My Laughable Costco Membership Photo Experience

 A couple years ago it was time…we were going to sign up for the coveted Costco membership. So we walked up to the info desk to get it all set up and eventually they asked me to “go stand in front of that blue board” that was on the wall to get my photo taken. So I walked over there, and being an exact instruction follower in this moment, I stood right in front of the blue board.

As I stood there, my nose maybe about 2 inches from the blue board, I began to wonder what the purpose of this was. After much too long of a moment, I turned to look at Kalynn to question why they would ask me to do this. She proceeded to look back at me with a fairly perplexed look. The “wait…are you being serious..?” type of look. Lol Obviously, my brain now racing a little bit, I look back at her now even more confused wondering why she would be looking at me that way.

I quickly began to look around a little bit to see if I could solve this deep mystery that I now found myself engaged in. It seemed as if all at once the answer came. Though I was in fact standing as directly in front of “that blue board” as I possibly could, it was then I realized that the camera I was to be flashing these pearly whites at, was in fact behind me… I had stood in the right place, just not facing the right direction…

I immediately locked eyes with Kalynn, realizing my mistake, and we began to have a great laugh about the situation. She could not believe that that was how I interpreted the instructions and stood in front of the “blue board.” Obviously, after replaying the events in my head, I couldn’t really believe it either. Lol 

Moral of the story; try not to take yourself too seriously. Maybe I could have been given clearer instructions or maybe I could have just been a normal person and stood the right way. Lol Regardless, the more you’re able to laugh at yourself and the silly things you do, the happier and less stressed I presume you’ll be. 

Anyways, have a good one, y’all.

PEACEEE 

"Do you want to keep the placenta?"

 I apologize from the jump if my ignorance in this story is somehow offensive in any way. This was just my personal experience. 

Excitedly, we walked through the automatic sliding doors of the birthing center knowing our first baby was about to be born in the next few hours. It was a fairly relaxed check-in because we had scheduled an appointment to get induced. Kalynn’s water hadn’t broke or anything and nothing else was really spiking the blood pressure up to that point. As we’re checking in and the nurses are going through a little check-list with us, they asked, “do you guys want to keep the placenta?” Full disclosure, up until just reading into it right now, I didn’t really fully know what the placenta even was. Just knew it was something up in the female business that has something to do with the baby process.

My response, with probably a fairly grossed out/perplexed look was, “for what? Do people put them in like jars and then put them on their trophy case or something?” Lol Honestly thinking only about those evil scientist cartoons/movies where they have different body parts or whatever in jars on shelves. Lol I literally had zero preparation for this question or any idea of what one would possibly want to do with a placenta and why they would want to keep it. I’m fairly sure all of this was being clearly expressed by my body language and responses.

The nurse, seemingly amused by my reaction and silly question, shrugged her shoulders and responded with, “sometimes people like to eat it. I’ve heard of people putting them in smoothies or eating it in other ways.” Wide eyed and a little shocked, having not had this option anywhere even near the realm of possibilities of why someone would keep the placenta, I asked, “Why..?!” Lol Of course, they then explained the health benefits of it and also that some people do it for more natural and/or spiritual types of reasons. It was finally starting to make a little sense.

Nevertheless, selfishly and completely locked into my own thoughts at this point, without even thinking of consulting Kalynn, I responded with a sharp, “Uhhhh, no I think we're good.” Lol It was at this moment that I somehow came to and remembered that I wasn’t the only person on the planet and looked over to Kalynn to see what she wanted to do(as if she’s more connected and important to this whole “birthing/placenta process” than I am…(-; ). 

Anyways, long story long, we ended up deciding not to keep the placenta. I look back at this experience though and can’t help but just chuckle a little bit. Just another probably very normal and understood life question/process(of keeping the placenta) completely taking me off guard. I guess the moral of the story is to never be too afraid to ask questions..? I mean, look how much knowledge I now have. Lol

Hope everyone is doing great. 

PEACEEEE

Gotta Protect Savannah From Dudes Already?

So in our church congregation, Kalynn and I just got assigned to teach Sunday School to the kids that are turning 8 years old. Before we completely split into our class each Sunday, all of the kids(including their teachers) aged 3 to 11, meet together to have singing time. So that means we get to do that with Savannah; it’s dope. Before we’d have to just drop her off and go to the adult classes. Anyways, a few weeks earlier, another mom had sent Kalynn a few pictures of Savannah and her son holding hands as they walked to class and just thought it was the cutest thing ever. Let's just say she was way more stoked about it than I was. 

Fast forward to our first Sunday in singing time. Savannah and her class ended up only sitting 2 rows in front of us so I was excited just to observe her a little bit. Anyways, her and the same hold hands kid were just playing around and laughing with each other which was obviously fine. But all of the sudden the kid starts trying to kiss Savannah; like on the face. So Savannah starts putting up her hand for some defense and is leaning basically all the way sideways in her chair trying to avoid this kid from kissing her. This goes on for another minute or so and at this point I’m like(in my head) “Really, homie? That’s how we’re operating today?” So I irritatingly look over to Kalynn who I think kind of shoulder shrugged at me and then calmly walked up to them and just said, “hey bro, no kisses. Just play but don’t try and kiss her.” Literally all I said and in a normal tone as well; nothing demonstrative. 

Anyways, this kid responds as if I just super yelled at him and stole his most prized possession. He gives me a dirty look, his eyes start to well up, he starts sucking his thumb, and then begins to completely avoid Savannah. Like Savannah is sitting in the chair immediately to his left and he starts leaning as far to his right as possible, looking to his right at the ceiling; all while still sucking his thumb. So Savannah starts tapping him on his left shoulder trying to get his attention to play and he won’t even acknowledge her. Lol In fact, everytime she taps him he kind of yanks his body/shoulder away from her in that pouty way, you know how kids do? Lol So Kalynn gives me a dirty look as if I was out of line and obviously I’m like, “I didn’t even do anything. I literally just told him to stop kissing her.” Lol 

So this is basically how the rest of the 30 minutes went. He assertively avoided Savannah’s attempts at playing and occasionally would look back at me, thumb in mouth and puppy dog faced, almost just to see if I was looking, we would make eye contact, and then he would shoot back around in his chair as if he’d seen a ghost. Lol I mean I really didn’t care that this was his response but I thought it was a little unnecessary and unfair for Savannah.

I wasn’t sure how I would be received in the primary after that based on his reaction but a few of the other teachers seemed to find it fairly humorous and smirked at the situation a little bit. This atleast helped to reassure me that I wasn’t that crazy. Lol Not that I was that worried about that. I really was just shocked that this kid responded the way he did based on what I did. Literally was having a meltdown for what I felt like was basically nothing. It was interesting. 4 years old and I’m already having to be Savannah’s body guard a little bit. Practice for the future, I suppose…

Hope y’all are doing grrrrrreat. Peaceeeeeee.. 

Potty Training Savannah

 Potty Training Savannah

One day we decided to go get our grub on at the Cheesecake Factory. As chance would have it they seated us next to a couple who also had a few small children. Shockingly, we started talking about our kids. During the chit chat, somehow the topic of potty training came up. At the time, Savannah was still in diapers, but we were thinking about it. The husband of this couple told us that all they did was let their son run around naked for about a weekend while taking him to the toilet every 15 minutes to build the habit of going. If I’m not mistaken they basically told us that he was pretty much potty trained after that weekend. So in our minds we were like “Dope. Sounds easy. When the time comes we’ll definitely give it a try.”

Eventually, we did give it a try. We stripped her diaper off and tried to stay as consistent as possible with taking her every 15 minutes; phone timer activated. After the first few times she didn’t seem to be loving the idea of what was going on. It seemed like we were cramping her playtime style a little bit; too many interruptions. So we then tried to use Skittles and Starbursts as some “conditioning reinforcement” every time she would simply sit on the toilet; even if she didn’t “go.” Regardless of what we tried though she just kept peeing in random places around the house. Which was fine at first because initially you've got to expect at least a couple accidents. However, as her “shooting percentage” continually dwindled, the patience began to dwindle as well.

She did end up “going” a couple times in the toilet but very sporadically and with no type of consistency. The look in her eyes was one of “I don’t really know what’s going on” and she didn’t really seem to be connecting what we were trying to accomplish. This, along with many opportunities to improve our pee clean-up game, led us to temporarily wave the white flag and put her diapers back on. We would still try to catch her when she would disappear to go “boop” to try and get her to do it on the toilet, but every time I would pick her up in that moment, she would act as if I was a stranger attempting to abduct her; seemed fairly traumatic. Lol So we basically just chalked it up to her not being ready and gave up for the time being.

I can’t remember how much time had taken place since the white flag waving(a few months at least), but one day we were at Walmart and decided to get her a little Minnie Mouse toilet. Our thinking was that she would think it was so cool that she would want to sit on it and use it. Anyways, the day we got it, Savannah and Ray were joyfully playing with it in the bathroom. They were loving it and continuously pressing the buttons that would make the artificial flushing sound; it was a dope toilet. Lol Anyways, as they played, Savannah was definitely giving off the vibes that she viewed this as a baby toy meant more for Ray than for her. She played around with it for a little bit and then all of the sudden out of nowhere simply climbed up on the real toilet and went to the bathroom on her own. Then she did it again. And again. And again… Literally the only thing we did was to help her flush and wipe but she just kept using the toilet on her own. It was the craziest thing. 

She’s rarely had any accidents since that day and we basically did nothing to potty train her; she did it on her own with a little help from an overpriced, plastic Minnie Mouse toilet. Who would have thought… 

So whenever the topic comes up, based on our experience, I just tell whoever to just let the kid rock and roll whenever they’re ready. I’ve read that pushing too hard in this area could end up being fairly traumatic for the kid long-term. Don’t know how factually accurate that is but take it for what it’s worth.

Anyways, peaceeeeeeee.

          

First Day Alone As A 3-Time Dad

 First Day Alone As A 3 Time Dad

After Kay gave birth to Jrue, she stayed home from work for about a month or so on maternity leave. She watched Jrue while I was mostly responsible for Savannah and Ray; which was fine because that’s already how it had been for the previous few months. However, I knew the day would come when Kalynn would have to go back to work and I would be home with all 3 girls…alone. To be honest I was sort of dreading that day... I mean dreading might be a little too strong of a word but I knew there would basically be no room for error with this infant. Kalynn basically probably handled 99% of our first two’s baby needs(as I’m sure most other mothers do) so I was a little inexperienced. Partly because Mom’s are superheroes and just handle that shiz and partly because I’ve learned that I’m not a huge fan of the completely helpless baby phase(I mean does it ever not happen at the literal most inconvenient times or what..? Lol). So I would have to be doing all of that for Jrue while also making sure to keep Savannah and Ray alive. Tough ask. 

So the day comes and I’m probably blowing smoke to Kalynn talking about how everything will be fine yada yada yada just to calm her nerves, ya know. Anyways, everything WAS fine for the most part and the day was going fairly normal/smooth. That was until Savannah started to spin Ray on an office chair that we had put in our apartment so Kay could work from home when needed. At the time, I was busy feeding Jrue a bottle so I wasn’t super accessible to them. They had spun on this chair many times before and everything had always been fine. I think one of the major contributing factors to what would happen next is Savannah had pulled the lever on the chair that made it lift to its highest point. And because I was a little preoccupied I had never really noticed that had happened.. So at this point the chair was maybe 6 inches taller than normal.

One of the lamest parts about this whole thing was that I was feeding Jrue in a different chair that was literally only an arms length away from them. So, Savannah was spinning Ray and they were honestly having the time of their lives…until they weren’t. Eventually Ray was over it and was trying to get off the chair. Savannah, who was behind the chair, couldn’t see Ray and coincidentally spun the chair at the same time Ray was attempting to get off. Ray ended up falling off head first and obviously put her arms down to try and catch herself. After she landed, she ended up crying and holding her arm for an abnormal amount of time which was starting to concern me a little bit. I’ve had a few broken arms in my day so I was trying to give her some of the “tests” that I remember doctors giving me and she seemed somewhat okay. She just kept crying though and that wasn’t normal for her.

When I told Kalynn all that had transpired, she was a little upset. Mostly at me, assuming that if roles were reversed, this would have never happened. Maybe true, maybe not. Anyways, lol, I told Kay that Ray was probably fine, but Kay decided to call the doctor anyway and set up an appointment for the next day. Welp, we went in, she got checked up, and of course, it was broken… She had a small buckle fracture in her left wrist…

My first day on the job as a 3 Time Dad and Ray breaks her arm…Lol Literally what are the chances of that. I don’t know if things could have looked any bleaker for me in the moment. I honestly equated it to simply “stuff happens” but that probably didn’t make Kalynn feel any more reassured about our current situational roles at the time. Lol So that was my first day with all 3 girls. Things have been pretty smooth since then as far as I’m concerned, BUT, it all started with a bang...or crack. Lol

Trying to Not Let The Dryer "Shrink" Our Clothes Too Much

4/5/2022

What it dooooooo?!

We are currently in Moses Lake, WaRshington(as Bobby Knight pronounces it…) just living the dream. Kalynn is working at the law firm Earl and Edwards as a legal secretary/assistant and about to do a little schooling to level up to a paralegal while I stay home with the three girls and try not to screw them up too bad… During the months of September to the beginning of March I have practice every night being one of the assistant coaches of the local community college basketball team here. So during those months, Kalynn will come home and we’ll basically just trade spots. Savannah currently loves princesses and will put a tutu over everything she wears, Ray is basically like a chicken with its head cut off running in every direction with very "selective" hearing, and Jrue turns 1 this week and is getting more and more mobile by the day.

I’d say it’s been a pretty good experience for us so far. Just learning and growing and getting a solid taste of “real life.” This is really the first time we’ve ever been on our own and had our own space so it’s been a good opportunity for us.

At the moment, Kalynn and I are currently living the “don’t blame the dryer for the ‘shrinking’ of your clothes” lifestyle. I’m sure many of you can relate. It’s hard once you finish competing regularly in sports to really seek opportunities to push your body physically on a regular basis when it’s just so much easier and convenient to just chill. Lol Plus one of us has birthed 3 children and “apparently” that adds to the struggle as well. Seems fake but…  Jk Jk for anyone that took that seriously. 

They also say that you can’t outwork a bad diet. Which actually does seem fake because I swear when I was playing college basketball, no matter what I ate, I was still losing weight throughout the season. So…jury is still out on that one. WIthout those sports though our diets have definitely been sneaking up on us and we’re starting to try and fight back a little. I started more a few years ago(as I suppose these habits caught up to me faster…lol) while Kalynn has started more recently(making it so much easier for me). 2 quick stories to kind of illustrate Kalynn and I in the eating game.

1st story: 

So when we were dating, Kalynn had softball practice every night. And for those of you who don’t know, Hawai’i doesn’t do daylight savings time so it gets dark around 6:30 roughly every night of the year. So I'd pick her up most days after her practice and rather than go to my house or hers to hang out we’d generally just go for drives. Which usually consisted of us going out to eat somewhere along those drives. My general principle when going to fast food places is to order enough that I think will be “good” and then order a little more. Lol While Kalynn will order something that generally is perfect for how hungry she is(who does that?). On top of that, Kalynn somehow would only eat about half her stuff and save the rest for later while I would eat everything I ordered regardless of whether it ended up being way too much or not. So after doing that fairly regularly for a few months, you can imagine some of the results. Kalynn stayed as perfect as ever while I…didn’t. Lol 

2nd Story:

When we go to the movies, generally we always get popcorn along with some other snacks. Also, from what I hear, this seems to be a habit of children who come from big families but Kalynn and mine had the same amount of people in them so I guess it doesn’t necessarily apply here. Anyways, let’s just say our popcorn eating habits are a little different. And you could probably already guess them based on the previous story. She somehow sits there and finesses one piece at a time. While I’m over here stuffing handful after handful not even sure if I’m even tasting the popcorn or not. Lol Again, probably not the greatest habit of mine. Something that gives me a little reassurance, though, is I brought this story up to my sister and apparently she’s had people tell her “yo, your food isn’t going anywhere” as she rapidly races nobody while eating her food. Lol So I'm clearly not alone.

Aaaaaaanyways, this was not my intentional topic when I started writing but it is what it is I guess. We’re learning that being able to reach some of our “fitness” goals are much more about lifestyle adjustments than anything else I suppose. And us going through some of it right now, seems to clearly be encompassing much of our lives based on this writing. Lol More-so probably just me as I have to continuously tell myself throughout the day “don’t eat that, bro.” Lol It’s good though. 

Hope you all are good. Peaceeee

"Today was a good day..."

What's up everybody and welcome to the show, they call me Trop, and Troppy Boy thought you should know...

Seems like each time that I post I start it with something relative to, "it's been awhile." Honestly, it has been a while. And a lot has happened in that "while." I think that the last time I posted, I was gearing up for a big season at BBCC and living in Moses Lake, WA. Well, I never got around to that "big season" and I am currently living in La'ie, Hawaii, going to Brigham Young University here. How did I end up here? Well we'll see what I let out in this post. I don't think a day goes by where I don't day dream about what that "big season" would have been like for me. I was ready to have big season as an individual and also ready for our team to do big things. We had lost some key players, but were keeping a great main core with the reigning MVP leading the pack (shout out to B who's doing big things at Seattle U now). My confidence was high and I was ready to come in and make more noise than I ever had before on a basketball court. Well, long story short, I didn't tear my ACL or break my leg or anything like that, I simply just felt like I needed to move on from Moses. I used the wrod "simple" but i'll let you know right now that I think that was the toughest decision I have ever made. Why would I give up something that I love and have the opportunity to keep doing? I don't know, I just felt like it was right...

Well, after making that decision I ended up at home trying to figure things out. I had one more class to take to get my Associate's degree and so I took that at the CC near my house while I worked full time. I had never lived a life without basketball being a vital priority in it. It was my "job" but it was also my hobby. Most of my free time was spent trying to be better at it. So now with it not at the focal point, I was in kind of a void. I didn't have other hobbies but at the same time, I wasn't really wanting to play at that point in time because it just brought up somber feelings for me. So I could either sulk or go out and try to find other things that I could love. Even though I love(d) basketball, there were a lot of things that I never really got to do because I was so busy with it every year. There were some things that I could do now that I wasn't playing for no other reason than just because I could. Without always having to worry about games and practices and getting better as well, I was able to be much more consistently relaxed. I loved being able to visit places in Seattle that I had never been before. I got to go to Halli's soccer games. I got to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas that year stress free and with family without having to worry about practices and games. Not playing sucked, but there were some positives with it as well.

During that fall, I met someone that believed in me more than anyone I felt ever had; even myself. They consistently told me that I could do anything and be anything that I wanted regardless of what it was. They totally changed and helped to shape my overall mindset. Because of that person I decided to just be a do'er and go after dreams. I bought my first screen press having never had any experience with it before. I had been wanting to make shirts for awhile but I had never gotten around to do anything about it. So one night I just decided "I'm done hoping and wishing for things, I'm just gonna start doing them." That night I bought the press. I almost tried to change my own clutch knowing nothing about cars but honestly believing I could do it. I mention these because I feel like this is the start of the mindset that has driven me from there to now. I honestly believe we can do anything that we want. If you want to bad enough, you'll figure out how to do it.

I ended up finishing the credits I needed to get my associates degree and somehow got accepted to and decided to enroll at BYU Provo. I was trying to decided between there and BYU-Hawaii. BYU-Hawaii was a super foreign concept but I just wanted to go for it. Obviously I decided to go to Provo but after a few weeks of being there, I wished that I had chosen to go to Hawaii. I was shopping at the DI with QB1 and there was a BYU-H sweatshirt hanging on the wall and that's basically when I decided.  So with that mindset, rather than deciding to just stay and tough it out, I reapplied and got into Hawaii again. I felt like I was supposed to go there.

Provo was cool though and I'm glad that I got to experience it. I took this entrepreneurship class and that's really where the beginnings of Trop Clothing started. I was blessed to have Adobe programs fall into my lap(shout out to Nate Dogg for that) and I just started getting after it. My grades weren't the greatest because of a combination of that and Provo just gives way too much freakin homework. Lol I will forever cringe at the sound of Accounting because that class that I took there. After finishing the semester there, I was trying to decide what I should do for the summer. I didn't feel like I should go home and I had to make some money. My friend in Vernal told me I could come up there and work in the oil fields and stay with him and his family. I didn't love the sound of working in the oil fields but I knew that I would be able to make a lot of money. Before going out there though, my friend convined me to come up and stay with him in Rexburg for a little bit. So I did. While I was there he told me that I should just stay there for the summer and try to flip houses with him and his dad and sell some t-shirts. Honestly to me and my entrepreneurial spirit, this sounded so much better to me than working in the oil fields. So for the first few months of that summer, I slept on his couch and lived out of my car. We didn't flip one house and Trop Clothing didn't do much either but I had some of the funnest months of my life while I was there. So huge shout out to all the people that were there that made it so awesome.

After their semester, I decided to go home for the rest of the summer. Trop Clothing made some more ground but mostly we just played. Honestly that was probably the best summer of my life. Not a very productive one in terms of finances or things like that but so good in terms of coming into my own and loving life. I took off for Hawaii after that summer and I have been here ever since.

People kind of look at me weird when I tell them that this is the 5th school that I have been too. And I agree that it kind of just makes me look reckless. In my mind though, I'm grateful for all those experiences because it was just me trying. Trying to figure everything out and I like it because it kinda symbolizes my path and what it's taken for me to get to where I am. It was just real and raw attempts to do what I wanted to do and figure things out and I am proud of that.

If you've read this far, shout out to you. I don't know if my life is that interesting but this is a little look into what Troppy Boy has been into for the last few years. Life is crazy but so much better when you live it being yourself and trying to do what's right for you. People may question your decisions and such but the ones who really love you will always be in your corner.