Pamela Hunter

What a wonderful weekend this has been. Very busy, very hectic and a bit confusing but it has been fun. I'm going to have to tell several stories and they will all tie in at the end. Story number one. This picture on the left is of Pamela Hunter. Their family moved into our ward from American Fork when I was about ten years old (just guessing there) and Lester and I became pretty good friends with Pam and her sister Christine. I was a bit of a nerd in school and Pam was one of the few people who was actually nice to me. A few people were mean but most just ignored me. Pam was actually nice. Her dad was my band teacher and he really scared me. Pam confirmed to me that he actually was in the military. I always figured he was. I remember one time Wayne Wheeler (the drummer) ticked Mr Hunter off so he told him to leave. Wayne wouldn't go so Mr Hunter stormed to the back of the room, picked Wayne up and physically threw him out into the hallway. It was quite funny but I can tell you that room was very quiet after that. Mr Hunter made our marching band the best band in Canada. We were good, I wasn't good but the band was. Pam played the Oboe and I loved it. That is why when they asked for volunteers to play the Oboe in Kira's band I encouraged her to go for it. There you go Kira, you can thank Pam for your Oboe. When I went on my mission Pam threw me a going away party. I was thrilled. She was dating some guy named Dan Court when I left and while I was on my mission she married him. I never heard anything about Pam after that day in August 1976 until a few months ago when she found Lester on Face book and he gave her my email address. Since then we've emailed a couple of times and on this trip we went and visited the Courts.

Now for story number two. Before my mission I did a year at BYU but when I came home it was late in August and Mom had registered me for the University of Alberta. The dollar was low and she wanted me closer to home. I, of course, hadn't done anything about BYU so I was home for a couple of days and then off to Edmonton. I lived with my brother Greg for that first year and attended Edmonton fifth ward. In the ward they had a fairly large Young Adult group that I hung out with.

------------------------------------------------------------ Edmonton 5th Ward Young Adult Group
back row left to right - Roseanne Anderson, Dave Butler, Barb Hodges, Lester Leavitt, ?,
Renee Shapcott, Wilf Gotzman
middle row - Bill Shapcott, ?, ?, Glenn Fern, Fred Leavitt
front row - Donna O'Soup, Gaylene Cooper, David Gander, Wendy Wallbank, Rob McGaskell, Lisa Shaw, Linda, Greg Rolls
The picture was taken by Carol Labonte and she is the one who remembers most of the names not me. Since Carol took the picture I guess that would explain why she isn't in the picture. Click on her name for a link to more about Carol

-------------------------------------------------------------

I soon became friends with Dave Gander and we decided to room together. Lisa and Gaylene were good friends and because they were in Greg's ward they knew I was coming home. The plan was to try and hook me up with Gaylene but as things turned out Gaylene ended marrying my room mate, Dave and I ended up marrying Lisa. It was a pretty good arrangement I think. Gaylene's mom was Lisa's young womans adviser so we were pretty good friends with the family. After we married we stayed in the ward and so we kept in touch. Gaylene had a little sister named Loretta. Loretta ended up getting pregnant not long after Lisa got pregnant. She was only sixteen and still in school so Lisa took her under her arm and they went through their pregnancies together. Kira was born in September and Loretta's little girl was born shortly after. Lisa was in the delivery room with her. Loretta had the courage to give her little girl to a family who disparately wanted a baby and Lisa consoled her through the whole process.

Story number 3. When I was seven years old we moved off the farm into Cardston. Our next door neighbors were the Olsen's. Nan Olsen was a widow and raising her four girls and one boy. Oldest to youngest the Olsen's were Laura, Dena, Jessie, Diane and Susan. We had a sort of love-hate relationship. We really were good friends but we had a huge tree that went over the Olsen's yard and we had a pretty white fence between the yards. I loved to climb the tree and hang above their yard and I loved to walk on the fence. Nan, of course, hated it when I would do that and so being a boy I would only do it more to irritate her. I believe I was quite successful. In spite of that, Lester and I were good friends with Diane (my age) and Susan (Lesters age). We would walk to mutual together and all of that. I remember one time Susan was eating a sandwich and I begged a bite off of her. It was honey and it was the best I had ever tasted. It was years later before I figured out that the reason it was so delicious is that it was made with butter and our family always used margarine. Isn't it funny the things you remember?

A few years after Loretta's baby was born we learned that Laura and her husband Wilf had adopted her. By this time we were living in Rosemary and so we made arrangements to drive into Calgary and visit them. It was quite a special experience to see little Amber.

Many years later Loretta called up Lisa. Amber was older now and had made contact with her birth mother. Loretta wanted to share the experience with Lisa. Not long after that Loretta called Lisa and told her that Amber was getting married. She didn't want to go alone so Lisa met up with her in Las Vegas and they drove to the Bountiful temple. Lisa was Loretta's eyes and ears in the temple. It was another special experience.

Ok, now with those stories told I'll tell you about my weekend. Lisa, Alycia and I loaded up her stuff and headed to Utah so she could start at the University of Utah. After much stress we finally got her an apartment last week. Nothing like the last minute. We arrived late Thursday and stayed with the Sanchez's. Molly and Mahonri Sanchez lived in our ward here in San Diego and moved to Utah just last week. They were still living out of boxes but welcomed us anyway. They live in Cedar Hills. Friday we toured the campus (mostly for my benefit since Lisa and Alycia toured it last year) and took care of some things at the U and also got Alycia signed up for an institute class. What a beautiful building. We also found out that Alycia's apartment wouldn't be ready until the end of the next week (that would be this week). Now it was panic time. I suggested she live in the park but no one thought that was funny. Sanchez's would be glad to have her but that would be a 51 minute drive. We thought of the Alsup's in Ogden but that would be even further. The Welch's are also too far out. Pam had invited her to stay with them and that would only be a 39 minute drive. We graciously accepted Pams invitation because they were the closest. Our first thought was of course Aunt Nola but we had talked to her earlier and learned that her grandsons family was living with them. We were just grateful that even though none of the options were ideal we knew that we had many friends and that Alycia wouldn't be sleeping on the park bench. In the end Aunt Nola was able to put Alycia up in Uncle Merlin's den and her commute is a mere 14 minutes. Thanks Pam for your offer and I apologize for making you clean the room.

Friday was Laurel Sanchez's eleventh birthday. We celebrated with hot cinnamon buns. It was funny because they were so hot that they melted the candles. Do you notice how the candles are starting to tip over. By the time we finished "happy birthday" some of them were laying down. After a relaxed morning we ran into Provo to pick some stuff up from Alycia's old room mate. Since we were there we did some shopping and then headed into Salt Lake. We decided to go to Pam's first. It was so good to see her after 32 years. It was also amazing what a small world this is. Pam and Dan were very good friends with Dave and Gaylene. We had a great time coming up to speed on them. We also learned that that Wilf and Laura were good friends of theirs and we were surprised to learn that they lived close by. In fact Wilf was Dan's best man at their wedding. I told them that Dave was my best man. Pam's daughter was having a baby shower that night so we made plans to come by after and meet everyone. Best of all, Amber was going to be there with her brand new baby. We then headed off to see Aunt Nola. She had invited us to come by and we wanted to see her. We had a good visit with Aunt Nola and then we talked her into coming to dinner with us. There was a missionary who served in our ward and his family owned a restaurant in Salt Lake. The Sanchez's also met us there. We had such a good time visiting that we were way late getting to Pams and we missed everyone. They then told us Amber's baby was getting blessed in church the next morning so we made plans to go to their meeting.

Saturday was a late day all day long. We got up late, we went to Provo late, we got to Pam and Dan's late, we were late getting to Aunt Nola's, we got to the restaurant late (but Mahonri and Molly were late too so that was OK, and we got back to the Courts late. It was a day of lates but every visit was wonderful. It took some fancy arranging but we were able to go to Amber's baby's blessing on Sunday morning. It meant that I had to get up early (after a very late night) and we would get to San Diego late but it was worth it. What was even better was that the Olsen's had all been down to Utah for a reunion and so most of their family was at the baby blessing. It had been 32 years since I saw Pam but it had been almost as long since I saw the Olsen's.

The blessing was a beautiful blessing and then we went over to Amber's house for a get together. I took pictures of a lot of people but I know I missed some and please forgive me but I have also forgotten most of the names. Feel free to send me the missing names and I will gladly update the posting.

--------------------------------------------------- Laura and Wilf
-----------------------------------------

Amber and Lisa
---------------------------------------------

Amber with her husband and daughter Yazzi and son Taten
----------------------------------

Amber's daughter Yazzi
---------------------------------------------

Amber's son Taten
-------------------------------------

Dena (formerly Olsen)
-------------------------------------

Jessie and Lori Olsen
Lori's maiden name was May and she went to school with Me and Pam and Diane. We were all in the same grade.
-----------------------------------
Pam, Laura's twin daughter, Yazzi
-----------------------------------------------

Dena's daughter and Laura's other twin daughter. A few years after Amber was adopted Wilf and Laura were blessed with twin girls.
-----------------------------------------Jessie's son, Jessie's grandson and Jessie Olsen
---------------------------------