It’s Time to Appreciate Dads!

This post is a bit overdue since Father’s Day was last month, but hey, better late than never right? I’m not sure how many of you reading have fathers or not, but if you ever did have a handy father I’m sure you will relate to what I’m thankful for in this post.

My entire life I have been blessed with having a dad who could pretty much solve any problem involving a house, mechanics, or tools. He’s what you call a “manly man” who’s always ready to work hard, get dirty, and fix stuff! This is a quality I have always loved about him and never truly appreciated until I got older and realized how much work goes into all of those categories. When you’re young you tend to take it for granted and never think twice about it, but when you grow up and have these responsibilities of your own you start to understand the value of this knowledge.

Now I’m lucky because, I not only have my dad who is a wealth of fixer knowledge, but I also have my Father-In-Law who loves to help out and fix any problem. So with these two at our fingertips we shouldn’t have any problems anymore, right? haha! Well, buying our house came with a lot of problems we didn’t expect or know how to fix. Before we moved into our house there was a ton of grunt work that needed to happen. This included demo, patching, painting, investigating, and troubleshooting. My Father-in-Law was there for all of it. He is semi-retired so he would come down to Chicago for a couple of days at a time and help us out. This was incredible and I’ll forever be so thankful for his time, care, love, hard work, oh and his truck obviously haha.

More recently though, when it was time to install our kitchen, my dad had some free time that allowed him to come down and help out (along with my two brothers which were the main help for the kitchen cabinet install, BLESS THEM). This was the first time he was able to see our house after we bought it. While he was here, there were so many little projects he wanted to help out with. Unfortunately, the next time he ended up coming down was to troubleshoot some water issues we were having because the gutters and downspouts had never properly been cleaned.

So after that wild time, my dad and Father-in-Law decided to take some vacation days from work to come and help me out more. During that week/weekend (Fourth of July), both dads installed all of our interior doors, learned how to install trim, and fixed a long list of random projects. This was so awesome having them here working together. Talk about two powerhouses just cranking through our to-do list. My dad ended up staying for a couple more days after that, and dang did we learn so much from him. It’s moments like this that you learn the most by working on the small things that pop up throughout bigger projects.

Getting to have this time with my dad and Father-in-Law is so important to me. It’s time I’ll never forget or take for granted. It makes you appreciate all that your parents do for you and the love they are willing to give through their time. A lot of our projects would still be on our to-do list if it weren’t for all their help. My biggest recommendation if you have someone helping you out with house projects or really any project in life is to listen and take it all in. Learning from someone who is experienced is one of the best ways to gather that information. It’s even more special if it’s coming from a dad because let’s be honest, you know they love sharing their wealth of knowledge.

To end this appreciation post, I’d love to say THANK YOU SO MUCH DADS!