Dad's Day Gift

[SavaTheAggie]

Here's the father's day gift I gave my Dad yesterday:

The story behind it:

My grandfather owned 40 acres of land in the outskirts of Texarkana, Arkansas, 15 of which was cleared (the rest is dense forest). My grandfather didn't do much farming, but he did do a little, and he kept the field nice and trim with his old 1959 John Deere liquid propane fired row-crop farm tractor pulling a brush hog (big lawn mower attachment).

When my grandfather passed away he left the tractor and half his land to my father, the half with the field, and the other half to my aunt. My father has spent many years fixing up that old tractor (my grandfather didn't know the meaning of the word 'maintenance'), and he's got it running real nice.

However the tractor and bush hog are too large and ungainly to mow the small fenced yard around the house, so a few years ago my father bought a John Deere riding mower, which he is very proud of. My father has always been a John Deere man; every one of his push-mowers for our house where I grew up were John Deeres, and my father owns several John Deere t-shirts, ballcaps and other paraphernalia.

So for my gift to him this year I gave him a pair of custom minifigs of him and his father, and LEGO versions of his mower and tractor. The mower is an unchanged design of one I found on Brickshelf, so I cannot take any credit for that. As for the figs, I commissioned Jared "Kaminoan" Burks to design and create them for me, including my father's John Deere "Suburban Legend" T-Shirt and my grandfather's trademark light blue windbreaker and day-glo orange hunter's ball cap.

Here's a pic of my dad and a pic of a painting my mother did of my Grandaddy (the only 'pic' I have of him that's digital).

Close ups of the figs and WiP pics of the tractors can be found in my Flickr Gallery.

My father really liked his present, btw.

--Tony

Edited June 18, 2007 by SavaTheAggie

[Asuka]

That

[simonwillems]

Nice idea this! I like the way you made the front wheels on the tractor, that airplane piece is just spot on *y*

:-)

[zeki]

I love the moc and the idea behind it! The design is great, color scheme also...good one!

[KimT]

Nice...it's always great when MOC's have a deeper meaning.

I'm sure he got pretty happy with his gift. John Deere RULES!

KimT