Why I LOVE being a parent - Episode 6

I have been pretty sick for the last few days and it seems that I may actually be getting slightly better (maybe). For this episode I wanted to talk about a conversation I had with Korver this morning.

I filled Korvers little pepsi mug up with some root beer this morning for a treat. This is the conversation we had:

Korver: Dadda, will you drink my root beer with me?
Me: Buddy, I'm sick and I don't want you to get my germs.
Korver: You're not sick, your Dadda.
Me: (as I laugh and cough up half a lung) Well buddy, I am daddy, but I'm also sick. Can't you hear me coughing.
Korver: Don't cough, just share my drink (as he smiles huge)... you can drink the little straw.
Me: Sorry bud, I don't want you to get sick. Wait until I get better and I will share a slurpee with you.
Korver: Dadda, I have to poop

HA HA HA HA HA HA

Oh man, I love this kid. I about died.

This just goes to show, that it doesn't matter what you are talking about....... a good poop is all it takes to make you LOVE being a parent.

Why I LOVE Being a Parent - Episode 5

A super quick trip to the grocery store and we get episode 5 :)

Korver and I make a quick trip to our local Smith's store tonight and knowing that Korver absolutely LOVES "Crane Games" I grabbed a couple quarters out of my truck to throw in the machine on the way out of the store.

We get a few items and checkout and head to the exit where the crane game is sitting. I have never before seen anyone using this particular crane game before but it happens (like always) that I end up having to wait in line to give Korver a big smile. We watched the lady burn through several quarters not getting anything before I realize that she is trying to hook a "Mitt Romney Plush Toy" (kinda weird thing to have in a kids crane game). She turns and apologizes for taking so long but apparently she just HAD to have this for her dad.

Korver is getting pretty restless so I pick him up and say softly to him: "Hold on buddy, she has to get her stupid toy first"...... moments later Korver watches the crane drop (with no catch) to which Korver yells out: "Did ya get your stupid Toy?" Needless to say my face went a little red (like always) and she finally gave up to go cash out some bills to get more quarters... we hurried and spent our .50 cents (with no win) and exited the store.

This just goes to show that if you really want something important to get out to everyone, tell your kids!!! It's moments like this that I LOVE being a parent.

Why I LOVE Being a Parent - Episode 4

The other night my in-laws watched our two kids so that we could go on a quick date (to Red Lobster). The nearest Red Lobster to us is in Layton and happens to be pretty close to a Toys'R'Us. After Dinner we hit up Toys'R'Us and once inside I headed right for the Thomas Train sets (Korver has tons of them but is missing a few characters). I found this sweet track set that has a huge hill and little mechanism that pulls the trains up the hill... its pretty sweet. It was a $45.00 set and it was on sale for $35.00 so I HAD TO HAVE IT FOR KORVER.

K'Dee said: "he doesn't really need it" to which I replied: "but I will give it to him for Christmas, I'll save it". She gave me an interesting look and said: "I really doubt it will last that long". We get home and I put it on a table in my bedroom and it was still in its large bag.

Later that night we are on Skype with my brother and his family and Korver runs up to me and says: "Daddy, I need my big Thomas" and I thought he was just asking for his big Thomas pillow. He kept asking and asking and at one point was giving me a little screaming. About the time I finally realized what he was asking for he ran over to me and said: "Daddy, can I have my Big Thomas PLEEEEEASE"...... "Daddy, I said Please" and then he gave me a huge smile and pointed toward my bedroom....

..... Needless to say it was cute enough to score him a brand new toy and K'Dee looked at me and said: "I told you it wasn't going to last til Christmas".

It doesn't matter how terrible the "Terrible Twos" are.... A little smile and the word please can still make your heart melt and make you completely glad that you are a parent.

Why I LOVE Being a Parent - Episode 3

Hey everyone, it has been over a months since my last post and as many of you know we just had our second child earlier this week. For those of you who don't know we had a little boy (BIG boy actually) He was 9 lbs 12 ounces and 21 inches long. We named him Griffin Randall Wood.

Now to get on with the episode. I am writing this while Griffin is completely zonked out on my chest so I will try to not have too many grammatical errors :)

Korver (our fist son, almost 3 years old) is a little skittish around kids so naturally we were a bit worried how he was going to handle the new little one. It took some time but after a few hours he finally got warmed up to the idea that he had a little brother. He would sorta think about touching his hands and petting his head but wouldn't really have much to do with Griffin. Several hours had gone by and it was time for bed and like every night Korver started getting upset knowing that he had to retire for the night. He was making rounds giving kisses to everyone and stopped by his mommy and in the softest voice I have ever heard he said: "Can I kiss Little Brother?" It was awesome, maybe all our worrying was for nothing. Korver went to bed and was out cold in less than 3 minutes (gotta be some sort of record).

It doesn't matter how stressful things can be and it doesn't matter how tired you are but the simplest little phrase can make everyone in the room completely happy to be a parent!!!!!!

Uinta Mountains Trip July 19-22 2012

Joe and I left Brigham City and headed towards the mountains around 3 p.m. Thursday. We set up camp at Butterfly Lake and decided to just fish there for the evening. Generally I catch TONS of fish at Butterfly but wasn't really having much luck. Joe was out-catching me 4 to 1 (which sucks because he is the newby ha ha).

Friday we played around some more at Butterfly and decided to hike the short trail-less hike to Castle Lake. Again, Joe caught all the fish at Castle. We decided to head back to Butterfly and my wife, son, and my in-laws were fishing and waiting for us at Butterfly. We drove down to Pass Lake and played around a little before returning to camp to cook some dinner. After dinner they went home and Joe and I drove down to Kamas to meet my brother and bring him up to camp.

Saturday is where the story gets good. We decided to go for another small hike to Ibantik Lake. Trying to find a place to park was pretty ridiculous but after a while we finally were able to. What a crazy packed weekend. We got a pretty late start but the hike started out really well.... until we realized we took the wrong trail. We ended up at Watson Lake and realized we took the wrong trail so we hiked straight over over the "mountain" next to us and dropped down to Wall Lake. We fished there for a few minutes but decided to get on our way to Ibantik. The clouds were coming in at this point but we didn't really think it would be too horrible so we trucked on. We ran into several people that were hiking out, none of which had been all the way to Ibantik. Most of the people we talked to said they were catching lots of little bitty brookies but nothing big. We finally made it over The Notch and it had been lightly sprinkling on and off.

We hiked down passed Lovenia and the several other small lakes right there and the rain started to pick up pretty good. We started seeing lightning and hearing lots of thunder and were going to head back but decided that hiking back over The Notch wouldn't be a good idea with the lightning, not to mention we were so close to Ibantik that we decided to try our luck with some fishing.... but just before we got to the lake THIS HAPPENED:

After the hail stopped we went down to the lake (there were several tents at the lake) and we threw in some flies and some lures, none of which proved to be productive (with the rain and all we didn't think the fishing was going to be good anyways). With a break in the storm we decided to hurry and head back over The Notch. We got hit with rain pretty hard on the way out and decided to just hit it hard, needless to say we were completely soaked by the time we even got to back to Wall. From wall I made another small error and we headed down towards Trial Lake (which was the best error of the trip). We had to hike back up to the Crystal Lake Trail Head from Trial. We finally got back to the truck and drove to a camp host site and purchased a few bundles of DRY firewood. We headed back to camp and ate some dinner and cooked a sweet cobler (Cherry Apricot Cake over peaches) it was fantastic. It took us a while to get warm since we were all soaked straight to our bones, but it was completely worth it. Ibantik was quite beautiful, even if we got completely hammered by hail and rain.

Needless to say I was trying to ruin the Uintas for the two brothers with me that were first timers in the Uintas. However, they were already planning next years trip so I don't think it was completely ruined for them.

Aside from Joe catching all the fish (JERK), my constant lack of correct trail picking, and the horrible weather.... It was a great trip.

The "PLUG" Post

Hey Everyone,

Today is the day that I give a couple shout outs to a couple awesome things.

First thing on the list for the day: My older brother has created something amazing and he has put in VERY hard work to get it to where it is and I would love to see it go even further. What we are talking about here is this: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/340631149/dragonmage-warfaretm-0 <<< This link will take you to a kickstarter.com project that my brother has launched. It is a board game that he has been working on for a few years now and it is awesome. Seriously, and I am not just saying that because he is my brother. My brother has spent so much time refining, play testing, updating, and tweaking that its almost unfathomable.

If nothing else you can stop in and drop a $1 donation just to support the cause. If you don't want to drop a dollar there is also an option to just support the game with no donation amount (raising the number of supporters helps get the project on the home page). On Kickstarter you are pledging money to the cause and you will only be charged the amount if the project reaches its goal. Personally, I donated $50.00 bucks and wish I could have done more.

A $32.00 pledge gets you a copy of the game. I have purchased games before that cost $60.00 dollars and although they were great games, they weren't as good as I think this is. Thanks in advance for all your support.

Second thing on the list for the day: I have an amazing Wife. She helps keep our business running both financially and physically. She is currently over 7 months pregnant and won't stop working to push things forward. She has been working in her spare time to come up with designs to add to shirts for our Etsy.com store. www.etsy.com/shop/cheaperthanshirt Check them out, share them, "like" them (or just our etsy shop in general). She has put some great effort into our business and there are no words that I can express to show how grateful I am to have such a perfect spouse. Without her I would be broke and have a crumbling business.

Third thing on the list for the day: Lets see, actually that is it... just those two things. Seriously though, please stop in and check out what I listed above, it would make some people pretty dang happy :)

Why I LOVE Being a Parent - Episode 2

My son is about two and a half years old and LOVES to push his limits. If we tell him not to hit something with his plastic baseball bat he will get it as close to said item as he can and then look at us and laugh. Putting him in "time out" always seems pointless most of the time until we heard this:

Korver was swinging his plastic baseball bat around and hitting everything he could when he accidentally smacked himself in the head with it. He brought the larger part of his bat to eye level and said this: Bat... YOU DON'T HIT!!!! You go time out, 2 minutes.

And he set his bat on the couch and left it there.

We were laughing pretty hard, I couldn't believe it.... but then a few minutes had passed and he went and picked his bat back up and said to it: Bat!!!!! You went time out..... You don't hit.

Just when you think that everything you say goes completely unheard, you realize that there is nothing as great as being a parent.