Happy Father's Day to my dad

As I get older, I develop a little better appreciation for what my parents had taken on in raising nine of us.  Somehow they found a way to keep everything going and get all nine through private Catholic colleges - wow.  Thinking a bit on this Father's Day about the $$ side of it - an EMG area of responsibility in their division of labor - it couldn't have been easy!

April or May 1956 - a youngish (age 27) father of three.  Steve and Cecilia
are "real" kids at this point.  Me a punk, but at least I had a sweet
outfit.  How about that lovely wallpaper (dining room of farm house)?

EMG's core financial strategies seem to be:
--never spend money on oneself
--make do with what's at hand (or as Pete Kirsch might have put it, "wear out the old stuff first")
--relentless generosity with charities (primarily St. Joe Parish, Garrigan) and we kids
[--in later decades, consult with SEG!]

[As to EMG's financial strategy #1:  I was happy to hear that EMG recently treated himself to a new pickup!  Then I learned that "new" perhaps wasn't the right term - it's a 1989 Dodge pickup (and priced accordingly).  Hardly frivolous spending but at least  it was something . . . and the "new" pickup at least is a couple decades newer than the often-functional pickup he's been using for so long.]

Still a youngish (age 36) dad when this was taken on his birthday in 1965.  But
there had been some (well, at least five) developments since the above 1956 photo.  Note the
German chocolate cake (with coconut frosting) - a fine though only
occasional alternative to Mom's usual delightful angel's food birthday cakes.  
Only about six years left for EMG to build up those college tuition funds!

Farming - especially corn shelling and hauling but also field work to a lesser extent - allowed me to work side-by-side with EMG during every summer from mid-grade school through the end of college.  So I spent many-many hours as a co-worker with EMG (or, more accurately and appropriately, a flunky) - in addition to the normal "being around your dad" stuff that takes place in the home.  That was a lot of EMG-exposure for me, it flavored me, and taught me - a lot - and I'm quite happy about that.

EMG here 52 years later with almost the entire crew from the 1965 photo above
 - though with Therese and not Mary - in this photo from March 2017.

And EMG's crew is expanding - something I trust and hope EMG enjoys thinking about every
now and then.  Here are some (but certainly not all) of next gens (also from March 2017).