The ultimate reward a.k.a. my Daddy loves his yard

My dad recently won theYard of the Month award from the city of Hampton, VA. They gave him a sign he gets to keep all month and everything. Plus as a monthly winner, he’s now in the running for Yard of the Year!

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My dad has won numerous Man of the Year awards, garnered accolades on his job, and for his community service, but anyone that knows my dad knows that YOTM is pretty much the best compliment anyone could give him. Because he is a bit obsessed with his yard. He loves flowers so much my mom and I would swear he was gonna dig up the grass to make room for more. We used to joke that he would spend his very last dime on flowers and seeds and landscape beautification.

Admittedly, in the grand scheme of vices that’s not a bad one to have. But still…

He has chronic problems with his back so there were years when we lived in Jersey when he couldn’t mow the lawn himself so he’d hire kids in the neighborhood or his friends’ children to do it for him. But he always had a very specific pattern he wanted the grass cut in — alternating diagonals so you could see the color differentiation in the rows — and you BET NOT mess it up!!! My dad was in sales so when he was in town he worked from a home office that overlooked the front yard. And bad back and all I have — on numerous occasions — seen him bound down two flights of stairs to confront postal workers who cut across the lawn to deliver the mail.

They only ever did it once. Hahaha.

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Way too much

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Why? Why? Why?

This house is located in Hampton, VA. Not far from where my parents live. Every year these people “decorate” their house with every Christmas trinket ever made. Barbie dolls, blow up glow in the dark Grinches… and then people from miles and miles around come with their families to see the house during the holidays. They give out Christmas trivia leaflets for people to fill out while they’re visiting. It’s just way too much. These photos don’t even do it any justice.

I’m sure the people who own this house would say they do this because it makes them happy to make so many other people happy. And hey, it makes me happy to make fun of people who think that doing this to their home makes other people happy. So I guess… in the end, everyone’s happy.