total hottie and my dad is AWESOME. As a pre-Father's day shout-out, and because he frequently mentions I never write about him on my blog, here are a few things I LOVE about my dad:

1. My dad is HILARIOUS, he is a living breathing moving walking SNL character. People need to follow him around and make a movie from his life because people would die laughing at the things he thinks are totally normal.

This is at my sister's wedding. He didn't want his hair to get messed up so he carried a VERY LARGE round brush in his coat pocket to touch it up throughout the day.

Up until recently my dad used one of those old Nokia phones that we all had back in high school (it had a piece of duct tape around the back) and is generally clueless about technology and social media. A few months ago he asked my sister and I to make him a Twitter account. We were getting it all set up and when it came time to choose a 'username' we asked him if he wanted it to be Mike, or Mike H or something normal, but without skipping a beat, he said, "No no, make it 'Mr. Luckbox.' That is what all my poker friends call me."

This is Mr. Luckbox and I in Las Vegas

AND ALSO FOR INSTANCE, my dad does not carry a briefcase, nor a back pack, but instead he puts everything he needs into plastic bags. They liter the end tables in my parent's house, are piled up on the floor, cover the fireplace mantel and shelves driving my mother CRAZY. Can you just imagine having to find a bill and having your husband tell you it's in one of 30 different plastic bags sitting on the family room floor? Each bag serves a combination of purposes. Last year my dad came to visit me, and brought in about a dozen plastic bags that he had with him on a recent gambling trip (yes, my dad is a professional poker player!)
I was making fun of him about his bags and pointed to a random one and this was what was in it! He said he collects free granola bars he gets from the casinos in case he needs a snack, I die!

So he is a bit of a hoarder. Understatement. His favorite drink is hot tea, and I kid you not, he saves all his tea bags after he uses them once to reuse later. Throughout the day, he puts each one in a bowl and at the end of the evening, he puts them all in one cup of tea so there will be like five tea bags that have each been used once or twice. It does not matter the flavor, tea is tea! And God forbid I throw them out, he freaks out about it and calls me ungrateful and wasteful!

One final thing that lately I have been finding hilarious about my dad and maybe your parents do this too, he just got a new phone and is really into the "talk-to-text" feature. When I am around him it always catches me off guard because we will be doing something or in the middle of a conversation and he will pick up his phone and speak a message into it. And because my dad is a little goofy the messages he says are hilarious like a few weeks ago I heard him say, "TELL JIM HE IS DEAD TO ME" and then there's all the loooong messages he likes to send so he will say aloud, "I AM AT APPLEBEE'S IN PELLA, IOWA WITH MY PREGNANT DAUGHTER AND MY GRANDDAUGHTER I AM HERE UNTIL FRIDAY AND WILL CALL YOU BACK WHEN I LEAVE."

2. My dad LOVES US so well. This is a small example, but if we were out to eat growing up and I did not like my meal, he would always give me the food off of his plate without thinking twice. Even if I ordered something lame like a corn dog and he was eating filet minion, he would give me his food like it was no big deal. Little things like this have always showed me my dad loves me more than himself. That he would rather meet my needs than his own. If any of us kids needs something, he will not stop until we have it. When I got sick last fall, he literally sought after one of the best doctors in the country for me to talk to. Mike was out of town during the last few weeks of my pregnancy with Mack so my dad dropped everything he was doing to come stay with me and help us take care of Lou and even walked our awful dog Gus who was untrained and would dislocate your shoulder by jerking the leash every time he saw a squirrel. My dad constantly lets me know that he loves me and would do anything for me.

3. My dad is an AWESOME GRANDPA to my kids. He has a slideshow on his phone of pictures that he shows all his poker buddies. I'm sure that they could care less, and the slideshow is VERY long (I have seen it) but he will sit there and narrate through each photo like his grand-kids are the first cute babies to ever grace the planet with their presence. I get texts like this on a DAILY basis:

And if I don't text him back right away, he gets a little sassy like in this one:

4. My dad has taught me some pretty serious lessons throughout my life. Some of them I clearly ignored but others sunk in deep. When I was little, my dad had a job as a headhunter in the food industry that made him lots of money- but he was miserable. He took a big risk and did something he loved instead, starting an audio business in our basement. He bought a small building to run Holm Audio out of, it grew and he bought a bigger building. He always loved music and channeled it into a career, it was a risky move but it paid off and he was able to spend more time with his family. I love that my dad isn't afraid to pursue things that he loves to do and is good at, even if from the outside it might not make sense to others. From watching his life, I've learned to fight for what's most important to me and to create a life that I actually enjoy instead of just going through the motions to make everyone around me happy.

My kids both ADORE their Papa

5. My Dad is REALLY good at a LOT of different things. A favorite memory of my dad from when I was little was him playing these amazing classical songs from memory on the piano. The piano would shake and the whole house would be filled with the sound of it, and I would sneak into the living room to watch him and lay on the ground with my ear to the floor. Growing up my dad's family was really poor so instead of owning a piano, he had a piece of cardboard that he drew the keys on and used to practice songs he knew by heart. My dad put himself through college by working in the psyche ward at the Elgin State Mental Hospital, and got a duel degree in Psychology and Business from North Central College. He then became a high school economics teacher. After later having a successful career as a recruiter then opening his audio store, my dad decided he was passionate about playing poker. Right now he is in Las Vegas getting ready to play in the Poker World Series. Over the years I have visited my dad several times in Vegas-- he used to gather business cards from eligible bachelors for me, and when I was single I would walk into a room full of 200 men intensely playing poker, and he would shout to all of them "Hey everybody, I want you to meet my beautiful, Christian daughter!" The man has no social boundaries and this has become another one of my favorite things about my dad. He is confident and doesn't care what people think of him, this attitude towards life frees him up to really love and engage with people.

My dad is not perfect but he is even better than perfect because his flaws make him an awesome father. He is transparent in his strengths and weaknesses and I love that about him. My dad makes me feel like I am the best thing that ever happened to him and I'm happy to return the favor today in saying, I love you dad!

Thank you for loving me so well. You make me a better mom and wife and human being through the man that you are.

AND PEOPLE, men are hard to shop for, particularly the men in my life. Check out this awesome company Man Crates if you are still in need of a Father's Day gift. Because of the spending fast I have become a tad pickier about what I spend my money on and the crates this company designs are full of yummy goodnesses and the packaging is awesome!