The fire in Centerville Utah.

I want to start writing on this blog and I hope to have a lot of incredible people want to join. We come from a very large family. If they all help we may learn things we didn't know before. So I am going to start this blog again. I don't think anyone has written on it since our dear father passed away a year and 1/2 ago. I know I am far from perfect, so I have decided I need to change. This blog is going to be something I hope to write in often. I want to make this blog about both of my wonderful parents who raised all of their wonderful children to be members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. We are all striving to be the best we can be. All 17 of us. We all have children of our own now. Some of us are getting older so it is time for our memories to be written down so we don't forget more than we have forgotten, for our children and grandchildren to get to know their grandparents a little bit better.

I'm going to start by telling you about an experience that 10 of us as the Hair children were a part of. My parents had gone to irrigate the Croft farm. They said they would be back in a couple of hours. Croft farm was a large area where alfalfa and corn was grown. My older brother Mike was left in charge. Everyone was a sleep except Mike and I. David and Tom were down at out neighbors the Whickers spending the night. So their were just 8 of the children. Mike and I would go to our big picture window in the frontroom and watch the cars. Even though it was dark Mike could tell what make the car was and whether it was Mom and Dad. It was fun to hear him tell me what each car was. After watching the cars for awhile we decided to go make french fries. We got out the big pot and put grease in it. Then we decided to start peeling potatoes and cutting them into french fries. When we had enough we decided to pour them in the hot grease we had poured into the pan and heated. I thought we did an amazing job! When we had cooked enough. We put some ketchup on our plate and headed to Mikes room. It was upstairs. We went to his room to watch some TV on a little black  white TV. We were quite enjoying ourselves eating our french fries and watching TV We had only been there what seemed like a short time, when a knock came at the front door. We were a little frightened because it was late. The knock got louder and louder suddenly a man burst into the door yelling your house is on fire get everyone out. Mike ran to the room and garbed the twins Dan and Diane, It was a cold evening and they couldn't understand why they were being taken outside especially when they were both in their underwear. So they kept running back into the house. They were finally put in a police car. Mike ran in the house and put the two littlest children under each arm I helped and got the other children out of the house. Because my parents were away , Michael was taken to help find them. A wonderful lady took all of us children to her home. I think she was certainly a ministering angel. She took us to her home bathed us and put us to bed. I was taken in a beautiful room and put in a big bed with Ann Marie and Carol on each side of me. The other children were put in other rooms. Bob, Jeanne, Diane and Daniel. I would just lay and think about everything that happened. I kept dreaming about fire. But the bed I slept in reminded me of my grandmothers big nice bed. It smelt so wonderful and I felt so good. The next morning this wonderful lady made us a big breakfast. About this time my mother walked through the door. She was so happy to see us all. The whole back of the house had been burned. And even though the rest of the house wasn't burned, everything was black.  We could not go back home. The amazing thing to me was that the ward rallied around us. The Madsen's lived up the road from us. It was quit always away, but they offered to let us live in there summer home on there property, until our home could be repaired.  I don't know how long we lived there, but we loved it. I think it was about 3 months. I remember there was a loft we slept in and stairs going up there. I remember a fire place and a kitchen and frontroom. It was so fun for us because it was like living in a little house where we all were together, and so grateful to be so.  Thank you to all the wonderful people from our Centerville ward and the angels that came when we needed them.