The Shaytards Story on Forbes, Coopertard & their Aunt in Singapore

I haven’t blogged about the Shaytards in a while, but Coopertard is one of my favourites. He doesn’t appear very often, but when he does he’s a riot. He’s the cousin who’s the same age as Babytard and they have their funny toddler tiffs. They are both 3 now. Little Cooper is the son of Shay’s beautiful younger sister Carly and the kids always seem to have so much fun together. I think I am addicted to the videos because they reminds me of how fun it was playing with all my cousins when we were little. The videos are just so family oriented and they always seem to be having so much fun all the time. I always have a smile on my face when I watch the videos. It’s no wonder that Shaycarl has made it to Forbes. That’s how popular his YouTube channel has become. Quite an inspiration to anyone who wants to make a living through YouTube.

Here’s an extract of the article:

ShayCarl may play the fool to wife Katilette’s exasperated straight woman on YouTube, but he’s not clowning around when it comes to making those videos a business. His collaborative production company, recently featured in The New York Times, is just one of many examples of how he’s parlayed comedic snippets into a budding online mini-empire. But that manic part? Yeah, that’s real. After sending seven questions via email to Butler, I received a 2,000+ word block of text in response.

What he sent was an epic tale about a young man seeking his place in the world, happening upon YouTube and finding his way to internet stardom. Here’s that story:

Shay begins…

“It was a dark and stormy night.” I was born on March 5 1980 in Logan, Utah to my parents Carl and Laurie Butler. I am now 31 years old. I am the oldest of 4 kids. We lived in Logan, Utah till I was 4 years old and my parents decided to move to Phoenix, Arizona so that my dad could go to college as an electrical engineer. Four years later after, he graduated, he got a job in Pocatello, Idaho working for a semi conductor plant. Growing up in Pocatello I played multiple sports including basketball, football, track, baseball and really got into skiing. There was a mountain called Pebble Creek Ski resort that was less than 30 minutes away and we went there every chance we got. A couple summers I worked clearing trees, brush and rocks from the mountain in exchange for a season pass. My Junior and Senior year became dedicated to skiing as often as possible. I stopped playing almost all sports except for soccer and would ski 60 to 80 days a winter. Often skipping class or running up to the hill to get a few runs in after school.

Goes on mission…

Being raised as an active member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, “The Mormons,” I became an Eagle scout, and after graduating high school, I went on a full-time church mission to the West Indies for 2 years. I served in Barbados, Trinidad and Guyana, which is the ONLY English speaking country in South America.

Returns home, meets a girl …

Once I returned home from my mission I started to make plans to go to college at Idaho State University in Pocatello. I had a friend whose brother was in a local community theatre group performing the musical “Anything Goes.” He invited me to go with him to watch it. At this play, a 19-year-old brunette by the name of Colette Crofts was playing the role of Reno Sweeney, a classy night club singer on a cruise ship. She was beautiful and could SING. I feel like it was love at first sight. I even went so far as leaning over to my friend Derek and saying “I WILL marry that girl.” After stalking her around campus for the next 3 weeks I finally got a date with her. Nothing serious — just wakeboarding at the reservoir with a bunch of friends. Just as I thought. I was totally in love with this girl. I would have proposed at the end of the first date, but I felt that might have come across as a little forward.

They marry…

A REALLY long story, short: After about a year and a half of dating I finally convinced her to marry me. We were engaged for barely 2 months and were married in the Idaho Falls, Idaho LDS temple on January 3rd 2003. We began to have children rather quickly and our first son was born 11 months later on December 3rd 2003.

He goes to work…

I have had almost every job under the sun, it feels like. One of the first jobs I took was as a door to door pest control salesman in Raleigh, North Carolina. We moved out there with 4 or 5 friends of mine and knock on doors selling $400 annual pest control contracts and my wife worked in the office scheduling the treatments and customer service.

He goes back to school…

After the summer was over we moved back to Idaho and I continued my education. I finished most of my generals and was considered a Junior but on the arrival of our second kid and first daughter, I was getting tired of sitting in college classrooms having just paid $300 dollars for some stupid book that would become obsolete the next semester — as the author would have made a second edition — and I would only be able to sell my book back for like 3 bucks. I felt like I was just part of a big scam JUST to get this little piece of paper that said I was qualified to get a job somewhere. I was more interested in gaining knowledge. I would take classes that were interesting to me but they would be on the required classes that I needed to tack for my program or whatever. So one frustrating morning where I was late, because my daughter had been up all night, I couldn’t find a parking spot on campus I just said screw this I am done with college. I like to tell people the reason I dropped out of college is because I couldn’t find a parking spot. Which later was part of the inspiration to co-produce a song with talented YouTube musician NicePeter called Best Spot in the Lot, which has been downloaded/viewed hundreds of thousands of times.

He goes back to work …

I have always been very entrepreneurial minded. Often times while I was sitting in class listening to my professor ramble on I would think to myself: I could be out there making money right now. I felt like going to college was holding me back and keeping me from creating something now. Among the many things that I have done while looking for “What I was going to do when I grew up:” I was a school bus driver, a car salesman, an after-school program teacher. I worked with mentally handicap kids, I was a prep cook, and even spent some time trying out different multi-level marketing schemes. I eventually got a job as a granite countertop laborer and worked cutting polishing and installing granite counter tops. After doing this for three or four years I decided I never wanted to work for anyone ever again.

He starts his own business…

I started taking classes to get my real estate license and ended up starting my own granite countertop business called Rock Tops!….

He gets a computer…

After about eight months or so of running my granite business and selling a few homes as a real estate agent, we bought our first computer. We had just had our third child, a second daughter. I went to my wife and said that I think we should buy a computer. I will never forget what she said, she said “What will we use it for?” I didn’t know the answer? I had barely used a computer at ALL in my life. I was 27 years old and only had a hotmail….

He finds YouTube…

I remember the night that I first got this $499 dollar Dell laptop up and running, I went to YouTube and just blindly started watching videos. I thought it was amazing! ….

He starts making videos …

I remember thinking “I could totally do that” I started posting videos and even entered a contest that sxephil was having. He liked me and made me one of the top 5 finalists. I received a few hundred subscribers and was hooked….I loved the feedback and the gratification was instant. I would film some random thought I had about hand sanitizer or gas prices or me dancing in my wife’s old uni-tard and I would upload it and people were instantly there to tell me if they thought it was funny or not. I loved the communication and the community of it all.

He quits his businesses…

The second I learned that I could make money and support my family doing this I wanted to quit being a granite and real estate guy and start doing this FULL TIME. I got a job as a weekend radio DJ at Z103 and my life took a 180 degree turn. I started making more and more videos and stated doing live shows on Blog TV from the radio studio. I was performing for 2 different audiences at the same time. It was crazy when the online audience started to become bigger than the radio listeners.

He starts his YouTube enterprises…

I became a YouTube Partner February 2008 and got my very first AdSense check April 24, 2008 in the amount of $367.40, for a month’s worth of videos. I COULD NOT believe that I was actually getting money for being “entertaining” I knew that my family couldn’t live on less than 400 bucks a month, but the wheels in my head were turning. I immersed myself into YouTube…..

Read the rest of the informative article here. It will definitely inspire you if you’re in a lousy job, are not camera shy and hope to make it on your own. Oh yeah – you also need a couple of cute kids and most of all, charisma. Check out their official YouTube Channel. They have tons of fan made compilation videos too, like this one which compiled the cutest clips featuring cousin Cooper.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ohqbe6hL0w]

And here’s one where the cutest baby ever, nicknamed Rocktard (youngest of the Shaytards) eats rocks. In Asia we would totally freak out over this. We would never allow our kids to even sit on the ground, so it’s interesting to me viewing how a child is raised in another culture. I think allowing kids to explore is a good thing. I feel that I grew up overly cautious because I was always told not to do this or that, especially in school.

Anyway Rocktard’s about to turn one and it’s pretty amazing that he has been filmed from his ultrasound to his birth to his first steps and words. Rocktard is like a Truman baby.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WJHt2HPLls]

Shaycarl’s wife Katilette’s sister Callie Moore is in Singapore as a expat wife right now and she’s also been featured in a magazine. I especially love what she says about Singapore in her vlogs:

Q- How’s Singapore? Has the move from the United States changed your career path in any way?
A- Singapore is amazing. I still feel like I’m walking around in a dream some days. This move changed my career path in a huge way. For six years I’ve been waiting for the day I would be able to quit my conventional job to put all of my energy in to music. Dave was offered an opportunity to move here for work, and for the first time I haven’t needed a full time job to make ends meet. I no longer have that constantly tired “just trying to survive” type of feeling every day. I’m happier, my relationship with Dave is better than ever, my confidence has finally showed up, and there is inspiration everywhere. I never expected to be here and I’m not sure I deserve it.

About bookjunkie

Blogging about life in Singapore & recently cancer too.
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2 Responses to The Shaytards Story on Forbes, Coopertard & their Aunt in Singapore

  1. says:

    Hey Bookjunkie.
    I haven’t commented here in probably three weeks, so hello! I have a few things that came to my mind. For one. the Shaytards are a darling family. I completely agree with you that the children’s beauty contests are way out there strange. I don’t watch the family of 8 but I did enjoy the videos you postes. I can’t cook worth a darn either and finally the Marina Sands is AMAZING. Maybe one day I can see it.
    Stay cool.
    Julie

    • bookjunkie says:

      Thanks so much Julie……watching the Shaytard videos makes me happy because they are always so happy and their family members seem so close….it’s just so nice huh?

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