Coaching with Carrots...

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Chester Elton's blog

Back Surgery can teach you a few things about yourself...

About a month ago I was sitting in a meeting at work with two vendors, talking about ways they could could get our budget money for 2009 when I felt that something wasn't quite right with me... internally. My lower back started to throb and I started getting cold sweats. Fortunately, the meeting didn't last too much longer and I was able to sit down and rest at my desk for the rest of the day.

**WARNING. VERY BORING RECAP OF MY BACK ISSUES TO FOLLOW. IF YOU'D RATHER SKIP, PLEASE PROCEED TO THE NEXT SET OF ASTERISKS MARKS**

I'm no stranger to back pain, so I chalked it up to my a long list of back ailments that come and go with me. It hurts for a few days, then it's gone in a week or so afterward. I rested on Thursday night, complaining as usual to Karli that my back did not feel right.

I woke up the next morning and I had a new type of pain/sensation. I could feel the main sciatic nerve all the way up and down my left leg. It didn't hurt when I stood or laid down, but man did it hurt when I sat.

I didn't put too much thought to it, so I got up, read scriptures and went to work as usual. Except this drive to work was not usual at all. The pain shooting up and down my leg was unbearable.... and I continually had to switch positions to make the pain less severe.

It got so bad during the drive in that I did the only feasible thing I could do at that point -- call Devin Orton, my chiropractor in training brother in law and ask him what the heck was going on with me. Hoping to just leave a message in which I whined about the pain alot, he actually picked up and he talked me in to the parking lot at OC Tanner. Telling me that I probably pinched my sciatic nerve, he told me he would send some exercises to help alleviate the pain.

At work the pain got intense, then went away - allowing me to get some important work done that morning and afternoon. I left early in the day to take my girl's soccer team to the BYU vs. William and Mary soccer game and the leg pain flared up on the drive back to Lehi and then again on the way to the BYU game.

Again, I didn't think it was too big of a deal until Saturday morning, when I woke up with a new level of pain unlike I had ever experienced. I could barely get out of bed. I could barely move. Walking especially painful and my left leg and foot were for the most part, numb.

I immediately talked to Dad who told me to relax and then gave me something for the pain. He also set me up with Dr. Bacon, and Orthopedic Surgeon who examined me on Wednesday. He instantly told me I had a big ole herniated disc, gave me a cortisone injection and scheduled an MRI.

The MRI confirmed his conclusion. After a week of no improvement the doctor told me that a herniation as big as mine can only be corrected with surgery.

Ouch. I've never had surgery before, but soon I was sitting at the Central Utah Medical Surgical Center in a cute blue gown, a blue hair net and blue socks -- ready to go under the knife.

The general anesthesia felt wonderful going in... but really sucked when I woke up.

The first thing I vaguely remember is the nurse sternly saying 'Mr Poyfair please quit rolling and thrashing like that!"

The next thing I remember was the pain. Youch. The nurse gave me a healthy dose of Demoral, that made it feel better. Except now I wanted to throw up... bad.

Karli was there every step of the way, talking to me when I was semi-conscious.. helping me to get up and walk when I had to... saying nice things to me when the pain was pretty bad.

I went home that night with a full bottle of Percaset and a big ole bandage on my back.

My recovery since then has been slow and frustrating. I've been moving around more and more, but my impatience to get back and working has been making more and more... uh... frustrated.


** END OF BORING RECAP **

In the past few weeks I've learned some very interesting things about myself.

1. Drugs make me act funny... sometimes in a bad way. Loritab gives me a feeling of being invincible and completely normal when I'm actually woozy and not controlled. During the time between my MRI and surgery, I took a few for the pain and proceeded to work as normal -- conference calls, proposals -- I even went into work one day under the influence. I shouldn't have done that. I was asked by my superiors to refrain from working while in that state.

2. My pain tolerance is a little strange -- I've never had a surgery like this before and I was interested to see how I'd take the pain. For the most part, I've thought I've taken it well. I felt that I could survive just fine without them, until yesterday at Krissy's final fall Soccer game. I decided to not take pain meds that day so that my brain would be alert and crisp and ready to coach. The only problem was that my back really hurt during the game and it made me angrier than normal. Combine that with a referee with a Napoleon complex and the result is me getting ejected from the game with a red card for dissent. Ooops. I shouldn't have gone anywhere near that game without pain meds. I really embarrassed myself.

3. I really like to work -- missing work has been hard for me. I actually can't wait to get back to working condition so I continue working again. I hate, hate, hate being laid up like this.

4. I'm super, super motivated to never have this happen again. I'm excited to start rehab, (Hear that Devin?) lose 25 pounds and strengthen my core muscles. I never, never want this to happen again. It's funny how it took me losing my health to appreciate having good health.

and for those of you who want to see what my surgery may have looked like, have a look...



Wasn't that gross? I was only able to stomach about 25 seconds of it.

Fall Soccer season is over -- As some of you know, I signed on to coach Krissy's U-11, Double AA soccer team this year. This team plays in the Northern Utah County League and gets to travel around the county. We play a fall season and a spring season and it's been a total blast so far.

We started playing about a month ago in a tournament in Riverton. We started out by playing the defending state champions for our age group and got destroyed 10-0. After the game I had to talk 12 sobbing 11 year olds off the ledge. The next day we played another tough team and only lost 3-0. The following day we played another tough team and tie them 0-0.

As we started our fall season we lost to our cross town rivals 3-1, then the girls started to go on a winning tear. It was cool to watch them come together as a team, overcome their fear of scoring and start overpowering each and every team we played. Until yesterday's unfortunate loss, they had won eight games in a row and finished the season 8-2 -- Not bad for a team that didn't play together before this year and had several players who had never played before.

Kristen has been one of the stars on offense. She has an uncanny knack for dribbling down the sidelines and crossing the ball into the middle with relative ease. She's scored several goals and has benefited from finally playing on a team where her skills complement other good players on the team as well.


At the end of each of our games this year, we gave one of the girls a Fuzzy, stuffed, Garrett the Carrot . They were a huge hit with the girls and at Saturday's game I was presented with this T-shirt from the girls. I loved it!

Here's our awesome team.

Here's our awesome team being silly. Notice my red tongue.


Dustin is also playing on a club team this fall. They play six on six on a shorter field, have real referees and real uniforms and a real coach who cares about if they play their position or not. It's been good for the little guy. Right now, the team he plays for it getting beat up on pretty good by some of the other teams, but he seems to enjoy the opportunity to play.
Dustin's left foot helps him dribble into places others just can't defend.

What better thing to do while sitting on the bench than wrestle with the other boys sitting on the bench.
Dustin plays peacefully.

And he's good too.
Katelyn is finishing up her Rec league volleyball season and has also shown constant, steady improvement. She holds her own in this league, contributing many important plays and learning a lot of the fundamentals. I'm proud of her for working so hard to get better at sports - she's doing an absolutely awesome job.
Kate returning a shot.
Here's Kate getting ready to return another serve. Her good friend Annie is behind her.



Dallin went to the Killers concert last night -- his first rock concert ever (If memory serves me correctly, he's been to Ryan Shupe and the Rubberband before). He went with his good friend Reuben Holdaway and his father, Adam Holdaway.

Dallin has been an avid Killers fan since he got his first Ipod. He owns all their CD's, knows all about them (the lead singer is Mormon you know), and even owns a Killers T-shirt that he proudly wears to school.

I wish I could have went with him, but our musical tastes are pretty well aligned and we'll go see other concerts together.

And finally, there's Karli. What an angel she's been to me this past month. She's had to deal with a whiny, complaining husband that's been absolutely no use around the house for the past month. She's been my personal nurse, housekeeper and friend during what has become a very frustrating month for me. She just continues to do what she can to contribute to our family. She is working six hours a day at a pretty challenging job at the school, then has had to come home to take care of the all the workings of our family and also care for her wounded husband.

I married her over 17 years ago because I knew she was much better than me and that I needed that at that time. This equation has changed some over the years, but she remains the strength, the hardest working, strongest willed person I've ever met and I'm so glad I'm married to her.

How about a little self deprecation? Anyone who knows me well understands that I have a problem when it comes to having photos taken of me. I've never met a photographed smile of mine that I've liked.

A few weeks ago I told Karli to take some pictures of me coaching the my girls soccer team. She took five photos, and this is what she came up with.


1. I call this one 'Happy old man.' The glasses, the clapping.

2. I call this one 'The Happy Sneeze.'


3. This is me clapping again. In this one I'm not a crazy cackling lunatic.


4. This is me thinking real hard. With my eyes closed.



5. And the grand prize goes to this one. Eyes closed, nose shriveled, tongue sticking out. It's hard to have all of that going for you in one shot.

Summer Critters, Boating, First day of school

Critter Country: I noticed that we had a lot of leftover pictures of the kids showing off the critter they caught. You'd think the animals in Oregon would have learned by now that Dallin and Dustin come every summer to find them, catch them and sometimes even eat them.

Luckily there were no snakes this year.

Here's a few pictures for your blog reading enjoyment.

This is Dustin's frog. He actually caught several more -- 5 total -- before his frog-catching experience came to an end. He was very upset that we wouldn't let him keep them as pets.

Some people are deathly afraid of even touching a fish, let alone holding one. Not Dustin. He pulled that bad boy out of the water and was holding it in no time.


Here's Dallin showing off one of his crayfish he caught. That little guy was mad, too.

What's the use of catching crayfish if you can't eat them? Here we have Dakota, Dallin and Uncle Dylan getting ready to dig in to the feast! Word on the street is that they taste like chicken.


When we stopped in Vancouver, Washington we visited Grandpa Ken and his amazing ginormous kitty named 'Chloe.'

Chloe has a weight problem. My kids fell in love with this silly cat.

Chloe really didn't like all the attention. He's Grandpa Ken calming her down so Krissy can get her picture with her.

Just in case you didn't figure it out.

The coast brought the critter catching experience to a whole new level. Dustin needed a bucket for all his treasures taken from the coast near Fort Stevens.

Alyssa and Chelsea joined in the fun.

Brandon even managed to dig up a live crab. Tammy said that this picture presents a wonderful juxtaposition -- A crab holding a crab...

(rimshot)

Katelyn found the first 'whole' sand dollar.

While Dallin branched out to find a live shrimp.

and not to be outdone, I too found a full sand dollar. Go me.

Goodbye Glasses, Hello contacts

Kate came back from girls camp looking like this. Notice the bent nature of the rims? Apparently someone 'accidently' stepped on them. So, we finally acquiesced and let her get....

Contacts!

I wish I could get contacts. Sheesh.

Hitting the lake one last time --

Grandma and Grandpa Craner were kind enough to take the kids boating before school started.

A good time was had by all.


First Day of School, 2009 --

Here's Dustin sporting the "Can this be over yet?" look. Dustin is a big second grader this year.

Krissy is always good for a pretty smile. She started the 5th grade A.L.L. (Accelerated Learning Lab) program. She now goes to Highland Elementary with all the other smart kids.

Proof that these two can occupy a common space without fighting.

Katelyn started 7th grade Middle School at Timberline. Dallin calls her a 'Sevvie' - short for 'Seventh Grader.' She tells me she's having a blast.

And here's our big man on campus. 9th grader. Freshman. Lead bass player for Jazz band. Enough Aeropostale t-shirts to clothe the entire school.

But he still hasn't learned that if he gives me a silly smile that it will show up on the blog.

Maybe one day he'll learn.

There you go. Enjoy!

Pat's two-month catch up post!

The summer is almost over. Can you believe that? Gah.

Well, I told you that I took a vacation and even posted a way cool picture of me below, (It's not everyday you can read a Readers Digest while sitting in a folding chair with your feet propped up on a rock in the middle of a relatively warm river in the Eastern Oregon Mountains) I have yet to give you the pictures and story to accompany it.

In my last post I discussed how Dustin managed to fly his way up to Oregon for a much needed and deserved vacation with Grandma and Grandpa Orton for three weeks before we showed up to crash his party.

Well this post takes up the story the party gets crashed.

The Orton Family Reunion/July 4th --

We showed up at the Orton Family Reunion to find our Dustin doing what he does best -- hanging out with his buddy and cousin Klora Thueson. I told Dustin to put his arm around her and this was the best I got.

The reunion is held at the 4-H center in LaGrande Oregon every other year. It's a fabulous place with lots of trees, open grass and in this case -- cousins. Here we have Dustin showing Kyle Thueson and Noah Orton how to be Cowboy/Superheros adept at foam sword play.

The is Kelsie Acor held by her Mom, Angie Acor. Out of all the pictures I took of this cute little baby, this is the only one in which she's kinda smiling. We'll hear more from her later.

This is Krista Thueson. I'm not sure a little girl could get any cuter than her. I need to work on her being a fan of Uncle Pat. We're not quite there yet.

The Reunion was great -- low key, lazy and a lot of fun. I've always enjoyed hanging out with the Ortons, they're such warm, affable people that it's hard not to just sit around and talk shop with them.

Tubin/Relaxin on the Grande Ronde River --

Since my time in LaGrande was short, Wayne and Janie (i.e. Mom and Dad) arranged for everyone to do my favorite activity -- tubing the Grande Ronde River. I had done it once before and had a blast many years ago.

Well, five minutes into the float, I realized that my tube had a big leak in it. So, I bid the main body of tubers adieu and got a ride to the finish line where I got a camp chair and soaked myself in the warm, lazy river. It didn't take long before my two awesome neices -- Cassidy and Kadyn Acor found me and took up residence in my chair.


This is Noah Orton getting some tubing action. He stayed there for at least 10 minutes -- no small feat for this little guy.

Dustin also managed to hang out on my lap in the middle of the river. It wasn't too long after this that he was off catching frogs. (Stay tuned for a special blog post -- August Critters -- which will chronicle all the strange creatures we caught during our vacation)

Fun Day at the Lay Homestead


The next day we visited the Lay Family Homestead - which is the place where Karli's Great Grandparents move and settled many years ago. It's a beautiful area complete with a campsite, creek and lots of critters to hunt and play with.

We had a great day, it was very relaxing and calm.

Moving West --

It wasn't long before we started on the second leg of our trip. Here we have the kids in front on Multnomah Falls.

We even took the ten minute hike up to the bridge for a better view. See us waving? It wasn't long before we were at Ken and Joanne Smith's home to visit and plan our next excursion to the Oregon Zoo. I haven't been to the Oregon Zoo for years and it was amazing to see how much it had changed. First off they added a cool new exhibit. Secondly, they now make sure that you (as a human being) feel totally stupid and responsible for the sad state of affairs currently taking place in the animal kingdom. That part really turned me off....

Here is Dustin and Kristen fighting over an interactive display at the zoo. As you can see, Dustin won this round.

Here is my beautiful wife, Karli. Can you believe we've been married for 17 years this Friday (August 21st)? She's my amazing friend and I can't imagine life without her. Love ya Babe.

And this is what she married -- a big fat guy who makes funny faces. If you look real hard you can see the gum in my mouth. Sharing in the frivolity is Joanne. We had a blast with them.


Isn't Krissy pretty?

Here's a picture of Dad/Ken Smith with Dallin. And yes, Dallin is taller. He'll be caught up to me soon. Darn him.

Here's my beautiful bride again, being the silly, happy girl I married.

More zoo shots. I think they're all looking at sheep here. Since when are sheep exotic zoo animals?

On our way home from the zoo we stopped in to see Bucky and his wife Chrissy and their two boys. Here's their oldest - Zachary.

Before we left for the coast we stopped by my Mother's grave and I shared some sweet moments talking with the kids about the grandma they never got to know in this world. I love this photo.

The Oregon Coast - Fort Stevens --


Our next stop was Fort Stevens, Oregon. Here we are trying not to shiver on an early low tide morning.

We managed to catch up with the Halcrow family (who had brought Anne Marie Darrington). On this morning, finding shells was the number one priority.

Dustin, Chelsea and Alyssa have a bucket. They're good to go.
The shells were elusive... but this group managed to find a few.

Kate and Maddie -- what a pose.
This just in -- The wreck of the Peter Iredale is still there. Here's Dustin standing in front of the proof.

Pretty soon Mom and Dad and Great Grandma Craner showed up to join the fun.

By the end of our beachcombing excursion we'd picked the place dry of sand dollars and any other shells we could find -- whole or not.

The Oregon Coast -- Cannon Beach

We moved from Fort Stevens to my all-time favorite beach -- Cannon Beach. Before we went to the sand, we managed to hit the salt water taffy shops. Here is a picture of the kids eating their self-purchased candy. Except for Dallin. He's texting instead.

Oh OK... now we have his attention.


The Halcrow family in front of Haystack Rock.

Kristen managed to get wet on her first foray into the surf -- even though she had express orders to not get her pants wet. Of course, Karli had to remind me of all the times I went to the beach and got completely wet and so that made this ok.
I love this picture of Tammy and Christopher. I'd frame it if I was her.

Here's Dustin, embarking on the alltime favorite male pastime of digging a hole.

Proof that Brandon got wet.
Yes, they're getting wetter. And the day was NOT warm. Of course, that didn't matter.
Allysa had a great time.
Dallin managed to get completely soaked. Here he is shivering in the cold but looking quite debonair. I mean, does this picture make him look hot or what. It's a good thing I gave him all his handsome genes -- huh Dallin?

Mom, Dad and the Dog. In that order. Unless you forget the rock behind them. We loved spending time with them -- even the next day when we woke up to a typical torrential downpour and they helped us pack up our tent and get us the heck out of there.

I left on Monday morning to go back to work, but the family drove back to Oregon for even more fun.

Kristen celebrated her 10th birthday when she got back. She got this awesome soccer ball for our upcoming soccer season (more on that in later posts).


Dallin was able to play in Grandpa's band. I love this picture.

Of course, he was also required to play the washbasin bass as well. Sources tell me that he actually got quite good at it.
Here's Kadyn, Cassidy and Krissy showing off their support of the High School Musical Franchise. It's nice that our hard earned dollars are going to support such a noble cause.

The family took a trip to swim in Catherine Creek and had a blast ... for the most part. Here's a picture of Dustin sitting in time out in the middle of the river.

Kate was also able to make this beautiful dress with Grandma. Isn't she cute?


Kristen also got this birthday dress. Even though she's way cute in this picture, It's hard to see all that corn behind her and know that I won't get any of it this year. Sigh. Maybe next year. And here are my amazing inlaws. I'm so thankful to be a part of their family and to have them play such amazing roles in my kid's lives.

Which brings us to the last photo of Kelsie Acor. This silly girl smiled like crazy until a camera was put in front of her. Then she turned solemn. Like this shot, which came at the tail end of a lengthy photo shoot orchestrated by Karli and her sister Angie. Can't you just hear Keslie saying 'I'm about done here." ? I know I can.

So, there is my catchup. I'm now going to bed.

I'm back from Vacation....

And here's the proof that I relaxed. Karli and the kids are still relaxin...

Dallin's new hair, There's only one Lagoon and man do I love a parade

A couple of weeks ago we decided to honor Dustin's largest wish of the year - to go to Grandma and Grandpa Orton's house without us. You see, Dustin is a cowboy and loves EVERYTHING about their farm in LaGrande, Oregon.

This place has horses, goats, donkeys, mules, rabbits, dogs, snakes, raccoons, and cats. Keep in mind that none of these things reside at our palatial estate in Lehi.

This year we threw Dustin a curve ball. We told him he could go, but he had to fly there by himself. We thought this would cause him some trepidation. Man, were we wrong. Karli expected to see crocodile tears from the little guy, but when they told him it was time to board he looked Karli squarely in the eye and said "I gotta go now Mom," and happily walked on the plane all by himself.

Apparently he did fine on the flight -- Julie Thueson, who picked him up, said that he deplaned with no problem, went up to his aunt and told her that he needed to fetch his checked bag.

Huh. This kid is good. It did make us feel a little better to find out that he missed us for a few days at least.

Dallin Poyfair - Teen Tennis phenom -- About two years ago Darrin and Clarissa got our whole family playing tennis... even Kristen and Dallin. Since this time all of us except Dallin has slackened in our tennis playing consistency. Dallin just keeps getting better and better.

Last year he played for the middle school and did quite well. This summer we signed Dallin up for a intense camp put on by Lehi High School. The captain of the tennis team is an old family neighbor who used to babysit Dallin and has taken a liking to Dallin, even though he'll only be a Freshman this year. Dallin has also caught the eye of the coach. He's still a little rough around the edges and could work on his quickness and serves -- but he's pretty darn good.

Maybe it's time to introduce him to Uncle Doug for some more 'seasoning.'

Sometimes, you want to be blonde. Sometimes you do something about it. If you're Dallin, you take matters into your own hands.

Equipped with a $10 bottle of hair bleach, a friend who also wanted bleached hair and 'permission' from his parents, Dallin embarked on a venture of epic proportion. There's nothing like swapping sandy brown hair for sandy red hair no matter which way you cut it - at least that's what he keeps telling us. And apparently the chicks love it. Bonus.

OC Tanner Lagoon Day -- Once a year you are subjected to pictures of our family at Lagoon. Well, this year is no different! I find that Lagoon is a great park when taken in extremely small doses. When the kids were smaller they loved the place. Since then we've introduced them to the wonders of Disneyland, Disneyworld, Magic Mountain, Universal Studies Hollywood and Orlando and Knotts Berry Farm.

But they still get so excited to go to silly Lagoon. Thank goodness Uncle Obert (OC Tanner) sees fit to send us there once a year for free and then pay for my day off to boot. It's a nice little perk.

So this year we finally allowed Dallin and Katelyn (and their friend Oakley) go off by themselves.

Here's a picture of them on the craziest ride I've ever seen -- the Samurai. Apparently 'Samurai' means 'spin kids around upside down until the barf' in Japanese.

Katelyn was too small to sit on the outside. Maybe someday, Kate.

Karli and I had a great time hanging out with Krissy. Yes, I am as happy as the picture illustrates.
And here are our three Lagoon crazies...

Aren't they cute?

I've decided to coach Krissy's Double A, U-11 soccer team. We're called the Arsenal Strikers. It's a club team, so parents are pretty into it and demand that their girls work hard. I love that.

I'm having a blast doing it, reliving my soccer playing glory days while combining it with my love for working and teaching youth. I'll keep you updated as our season progresses.

Kate the flutist -- When we lived in Arizona, Katelyn decided to play the flute in her school band. When we moved back to Utah she had to drop it because the Alpine School District didn't have that as part of the curriculum for her grade.

Now that she's entering middle school this year, she's picked it back up and spent the past three weeks at a pre-middle school band camp. Her previous flute experience put her way ahead of everyone else and I think she liked being the best one in the class. It all culminated in a cool concert last Friday at Timberline Middle School in which she played two songs very well.

The girls got an amazing opportunity to dance their hearts out in the Lehi Days Parade last Saturday. The only problem is they didn't really dance... unless you call walking and drinking water dancing. They sure were cute anyway...


Last week Dallin went with the scouts on a float trip down the Colorado River for three days - from Thursday until Saturday. He had many adventures during his sojourn (including 'almost dying' 5-6 times -- his words, not mine) and learned alot of water safety and the importance of applying sunblock several times a day.

When he returned home on Saturday he was amazed to see that all the top songs, albums and videos on Itunes were for Michael Jackson.

"This is really weird, Dad. I think Itune must be broken or something. Everything on here is about Michael Jackson."

So we got to break the now quite old news to him that Michael Jackson had died two days earlier. To Dallin's credit, he recognized that the world had lost a truly great musical artist. In fact, Dallin got to play 'Thriller' in his first Jazz Band concert of last year.

MJ part two -- Michael Jackson may have been a sad, confused freak of a person but there was no denying his talent. About two months ago we bought his greatest hits for fun and have been enjoying them with the kids. That guy could sing. And dance.

I think that Karli is finally getting better -- After close to two months of pneumonia, flu, coughing, aching, stuffy head, fevers, chills and overall nastiness, Karli is starting to get back to normal. Finally. I've missed having the healthy Karli around. It's hard to be lazy when she's sick all the time. Sheesh.

If you haven't already, go to www.pandora.com right now and register. It's quite possibly the coolest website out there. The gist is that you get to create 'radio stations' based on your specific musical tastes. It's very addicting... especially given that you can have it work on your iphone and now blackberry.

Anyone who knows me knows that I thrive on recognition of my great work. And while this might sound super corny -- if you like my silly blog writing, let me know. I'm pretty sure that if you do so, then you might see more frequent posts.

Just sayin....

Sick and injured Poyfairs. Read all about it here.

Whether you like it or not you're getting another excuse for why the blog postings have trickled to a monthly event. I mean, there for a while I was a blogging fool... now you're lucky to get a picture or two and some trite headline that perks your attention... right? Well, I hate to blame it on our Mac again... but I'm going to. About three months ago our hard drive crashed... again. Last time, we preserved all of our pictures. This time... not so much. So, we had to get it diagnosed, fixed and I've spent the last while updating the system to where it's just about back to where it should be... without the pictures, of course.

:(

So, if anyone knows of someone who can retrieve burned up data on a hard drive, let me know.

In the meantime, we're back up and running... blogs should resume.... maybe....

Converting to the Poyfairs to Trekker status: I took the boys to see the new Star Trek movie, they loved it -- but I realized that I'd shirked my Fatherly duties of turning all children that bear my name into big Trek nerds like me. I'd done ok on Star Wars and Lord of the Rings... so the neglect of Star Trek! How could I?

So, a week ago I forced everyone to watch 'The Wrath of Khan' and last night we watched 'The Voyage Home.' The movies were recieved with mixed reviews... Dustin and Krissy liked everything except for the scary bug in Wrath of Khan and have rewarded me with nightmares ever since.

But Dustin now owns a Spock glass he purchased from Burger King. He is also saving his pennies to buy a Captain Kirk (he calls him Jim). So.. we're getting a little progress.

Cooking KK:

Katelyn continues to amaze us with her cooking abilities. Here she made a cake that has a marshmallow type frosting for her friend.

Katelyn also updated her blog ... read it here....

www.kkpoyfair.blogspot.com

Kate, Krissy Dancers: It was recital time last week for the two dancers in our family.


Here's Krissy striking a pose.


Here's KK having fun with the other ballerinas.

Sick Karli: About the same time as the recital, Karli, who had already spent a week with what we were all sure was swine flu, started coughing.


and coughing. and coughing.

Since Karli thinks that doctors have much better things to do than see if she's sick, she resisted going. Then a week ago she started coughing real bad. So bad that she didn't go to Church. Karli never misses Church. Later that night, Brother Rockwood and I gave her a blessing, then I drug her into a doctors office -- kicking and screaming -- on Monday morning.

The doctor checked her lungs and said... 'You've got Pneumonia. In fact, if you wouldn't have come in today, we'd probably have to admit you to the hospital.' He then gave her an antibiotic shot, a prescription for more antibiotics and told her to get some rest.

So Karli has been attempting rest... she did stay home most of last week. She's also developed this cool new trick of hacking up the most grosteque loogies I've ever seen. Yuk.

And she's getting better. Slowly....

Dustin Poyfair, Soccer player: Dust-man has started up Lehi Rec-league soccer and he's having a great time. In three games so far he's scored four goals and has discovered he's a pretty good ball handler.


He was also invited to play for a club team in the fall made up of kids in the area. He's excited for that.


But you should have seen the other guy... The most exciting part of our past week has been Krissy's cool black eye. On Wednesday, she tried out for Lehi's AAA soccer team for her age group. There was close to 100 girls there for the first try out and they only called 14 back to compete for two spots. Kristen was one of those to get a call back.

So she worked hard to get noticed. So hard that during a sprint drill she ran right into another little girl's head with her eye. She went to the sideline for a few minutes but got right back into the action, doing everything she could to make the team.

Well, unfortunately, she didn't make the AAA team, but will start for the AA team, which is still pretty good.

When we brought her home Thursday night, she looked like this...

Of course she didn't like this at all. I told her to wait until the morning....

and sure enough, he had quite the shiner developing. She went to school anyway.


On Friday morning she was at least able to open her eye again.

And on Saturday Morning she was ready to play soccer again.

Which she did wonderfully, scoring two goals and while matching her uniform to her eye coloration.

Here's the latest, taken just moments ago. The swelling is gone, but the purple is still there....



Gretchen, Tasha, Eric, Tracey -- Friday night we had an awesome visit from Tasha, Gretchen, Eric and Gretchen's friend Tracey. For those of you who might not know, Tasha and Eric are all engaged and stuff.. they'll be getting married in Salt Lake in December.

It's always a blast to have them there. Especially when they make me crepes! With Nutella!


So there you have it! Feel free to post a comment!