June 20

Happy Father's Day to all of those fathers out there.

I have been blessed with more than one father in my life and it has been a great joy getting to know them and a greater hardship when I had to lose any of them.

Most of you know that my dad died of cancer just shy of my 19th birthday. I only knew him as child and never got to get to know him as a friend. I wish I had gotten to know him better and learned more about him before he died. It was 20 years in February that he passed and sometimes it still feels like the other day. There are some things that I will always miss, especially our fishing trips and the fires he built in our fireplace. I am thankful that I got to say good-bye.

My father-in-law died 2-1/2 years ago, 2 days before Christmas. We all took that one pretty hard. One of the first things I remember him saying to me shortly after we were married was that he would be my dad now since my dad had died. I never knew him when I was little but I got to know him as an adult and my friend. He died quite suddenly and without warning from a blood clot to his heart. There will always be a void in my heart from losing him and not being able to say good-bye.

My step-dad has been a great blessing in my life and my mothers. He came into her life at just the right time and has done so much for her and my sister and I. He never had children of his own and treats us like his daughters. I can't remember him once calling me his step-daughter in conversation, he has always called me his daughter. When they got married Teen was about 4 and Tween was 1 so they have always just known him as Grandpa T. He has treated my Mum as a Queen and does so much for her. And of course my sister and I are just as, if not more, spoiled by him than my Mum sometimes. And that is a lot, believe me.

I hope that you have been as blessed by one father as much as I have been blessed by 3.

Stacy