Happy Birthday Dad!

Yesterday we celebrated my Dad's 58th birthday! We celebrated it Jones-style with a lot of eating and hanging out.
It's so fun to have Jake and Natalie and their kiddos here so we have lots of fun cousins to play with!

The kids loved playing with all the babies, real and fake.

It's so fun to see my dad with all the kids gathered around and on top of him! My dad is a super fun grandpa, and he genuinely seemed to like the homemade cards and gift that my girls gave him last night.

For posterity's sake here's some fun facts about my dad/Grandpa Jones:

1. First given name: Melvin, but only call him that if you want him to punch you in the face. Just kidding he probably won't punch you, but definitely prefers "Mel" instead.

2. He is the best dentist around. Kirk nicknamed his practice Gentle Dental way before that was an actual dentist office. I seriously never had any nervousness going to the dentist because it was always a relaxing, fun experience. (It may have had something to do with the laughing gas we got though...)

3. My favorite story of his from when he was a kid is when he doused himself with ketchup and then laid in a field really still in hopes that a vulture would think he was covered in blood and come to get him.

4. He's the most honest man I know. I worked for him for about 9 months right after Kirk and I got married. (He made up a job for me, and paid me way too much to sit around and do nothing.) But during that time I saw several different times when he could have charged for something, or could have told a patient they needed something, but instead always was completely honest in every aspect of his job.

5. He loves loves loves to read! I seriously think he's read every book out there -- at least every book that's been carried at Costco or Deseret Book.

6. I don't know if it's primarily because of his love or reading or not, but he's also just about the smartest guy around! He know lots in just about every subject. I used to love going on road trips with him because you could ask him what any landmark or mountain range or anything was, and he'd know!!

7. His favorite store, hands down, is Costco. We've learned that before you ask for something for your birthday, you better make sure it's carried at Costco. Last year he told us, to our shock and horror, that he hates Target, and actually only goes to Target maybe once a year, if that. What?!

8. One of my favorite things about my dad is his interest and support of me and my family. I can't tell you how many talks I've given, or primary programs I led, that for some reason my mom wasn't able to come to, but I'd look out and there's my dad. Not because he's necessarily interested in whatever it was, but because he loves me and knew that this was something that was important to me. How many meetings did he have to miss or juggle to make this happen? It didn't matter to him, because he was there to support me.

Dad, you're the best and I love you tons!