Dallas Jr.

Because I don't have enough phone numbers of all of you or enough minutes on my phone to call, I am posting.

Yesterday and today Dallas has been in and out of the emergency room with what was thought to be appendicitis. Well it turned out this evening to be that he has sustained some kind of damage to one of his kidneys in a basketball game and blood flow to that kidney has been interrupted and he is in danger of loosing one of his kidneys. So to remedy this he is scheduled for surgery tomorrow (saturday) afternoon at Logan Regional Hospital to repair teh damage and hopefully save his damaged kidney. It will take them that long to complete any tests they need and get the proper surgeons ready.

You all know the shape Uncle DeLoy is in, so this is just another added stress to him, not to mention La Shar's dance review is scheduled for that same Saturday. It is hard for DeLoy but what we are being asked for now is to participate in a family fast and prayer for Dallas. He is a wonderful boy who is very scared. I got to spend time with him today in the ER and I was very impressed what a great man he has become. He loves his dad and his family very much and he needs the prayers to help keep himself and his dad strong through this.

If you have questions call your parents or Grandma Elder and they can fill you in. We won't know more until Saturday evening after the surgery.

We are Moving!!!

It is for real this time. We have found a home in Millville, 85 West 300 South, and we are exicted. I am mostly excited because there is a nice working kitchen in this home. The owners are very nice and they are moving out early so we can move in on May 15th, which is this upcoming weekend. I am not sure, but I think I may have mentioned before how much I hate moving. In fact if there actually was the kind of Hell that is protraied in the movies mine would be myself packing up the house just to turn around and have to pack it again. I hate it that much. So we are now busting butt to move this next Saturday because the Elder's Quarm found out about it and decided to all be here on Saturday at 9:00 so we will be ready by then no matter what. So to that end we are only partially packed and have run out of boxes. Luckily for some reason about a month ago Scott got this feeling we were going to move (this was before everything started falling apart) and he packed our storage room and basement. So we are left with the actual living areas and that is all. Because we are only moving a few miles away the kids clothes will be placed ever so gently in plastic bags and then deposited in their new rooms. I see no reason to "pack" clothes just to need them the next day. So unfortunately I see this move as kind of hectic and we will just move and dump stuff at the house and then we will spend the next few weeks unpacking and cleaning the house we left. I actually think this one time we will take the Relief Society up on their offer to help clean. Scott is usually adament about doing it ourselves because he said we made the mess so we clean it, but with both of us working it seems to fit that we get help this time.

When I get pictures of teh home I will post them. It turns out the owner of teh home is Brent Hirschi, who I went to high school with and graduated in the same year, GO 1996!!!!

Sunday Lunch

Hey everyone who can hear me......or I guess read me......or....you know what I mean. Please, if you can, come to our Elder Family lunch on Sunday at 1:00 at Denise & Reese's house. Please, please come. We will visit and enjoy each other and have a nice lunch and then we will discuss the Relay for Life.

Meat will be provided, just bring a salad or desert.

Hope to see you all then.

Quick Update.

AMERICAN IDOL:

Adam rocks, need I say more?

HOUSE:

Kitchen demolished Monday, no sick or counter tops while fixing plumbing problem. Our landlord has graciously (jk) let us out of our lease and now we have until the end of May to move. More details as they emerge.

JOB:

Busy, busy, busy. We are now in full swing and the hiring is massive and I am busier than ever. Needless to say since we are not in teh store until May 11 I still have no office and no official place to take care of my sensitive HR files, but I am making due.

FAMILY:

We are all doing well. Scott suffered a 2nd degree sprain of his ankle playing bball with the firefighters, but he miracously recovered overnight. Seriously, he was in the ER and could not walk, next morning all was well. Kids are all well. I am doing fine.

Sorry for the short post. I am still voting for Adam on American Idol though.

Welcome to Wal-Mart

Well I started my new job on Tuesday. Wow, I had no idea there was so much going on at Wal-Mart. So I officially begin "training" on Monday, with only 3 days of official training myself, I am kind of sorry for my first few classes, they are innocent people who have no idea what they are getting into. Initially they told me to expect to have a trainer for myself for a few weeks, I would do some portions of the training and then work on the massive amount of paperwork Wal-Mart has. Seriously there is a lot of paperwork. Because they work with every single government work related program teh paperwork is almost daunting. So yesterday we had a meeting with our regional HR Director (i think that is her title) and she informed me that my co-trainer from the North Logan Store should "phase out" and that she expected me to start training by myself. WHAT???!!! It was all I could do to keep my composure while she was there. She left and then I had to take a break so that the store manager did not see me freak out. I hadn't been through a single training yet, I keep getting pulled out for this meeting or this conference call, so honestly I hadn't finished orientation, but I am expected to do 3 classes next week.

So today and tomorrow is spent trying to calm myself. It will all work out. Worst case sceniorio is that I read from the training manuel word for word and sound like Ben Stein. If that is the worst I can do I am sure I can manage, but it is just daunting.

The schedule we have to hire and train between now and June 11 (I think that is the date) is very aggressive and I will be very very busy.

Have a nice weekend.

Relay for Life

So Josie mentioned putting together a team for this year's Relay for Life. I chatted with her and I totally agree. I hope you all know what the Relay for Life is, but just in case, it is a way to raise money for cancer research. It is a great foundation. In Colville my Uncle David and Tanner Pehl were the DJ's for the relay for that area.

As you know our Uncle DeLoy is fighting cancer right now and is in the end stages. We would like to do this in the name of him and all the others in our family who have fought the disease, Grandma Elder, Aunt Denise Poulsen, Tucker Ricker and DeLoy Elder. We would like to make T-shirts for our team and make it a special family event. We want to include everyone!!!

The date is JULY 9-10. We dont' have to walk all night, but that really is the fun of it. The entry fee is $100 per team, but if we get enough people together it won't be much at all, maybe $10-$15 per family.

I realize some of you don't live in Utah anymore, we are hoping and praying if you know of this far enough in advance you could make arrangements to attend. To be honest I am getting emotional just thinking about it.

So I want to hear from you all. We needs ideas for a team name and what our T-shirts should look like. I would also like to make sure Grandma and Grandpa Elder are there for at least some of it, kind of like an Elder Family Reunion????

Send myself or Josie ideas or suggestions. Love you all :)

What did you do today?

This could be a loaded question. Well last night I got a call from my dad that my Great Great Uncle Richard Pratt had died and my Uncle David, Uncle Bob and Grandma Bunny would be in Utah for 1 day on Monday if we wanted to go to Provo to see them. Well I had actually met my Uncle Richard a few times in my life and I was excited to possible see my Uncle David and Grandma Bunny. WE haven't seen either of them since Tanner's Funeral. So since my dad said they were still in Washington until Monday I called my Uncle Dave's house in Washington to see if we could meet up and low and behold he was already in Utah!!!! Imagine my shock!!1 So i instantly got on the phone and found him at the airport picking up my Grandma Bunny and my Uncle Bob. Unfortunately at that time he was lost and frustrated and could not talk to me. So I found out they were staying at my Great Aunt & Uncle Beverly and Dave Pratt house in Provo, so I looked them up and asked if my family and my sisters could possible come to her house on Sunday to visit our Grandma and Uncle. She was soooo open and welcoming and said "come on down" So we left our house at 9:00 this morning and drove to Provo. It was great!!! We got to see Grandma Bunny and Uncle Dave and some of Aunt Beverly's grandchildren. Our Pratt family is huge and we don't know many of them. If you have a minute look at teh link for my Uncle Richard's Obituariry, he was awesome!!! Not to bore you with family history but my uncle Richard was the son of Benjamin Pratt and Lilly Shink. Benjamin Pratt was the son of Nephi Pratt and Sarah Callister, Nephi Pratt was the son of Parly Pratt and Belinda Marden Pratt. I spent some time looking this up and it was fun. Through Benjamin Pratt my family came to live in Western Washington, Benjamin died in Spokane.

It was a great and wonderful day. My Aunt Beverly said the angels were "taking down" this meeting becuse it was special that such distant relatives got together and we were making Uncle Richard happy by coming together like this.

We got to stay for about 3 hours and then time to take the long ride home. Below are some pictures you may like. I threw in the ones of my Uncle Dave's backside just to show his personality. His son is Tanner, my cousin who was murdered last year. Hope you like them.