Cash is Okay!

Cash and Tara had a little scare the other day. He'd been at a gun show with a friend, come home and was breaking down his gun. He said he wasn't holding on to it tightly enough and it slipped and went off, shooting him in the thigh.

Of course, he was rushed to the hospital. In the E.R. he overhead someone say softly, "Was it a suicide attempt?"

Cash, being Cash, I know you all know what happened next.

"Yeah. I thought I'd shoot myself in the foot and if that didn't work, then the knee and on up until I got the job done."

He broke up the entire E.R. Doctors, nurses, EMTs . . . Tara.

To be serious though, the bullet took a fist-size chunk out of his leg and they had to put a rod in from knee to thigh. Turns out they put in one that is too long so I don't know where it's going to go from here, but I'll keep you all posted. He's home from the hospital, in pain but healing.

Life has been insane in the Case/Sluyter family over the last year.

When Dad (Fritz Sluyter) was diagnosed with terminal cancer last January, all of the family went home to spend time with him. While we were there, Sven's house burned down. It wasn't good, but they are a month away from moving into their new home.

Daddy passed away on March 8, 2007 -- we still miss him very much.

Jay's house burned down a couple, or maybe three, months ago. But he ended up getting a sweet property in Rigby, Idaho. Mom is selling the farm and will be moving to Rigby. We are putting a modulated home on an acre of Jay's property, moving Mom's animals into the barn and we'll all be hunky dory. An "adopted" daughter will be four miles away, Jay and his family just across the acre and Mom and Cheryl will be well taken care of . . . the best part, I'm only 3 hours away now and can be there in a flash if I'm needed.

We may have found a donor for Alvin . . . we'll know more in the next few days. But it's looking like his kidney transplant will take place near the first of March. Was hoping for earlier, but nope . . . it just didn't work. He's doing well and hanging in there.

Crystal is in Rugby, North Dakota ( I know, Rugby -- Rigby, believe me, when I'm tired I get confused) with Sweetie, her dog. They're having a blast and enjoying themselves up there.

I think everything else is status quo!

Have a great day everyone!

Too long . . .

Hey Everyone,

Sorry it's been so long since I dropped by this blog. Alvin just got out of the hospital after having parathyroid surgery on October 30th. Things have been a little hectic at our house. But we're doing great now. Alvin is already back at work, sleeping a lot when he's not, but growing stronger all the time.

I've got a new job at LDSBlogs.com. I am the manager of the site, managing all the bloggers and the content. It's a lot of fun and I am able to do it from home, or in Alvin's hospital room, as the case may be! It works great for us and brings in the extra money we needed.

Alvin got a promotion at work, and a raise, so we're pretty happy. We're in the process of filing bankruptcy to get all the old medical debt off our shoulders. With his job insurance and Medicare, we no longer have medical bills for Alvin anymore, which is a huge blessing.

BYU's kickin' butt in the Mountain West conference, which of course, makes me deliriously happy. I swear, every week as I watch my nephews play, and there is always one or two in every single play on the field during the game, I could not be prouder!

Connor, Heather's nine-year-old son, scored touchdowns in the last two games of his flag football season. We missed them and I felt terrible! We are so proud of him. His skills as a football player are growing (with a dad like Aaron and an uncle like Alvin, could they do anything but?) and he's getting better and better at the game.

All of Heather's children are growing, strong and healthy. Who could ask for anything more than that?

Mom and Cheryl are doing good on the farm. It's been tough from Mom to adjust to life without Dad around, but she's managing the farm and the business and doing okay. She and Cheryl are working hard, they're happy and healthy.

I think that's it for the update right now. I've got lots to do today and should get started on it.

Love you all and hope life is treating everyone great. Check in and let us know what's going on! Uncle Mike we need the 411 on the reunion this year. Cash, we need a heads up on what's going on in Texas. Bryan, Kristi --- everyone. What's up? Oh yeah, and our missing Uncle Richard. Never in the office, never returning a phone call. Uncle Mike tell him we miss him!

Lots of love from the Utah clan

Tyler and Katie Conger Family

I suppose if it is a family blog, then more than just Candace should be writing. I thought I could start by telling you a little about my family. My mom is Lynette Kachelmeyer, daughter of Freeman Case. Since I have talked with most of you I have started my own family. I married my husband Tyler in June of 2005, and we are currently living in Provo Utah while he finishes school at BYU. He will have a teaching credential for Technology and Japanese, and if anyone has suggestions for places where teachers make decent money and can afford to live, we are keeping our eyes open. For now I stay at home with our little girl Peyton who was born last year on December 26- poor girl, but I also have a teaching degree from BYU which I am sure I will put to use at some time. Aside from that, there is not a whole lot of exciting business going on with us, just the day to day trying to finish school, work, and raise our little family.

Levi Freeman Case - from Uncle Gordon's website and Viewpoint

(The original birth certificate for Freeman Case listed him as George Case, apparently Maggie named him for her older brother George Spencer, then changed it to the name he grew up with: Levi Freeman Case. His birth certificate was modified to reflect his proper name when he joined the Navy in 1942.)

Born in Long Beach, California, Levi grew up in the Los Angeles Area, surrounded by his father's and his mother's brothers and sisters. Levi Freeman (“Freeman”) followed in his father’s and his father’s and his father’s footsteps in the building trades and became a lather in Los Angeles. During the depression, building activity dwindled, and several parts of the Case family in southern California supported themselves by making and selling on the street, Cases' Texas Tamales.

Following the lead of Freeman's grandmother, Sarah Percy Black/Spencer of Decatur, Texas, much of the Case family were active members of the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Los Angeles after they arrived from Texas. Through the church activities, young Levi, who went by his middle name Freeman, met Alys-Mae Barkwille. Alys-Mae and her mother were a moderately successful professional singing act, and Freeman tried to accompany them on his guitar and sing along, but he turned out to be slightly tone-deaf and gave it up (ah, that's where I get it from (yes, this is a note from Candace)). He finally did marry Alys-Mae July 22, 1933 in South Gate, CA. Alys-Mae quit the singing act and joined the Case family tamale business.

Freeman and Alys-Mae separated in 1941 and divorced in 1943. When the Second World War broke out, Dad joined the Navy, and was a Carpenter's Mate 1st Class in the Pacific Fleet.

During the War, Alys-Mae cared for their children when she could afford it, and at other times we were with friends or relatives. We were cared for, for a while, by Flo Case, daughter of Dad's brother Deward. In late summer of 1944, Leighton and I were placed with Ione Stellway in Bellflower. My mother was convinced Mrs. Stellway was a relative of the Cases, but I have not been able to place her in the family--maybe she was Deward Case's wife's mother/sister/aunt(?). A few blocks down the street, our brother Eugene Case was living with--I think--our uncle Deward Case.

1945. When WWII ended, Freeman returned to the lathing trade and lived for a short time with his 2^nd wife Lucille in Lemon Grove, CA in a trailer-home parked on the George and Ida Mae (Case) KRAFT property. Leighton, Eugene and I were all there at one point, bedded down in the Kraft home. Next door was Dad's sister Hazel, her husband Walter Meyer and their sons. The marriage to Lucille did not last too long . . . I was sent to live with my mother, while Leighton and Eugene stayed for a while longer.

Freeman later married a war-widow, Helen (Culka) ALLEN, and took on supporting her four children and his three sons. For a time, Freeman, Helen and her children Loretta, Larry, Collette and Barbara, and Freeman’s Leighton, Eugene and Gordon all lived in a small home on Bliss Street in Compton, CA—a very full house. It quickly turned out to be too crowded, and about 1948, his 3 boys moved to Hayward, CA one at a time to live with their mother and her husband Richard Shrank.

Helen and Freeman had one child, daughter Lynette Sue CASE.

They were avid fans of Monopoly, and when Canasta became popular, they shifted to that card-game, playing for decades almost every weekend with friends and relatives. Dad and Uncle Deward were quite close during that time. We went surf fishing together and their hobby for a while was brewing home-made beer—long before the advent of micro-breweries. Freeman Case retired in 1972 and moved his family to Apple Valley, CA. Helen Case died in 1981 after a five year battle with melanoma cancer.

Lynette CASE married Larry Kachelmeyer--yet another carpenter. Lynette and Larry have two daughters: Emily Ann Kachelmeyer (Watts) and Katie Lynn Kachelmeyer (Conger.)

Freeman developed "minor" prostate cancer at 75 and Alzheimer’s disease about 1989. Lynette’s husband built an apartment over their garage for Freeman to live in after he developed Alzheimer’s, and he lived there until he died in 1992.

Where is Everybody?

Come on folks -- I can blog all day long but wouldn't you just grow tired of me? I am certain you would! Besides, you can just check out my other blog http://candacesalima.blogspot.com if all you wanted to do was hear from me.

What's everybody up to these days? Fill me in ?

Lives, loves, marriages, births . . . give us the deets!

Here's the view from a friend of mine's back window in Oak City, Utah.

Kinda wanna makes you sigh and settle back on a chair on a big ol' wraparound porch.

I'm hosting a contest on my blogspot. So check that out please.

I'm also auctioning items off via that same place to raise money for my mother.

Just a note if you're trying to sign up for the blog and can't. You have to have a Google username and password. So go to www.google.com and create a username and password. Then you accept this invitation and begin posting.

In the meantime, if no one else posts I am going to inundate this site with BYU football stuff. Now, you wouldn't want that, would you?