Memorial Day

So yesterday was one of those very rare days. Since David started working at Wal-Mart 7 months ago he's worked 7 days a week. However on Memorial Day the fates conspired to give him the day off at both jobs. That's right...one whole day to spend together. I have to admit we were both fairly giddy at the idea. We can count the number of days he's had completely off on our fingers.

We slept in til 9, another thing he doesn't get to do, and then took the kids swimming in our community pool. The weather and the water were absolutely beautiful. After a quick ride home to shower and change we hit the car for a road trip. One of mine and David's favorite things to do together is to drive new roads and see new places. SO we drove to Gila Bend which is about an hour east of Maricopa. David had heard that there was a good italian place there so we went to check it out.

After lunch we were driving back when we saw a sign for a shrimp farm. Huh? We just had to check it out so we drove down this tiny road and found the shrimp farm. Where the very nice owner (farmer?) gave us a tour of his shrimp ponds. We're going to go back in November for Shrimp Days when they harvest the shrimp.

We drove back to town with a quick pit stop along the way to find Eli an obliging bush.

Then we stopped at our Brand-New Wal-Mart! You'd have to live in Maricopa to appreciate how absolutely wonderful this is.

We got home and my wonderful husband used his day off to scrub my kitchen floor, do my dishes, and then make us a wonderful dinner. After we put the kids to bed we snuggled up on the couch together and watched movies. It was so wonderful. Then after the movie David asked me if I was ready for bed and I started crying. I never wanted the day to end.

Birthday/Vacation/Fishing/Singing/Flowers/Surgery/School

So I'm going to quickly catch everyone up on the last 4 weeks of our lives!

First of all Eli had a birthday about a month ago. He turned 4 years old. He wanted a blue dinosaur cake for his birthday and silly string (sort of a family tradition). His favorite present was his booster seat, we graduated him from his carseat. About time too, his head was 2 inches above the back of his carseat!

Then we left for our 2 week vacation in Utah. I go up every year for Women's Conference and this year David went with us for the first few days. We had so much fun spending time together as a family. David's Dad took us out fishing and it was so much fun. Here you can see what Emma and Eli spent most of their time doing, Emma is studying the fish finder and Eli is eating.

We all caught some fish and Emma ended up catching the biggest one. That night we had a party and ate the fish of our labors.

The next day we went to the Tulip Festival with David's Mom and sister. Here you can see why Catherine was their favorite "Aunt-of-the-Day".

These were my favorite flowers and no they are not tulips. Don't they look like they're straight out of a Dr. Seuss book?

I love this picture of David and the kids. Also pictured are Blondie and my niece Kaylee. Aren't they all adorable?

On Sunday before David left we went to Temple Square to see Granna sing with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. After the performance by the choir we were treated to another show when President Monson gave an impromptu concert on the organ. It was awesome!

Anyway we had a blast in Utah but we were all happy to come home to our house. But we had to immediately turn around and prepare for Eli's operation. Here he is in his surgery outfit, he especially loved the hat.

Then this is the two of us in recovery. You can tell how he feels, poor little guy. But we're home from that now and he's doing very well. He's tired and sore but pretty cheerful anyway. He's going to have three tiny scars on his tummy.

And then today is Emma's last day of school this year. I can't believe she's old enough to be in first grade! Look at the difference between her first day of school and her last.

So I think that's it. Sorry about the long post. :-)

Eli

All right, I'm sorry I haven't posted in forever. We went on vacation for 2 weeks and then spent some time recovering form our vacation! :-) I promise I will post pics soon of all the fun we had in Utah.

But today there is a different agenda. Eli is having his appendectomy this afternoon. So if everyone could say a little prayer for us I would really appreciate it. I found out yesterday that the anethesiologist is going to put him to sleep before they do the IV. So that takes a big load off my mind. We'll be in the hospital for 24 hrs after his operation so I will update when we get home tomorrow night.

David

So a lot has happened since the last time I posted. Easter, baby blessing, 3 birthdays, ect. But with your permission I want to skip most of those and just focus on one event. David's birthday. I want to devote my blog post to him today. So here are the many sides of David Drorbaugh.

So let's start with the early years. David was born in Nogales (on the US side) and grew up in Snowflake before moving to Utah when he was 12. This is the house he lived in in Snowflake.

In Utah he met his best friend Matt Pyne. You'll see a lot of Matt in the following pictures.
David was super active and he LOVES the outdoors. As you can see from the following pictures he loves to hike, ski, mountain climb, mountain bike, camp, golf and fish.



It was a good thing that David was an outdoors sort of person because he was called to serve a mission in Honduras.

David and I were married in February of 2002, during the Salt Lake Olympics. We were married in the Manti Utah temple. Isn't he a total cutie?


Let's talk about talents now. The man I'm married to is so crazy talented! First let's talk about musically. David has a beautiful voice though he will often bemoan the fact of his "limited" range. This despite the fact that he can, and will, sing all 4 parts in sacrament meeting. Ward choir directors start panting when they hear him sing and will often try to recruit me (I am not so musically inclined) hoping he will come too. David sang in the BYU Men's Chorus and I hope someday he will have the opportunity to follow his mom into the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

But the musical talent does not end there! David plays both the piano and the accordian very well. He serenaded me with the accordian on our first date, playing songs from Lady and the Tramp.

Also he can literally pick up any musical instruments and play music. I have seen him play classical music on a slide whistle. It truly is a gift and one that has blessed our family.

On top of being musically brilliant David is also a good cook, he did most of the cooking our first year of marriage and taught me the joy of cooking without a recipe.
He also enjoys target shooting and hunting when given the chance. I love this picture of us shooting together.

David also loves photography and has overloaded our computer with pictures of plants, flowers, trees, and bugs. When he was younger he did some painting and I think there's an artists soul inside him waiting for a time to break free.


He is also, as most of you know, a total computer geek! He spends a lot of time on the phone walking other people through their computer difficulties. He has a gift for explaining things in a clear, concise way that is easy to understand.


One of the quirky things about David is his viewpoint on sports. He enjoys all of them, especially football but he's never been able to justify sitting down and watching sports for 3 hours. After about an hour he's fidgeting to get up and do something. This picture is from when we were engaged after a BYU football game.

I can't talk about David without mentioning what a great Dad he is. Each time I've told him I was pregnant it makes him very nervous. He worries about supporting our family. But by the time that baby is born he's mad in love and never looks back.


This is one of my favorite pictures of David. It's in the hospital after our daughter Daisy was stillborn. I'll never forget being in that room with him and crying together for the daughter we had to say goodbye too. His presence was such a strength to me and his tears, so seldom seen, were a beautiful tribute to our child.


David graduated from ASU in 2007 with a degree is Civil Engineering. He got a job with Standage & Associates. I don't understand a whole lot of what he does, but sometimes we drive to remote places like this and take pictures of dirt.


David is an extremely dedicated worker. He pours everything he has into what he's working on. He always wants to present himself and the business he works for in the best, professional light. He's truly a team player, not looking for glory or credit but trying to help out as much as he can. He's been like this in every job he's had, from delivery to the Engineering company he works for.

You'll notice that none of these pictures are recent. That's because I have basically no recent pictures of him. For 6 months now David has been working 70-80 hours a week to support our family. 6 months ago David started working a second job at Wal-Mart so that we could pay off debt and build up our food storage. Then there were some salary cuts at work and all of the sudden we are very grateful for our second job which helps us to make ends meet.

I have never heard David complain about his work schedule although he is only getting 5 hours of sleep a night. In fact he's often saying that it's not that hard and that I have the harder job. I feel so blessed to be married to such a wonderful man, who is willing to do whatever it takes to support our family. A righteous priesthood holder who has been my rock through all our trials and continues to be a calming influence in my life. We are truly soul mates and my marriage is the only thing in my life that is never a trial.

David, I love you. You are still my hero.

Where's Granna?

For those of you who aren't LDS, let me explain. Twice a year we have something called General Conference where the leaders of our church speak to us from the Conference Center in Salt Lake. During these meetings there is music provided by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, of which my digustingly talented mother-in-law is a member. So each time they sing we play our own version of "Where's Waldo?" Trying to pick Granna out of the 300+ member choir so the kids can say they saw Granna on the TV. Needless to say it is not super easy (especially since the cameramen seem to like the altos better and Wilma is a soprano). This year we were lucky though and saw her several times on both days.