Thanks!

Since it's been almost a year since the last post, I figured I'd break the silence. Thanks Kristie for a great summer reunion. It was so much fun and you did a wonderful job coordinating everything. What a great location! And thanks to Matt and Candi (and all the McMullins) for planning and hosting the Christmas party last December. We have a great family!

Save the Day

We are planning on having the X-Mas party this year at our house in Santaquin on December 27th. Currently the plan is to have a form of Open house with brunch being served starting around 9:30. We will send out some more information when we figure out exactly what we are going to do but mark the day and plan on spending some time with us.

Thanks,
--Matt

Just in case

I'm not sure if anyone looks at the blog list on the side, but I have added Sylvia and Paul and Vern and Deb. Sylvia's is private so if you want permission to look at it just send them a email.

Also if you haven't been given permisson to post on this blog just email me and I will invite you.

Love,
Charlyn

More Pineview pictures

Ditto what Matt said....thanks Hiatt's for a great time. We look forward to next year.

Can you top that?

What a great family party we had. A special thanks goes out to all those who helped plan such a great party. I would also like to take a moment to thank Grandpa for making it all happen. We had such a fun time. I wonder what Kristie was thinking about when she did her best Michael Jordan impression above.

The kids sure loved the tube. Kara was so brave out there with them. It was a little rough until I took the bungee cord off the tube.

Once they were finished it was time to get WILD!!!
Check out the cute feet...

and the cute butts...

That one made Landon cry.
Sorry buddy but Candi tried to get revenge for you
I am just about ready to kiss the water.

Thanks Vern and Deb. The place was great. We had soooo much fun.
The kids are already thinking about what we will be doing next year.
With my Love... --Matt, Candi and Kids

A little flashback that I had this morning...

Some of you may know how much I like music. So I relate a lot of my memories to a song. Well on my way to work this morning a song came on my Ipod that caused me to have a little flashback. The song was "Your Wildest Dreams" by the Moody Blues and my memory was of Grandma Hiatt. She drove me to the store in 1986 to buy the cassette tape. I remember sticking it into her converter that allowed you to play it in an 8 track player in the old Bonneville of course. She let me listen to the song over and over.

I then got to thinking about other songs that I have memories about. I remember my mom and Lorraine singing "In the Hollow of My Hand" at some missionary farewells. I also remember my mom listening to Kenny Rodgers and Dolly Parton.

One funny memory of a song... We were listening to the Oak Ridge Boys and Grandpa was in the car and he was telling us to turn it off because it was bad. So we asked him why. He said that he thought that the song was saying "Come on in baby take your clothes off!" but it was really saying "Come on in baby take your coat off" I remember laughing until tears came to my eyes. I still laugh about it to this day.

Hope that you are having a good one and here's to the memories...

--Matt

Becky's wedding

This is Andrea. Kristen and I went to Becky's wedding Saturday. I just wanted to post how beautiful she looked and how pretty everything was. The weather turned out nice and I know Debbie and other family members worked so hard to make it all happen. Congratulations to Becky and Devin! It was fun to see Victoria, Whitney, the Warners, Vernon and Deb, Amber and her cute family, and of course Grant and Debbie (and anyone else I failed to mention). Do you think we should fill Devin in on all of the Hiatt family secrets? He got a good look at everyone at Lake Powell and still decided to join the family. He must be a keeper.

Abigail Rae

Since I didn't get an announcement out to anyone but aunts and uncles I thought I would post the announcement here. We are so excited for our newest addition!! Hope all is well with everyone.

You might be a Hiatt

Hey guys this is Kristie. I don't know if anyone looks at this blog but I wanted to show off our mailbox. It' been wobbling around for months and finally fell off its stand. Burke said he would fix it and I went outside and it was duct taped back on. I think all these years off marriage the Hiatts are finally rubbing off on him.

I hope everyone is doing well. Love ya Kristie

Kennedy's winter fun and baby news!

This picture was taken December 31st up Provo Canyon. From left to right: Julie (Chris and Kara's daughter), Matthew (Andrea and Dave's son), Kyle (Mike and Jenny's son), and Maya (Matt and Kristen's daughter).
Dave and I (Andrea)are expecting our second child in September. I am 11 weeks along and we heard the heartbeat today for the first time. The baby is due September 17, but we are planning on having a c-section. The doctor said he does c-sections a week before the due date, so that is nice for me. We're pretty excited.

Lake Powell Pictures

Hey anyone or everyone who even checks this blog out besides Matt, David and myself. I'm trying to make a video from Lake Powell this last year and looking for more pictures. If you have any pictures from the trip I would love to get my hands of them to add to the video. I have some from myself and Sandy, but could use more if possible. You can just email them to me if you would, or Sandy just put hers on a disk and mailed them to me. I would greatly appreciate it!!!! Thanks :)

It's a happy New Year...

You put your right arm in

you put your left elbow out

and you shake it all about... :)

What a great party. It was fun to see everyone. I also heard that someone bribed Landon to take me down on the floor... I guess that I will have to be more careful when he is skating by me.

One year

It's hard to believe that on Tuesday the 18th it will have been one year since grandpa passed away. I just wanted to post some of the pictures we had of the day of his funeral. It was such a snowy day, but I thought it was beautiful. Although I miss grandpa so much I'm so glad that he is with grandma, our mom, Lucille, Veronica, and many other members of his family. I learned so much from my grandparents. Most importantly I learned the importance of living the gospel. Both grandma and grandpa were missionaries to our family. Without them I don't know if I would have attended my church meetings and stayed close to the gospel. I'm forever grateful for all that they have done for me. I miss them both so much.

Traditions!

The following is part of a talk about traditions that I gave in sacrament meeting in our ward in Virginia several months ago. I know this is two posts about the "long hard pull" in a row, but hey, maybe Grandpa should have thought about that before saying it so much. I'm actually really glad he did.

I'd like to take this chance to invite any and everyone else to write and share essays about grandma and grandpa.

------

My Grandpa was a hardworking man all his life. I heard him describe himself more than once as a farmer but as far as I know he never owned a farm. I assume by that he meant that his father was a farmer and that he inherited the hard-working farmer ethic and lifestyle from him. My grandpa was actually a builder: a builder of houses, of buildings, of businesses, and a builder of engines.

While my grandfather didn’t pass his talent for building things on to me, he did enjoy passing on advice – in particular he had one talk that he would recount whenever there was a marriage or birth or other life-changing event in the life of one of his kids or grandkids. It was a short talk the gist of which was “life is a long hard pull…and it just got longer and harder.” This “long hard pull” talk was given as a means of sharing fatherly/grandfatherly advice and mostly the advice was that life is not always easy and you have to work hard for what you get.

Now that Grandpa is gone, whenever the family gets together someone invariably says the words “long hard pull” and when we hear them we think of Grandpa. The “long hard pull” talk is a family tradition that reminds us of our Grandpa and his life and love for us.

We will give the same talk to our own kids and grandkids and tell them about Grandpa’s love and example of a Christlike life and in a way they will get to know Grandpa the way we did. Not only will they get to know him through his unique words but we will also tell them about his love for his family and friends, his hard work ethic, about how he rarely missed a day of work in his life and how he never retired. The spirit of what Grandpa said will carry on if not the memory of Grandpa himself.

This small, seemingly insignificant family tradition serves the dual purposes of bringing us as family members closer to each other through the memory of our Grandpa but also bringing us closer to our Heavenly Father by reminding us of a man who led a Christlike life.

Origin of the Phrase "Long Hard Pull"

I always thought the phrase "the long hard pull" came from farming but this makes me think that Grandpa picked it up in the Navy. Did anyone ever ask Grandpa where he got it?



This is the first page of the book Victory in the Pacific 1945 (History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Vol.14).

William and Mary Taylor Hiatt

This is the headstone of our great-great-great grandfather and grandmother, William Hiatt and Mary Taylor Hiatt (by "our" I mean Moses Ray Hiatt's grandchildren). I'll write all about the adventures we had in finding this cemetery and gravestone later this week, but I wanted to at least post this picture so everyone could see it and hopefully motivate me to write the rest of the story. Click on the picture to see a larger image.

Who exactly are William Hiatt and Mary Taylor Hiatt? They lived and died in Mount Airy, North Carolina, and are buried there in the W.C. Hiatt Cemetery, a very small and obscure cemetery on the outskirts of Mount Airy. Other than where they lived and died, I don't know anything about what they did but it's a safe bet that they were farmers. They had five children, all boys -- James Madison, Isaac Samuel, Jesse Lafayette, John Henry, and Edmund Franklin.

Three of the sons moved to Utah sometime during their lives. I'm not sure when they went there but according to my parents these three brothers have some sort of pioneer imprint on their gravestones which indicates they made the trek before the connecting of the intercontinental railroad at Promontory Summit in 1869 (well before William and Mary died, in 1891 and 1899, respectively). The three who went to Utah were James Madison, Isaac Samuel, and Edmund Franklin. James Madison and Edmund Franklin are buried in Payson and Isaac Samuel is buried in Salem.

As far as I can tell from a cursory search of the Internet and familysearch.org, all five of the sons were members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, which leads me to believe that William and Mary Taylor Hiatt were also members of the church. I'm not sure about that but I would like to find out for sure when and if they joined the church.

Edmund Franklin Hiatt (one of the three sons who went to Utah) is the father of Alma Leon Hiatt who is grandpa's (Moses Ray Hiatt's) father.

So, to sum up:

William Hiatt -> Edmund Franklin Hiatt -> Alma Leon Hiatt -> Moses Ray Hiatt

If anybody knows any details that I left out or has any information or where to find it, please let me know by commenting on this post or emailing me. You can also talk to Aunt Sylvia or Uncle Paul.

UPDATE: I was looking again tonight at the records on familysearch.org and if that information is correct the three brothers couldn't have come to Utah before 1869 because they were all married in Mount Airy in or after 1869.

James Madison married Martha Ellen Taylor on 8 July 1869 in Mount Airy.

Edmund Franklin married Elizabeth Martisha Hutchins on 24 June 1877 in Mount Airy.

Isaac Samuel married Martha Francis Bryant on 17 February 1879 in Mount Airy.

Lake Powell

Here are some of the pictures from our camera at Lake Powell. Also, just a hats off to Noel and Sandy for planning such a great trip. All the hard work and effort they put into Lake Powell really made it such a great trip. We are already looking forward to next year!!!! WELL that's if Ryan ever recoporates from Noels boat ride!! He has been going to physical therapy and it looks like he is going to be ok ;) He learned his lesson to never ride on the tube with Landon while he is tanting Noel " Is that all you got cheapo". From Noels famous boat rides to the scrable games, the treasure hunt for the kids, and sitting around talking about old times.....what a great trip. When I tell people that I went to Lake Powell with my aunts, uncles, cousins, and even second cousins they just are amazed that we are all so close. I feel we have truely been blessed with a wonderful family thanks to grandma and grandpa for setting the way. I love everyone and am so excited for next years big adventure. Unfortunately our picture of the entire group didn't turn out so I'm hoping someone else will share that!!

The Matt and Candi McMullin Family

Hey here is our latest Family picture. I wonder if we will be laughing at it in 20+ years. The kids have started school and Candi is getting into blogs. I will try to get Charlyn to post all of the family blogs on the right side of the screen here so you can check them out up close and in person.

--Matt

More sharing of old photos!!

Go Go McMullin Girls......dance like nobody's watching!!

Looks like the popular section was hanging out on the couch!! How did Kristie get her bangs to stand so high? (Aqua Net)

I found this one interesting because it's my mom, but I could swear it's Katie in the picture? Vote if you think it looks like Katie also!!

Never Miss a Blog Post

For those who may not know, there's a really simple way to keep up with all the new posts on this blog and all the others you might want to visit (in case you haven't noticed, Katie, Bonnie, Charlyn, and Christina and I all have our own blogs -- have I missed any?)

The way to do it is to use what is called a "reader". I have a google email account so I use and am only familiar with the google reader, and it's really easy. Here's what you do:

Open this link to a new page (if you have a google account and you're logged in, you should automatically be logged in here too): http://www.google.com/reader/view/

Then copy the url (or the website address) of a blog that you read and would like to keep up to date on (ex: http://thehiattfam.blogspot.com/) and paste it into the reader page under "Add Subscription". From there you click the "subscribe" button.

Every time someone makes a new post it will show up in your reader without you having to visit the website. It will have a link you can click on so you can visit the actual post and see comments.

You can to this with any website that is set up for it, and many are. For example, if you're a fan of the New York Times' obituary page or George Will's Washington Post columns you can add those to your reader too.