My Father is one of a kind.  There are very few men made from that same material that he is made from.  He grew up in a large family of 9 siblings with four brothers, four sisters, and himself, which is probably where he acquired a lot of his experience with others. My father grew up in the mid 40's to the mid 60's.  Times were very different back then.  His Father owned a used car dealership when he was a child and he got to wash cars inside and out for .50 cents a car.  Notice I said got to, which means he didn't really have a choice.  Well things didn't change much when my brother, sister and I came along.  We got to wash all his cars inside and out for $5.00 each and that was only after he made a thorough inspection of your work, and there was always at least one thing that we had to go back and fix.  Oh, I forgot to mention my dad was a bit of a car collector, so we never ran out of work. What is the quality I most admire about my dad?  His desire to help as many people as he can be as conservative as he has tried to be throughout the years.  Some people might say he has an odd ways of getting his point across, I have grown to call it UNIQUE.  Both of my parents worked when we were growing up, my mother worked mornings and my father worked nights, so there was always a parent at home with us.  Finding ways to save money and lower expenses was how we ran our home.  When we were children, if we left our light on in our bedroom, he would unscrew your light bulb and put it in a less expensive spot.  In other words until we promised to turn our light off when we left the room we did not get our light bulb back. Throughout our childhood, for some reason, our house was a hot spot for all the neighbor-hood kids.  We always had some kind of cool toy around that all the children wanted to play with, but instead of just letting everyone play we all had to pitch on the chores for the day.  One of my fondest memories was a big Bar-B-Q we had.   Now we didn't just go out and buy our meat like most families would, we raised or grew most of our groceries.  He gave each of the kids a five-gallon bucket and an old milk crate to sit on.  He lined us up in the backyard and then gave each child one chicken.  We all went to plucking away. After we were all done we got to ride four wheelers, play, and have a huge meal with our friends and family, that had to be one of the most fun Bar-B-Q's we ever had.  I think having to work hands on for your food makes it taste that much better.  Now I have been told that my dad and I are a lot alike, and we get along like two peas in a pod NOW, but when I was a little girl through my teenage years we butted heads like two male rams fighting for the prize.  I always did exactly what I was told specifically NOT to do, and I always got caught.  I never knew how parents always figured those things out.  My brother, sister and I would all agree that we have the most unique, kind, understanding, fair, caring, stern, but at the same time loving, humorous, and devoted father that any child could ask for.  When it comes to parents, we found the gold at the end of the rainbow.  
I will always love you Dad and Mom.