I have so much to say,
but all of it is “old news!”
Father’s Day came and Chelsea, Jeff, Brook, Brielle, Aaron,
and Katie were all here to help celebrate the day with Mark. Without getting too sappy, he is an
incredible father! One story to share
about Mark and his choice to be not just a good Dad—but, a great Dad!
When Mark was in
medical school, he had the desire to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. For me, I knew what this meant—LONG lonely
hours—with me tending to the children.
He began his internship/residency in surgery and I was prepared for the
lifestyle ahead of us, and our family—and ever ready to support him in whatever
career choices he made. Upon his 3rd
rotation in his surgery internship, which happened to be neurosurgery, he was
pulling extremely LONG hours. To help
you understand, he would leave between 4-5AM and return home somewhere between
midnight-2AM, AND taking call every third night—and when he was on-call he had
to stay at the hospital—being up all night.
L.O.N.G…hours! I believe it was
around week 3 of this 6-week rotation, he began to look like a walking
corpse. He also began to question if
this was the right career path for him and for our family.
One night, Mark came
home late—somewhere between 1-2 AM. He
did not come to bed right away. Out of
concern, I hoisted myself out of bed to find out what he was doing. As I walked down the hall, I found him in our
kids bedroom—sitting on Aaron’s bed holding him in his arms and simply staring
at him. After holding Aaron, he went
over and held Chelsea and then looked at me and said, “I can’t miss them
growing up.” He finished his internship
in surgery only to turn around and do another internship in internal medicine
and went on to be trained in interventional cardiology. Bottom line, he gave up his dream of being a
heart surgeon in order to keep his hand on the pulse of our family.
Many of you who read
this might not understand the sacrifice he made in order to be there for me,
for our children, and for the many important events in our children’s
lives. But, I know and our children know
and I am ever grateful for the man and father he is.
Anniversary—we celebrated our 31st wedding
anniversary. 31 years and still going strong!
Is he perfect? No…but, neither am
I! However, he is perfect for me!
Wedding—Rachel married Richard and it was simply a
beautiful day! From the temple, to the
luncheon, and then on to the reception—everything was perfect!! I put some pics up on FB—but, I will attach a
few to the blog. It was truly a
wonderful day… and… Zach was there with us in spirit and for that I have a
heart full of gratitude and joy!
Some of the highlights:
Pictures after the
sealing at the temple: HOT!!!! Our photographer, Tiffany was a trooper
corralling the crowd!
Lunch at the Gun
Barrell: Yummy and some special friends
from NC came out for the reception—Rich, Linda, & Josh Pandullo—what a
treat to have them come!
Reception: Picture perfect thanks to Laura who set up
and decorated everything beautifully with the added touch of little bunny
pictures everywhere. Rachel wanted
magical and I wanted happy—we got both! Kathy
did the flowers and again—every arrangement simply gorgeous! Robynn catered the event and EVERYTHING was
delicious!!! We even had some wedding
crashers come & stealing food. My
brother-in-law-Jamie, sister-Pam, and niece-Lindsay made the cake and it was
beautiful! They even put little lights
on the cake to make it sparkle. The
DJ—made the party F.U.N! The
Daddy/daughter dance—a tear-jerker as we all watched Rachel and Mark
dance. The mother/son dance—Aaron kept
twirling me to make my dress fly up and he could not stop laughing as I am
trying to hold down my dress all the while he is trying to embarrass me—I love
him anyway.
I am so grateful to ALL
who came and enjoyed in celebrating Rachel and Richard’s wedding day—bottom
line…it was “freaking awesome!”
On climbing
mountains: FOUR times…I have climbed Observation Point
FOUR times. Once in April with my sweet friend
Julie. Memorial Day with Mark. Our anniversary with Mark, Katie, &
Aaron. And, then again, with our good
friends Rich, Linda, & Josh.
Climbing up—for me…it is so hard!!!!
On our anniversary, Mark kept asking me, “why are we stopping so much?” To which I replied, “you are going so much
faster than we did last time.” And then
he retorted, “No, we are not!” When we
got to the top, Aaron asks, “So Dad, how long did it take us to get up here?” Mark replies, “well, we are a lot slower than
the last time we came up—but it took us 2 hours.” With fire in my eyes, “You DID go faster, as
the last time it took us 2 ½ hours!!!!”
Mark, “Aren’t you glad I am such a great coach?!”
Hillary Weeks sings it perfectly!
No comments:
Post a Comment