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Happy Birthday to Thomas on the 21st

This picture was taken in January 1993 by Tom Carlile and given to us after Tom's passing.

Dad and I decided that it was too cold and snowy to decorate the grave, but the weather didn't stop other family members from remembering Tom.  

Harvey, Mav, Bevy and Max went to a buffet as Elise has memories of eating with
Thomas at "Ryans Buffet" in Alpharetta, GA. (long out of business).

Adrienne took the kids to send balloons off to Tom, another long-standing tradition.

Experience wtih Nick and Sara

For Christmas Nick and Sara gave Roy and me an "experience" gift.  We cashed in on it on Friday evening and made homemade pasta together.  It went so smoothly.  I've tried making it before and I didn't have nearly the success we had in the class.  Of course, we had great tools to thin out and cut the pasta.

We also made Alfredo sauce.  It was delicious, but how could it not be with an entire cube of butter and heavy cream?  The teachers had prepared red sauce prior, so we got to have both.  Dessert was a delicious mousse.  We got recipes for everything (including the kale/brussel sprout salad).  It was a very fun evening.

We had dinner at Adrienne and Aj's home Sunday night.  Cub was enjoying playing with me.

Funeral for Thomas Carlile

Noel (Verl's brother).  Uncle Tom lived across the street from Teeny and Reed Rasband
when he was young, so he grew up with Verl, Noel and the other brothers.

Stephen Carlile, Roy, Catharine, David and Julie Berry, Gloria Toomey, Paul Carlile, Nichole Davis, Laurel Steele, Elaine McKay, Kelly Buckaloo, Chris McKay, Reed McKay.

Uncle Tom (Grandma Fern's brother in-law) passed away about 1 1/2 weeks ago; he was 96.  Yesterday, Roy and I traveled to Orem for the funeral.  We all loved Uncle Tom, he always made everyone feel like they were important.  I'm sure all of my children have received quarters from him at family events.  He always had a lot of quarters on-hand to give out to people.  I've received my share and Roy has a small cannister of quarters in his closet that Tom gave him on one occasion.  When they finished the dedicatory prayer at the casket, many family members came up and put quarters on the casket.  At our last family reunion, several years ago, Tom was out of quarters, so he started giving out dollars.  Most of the children at the event were my grandchildren and the word was soon out.  The children lined up for their dollar.  At some point he ran out and he felt so badly.  

Another thing that Tom has been known to give out is tickets.  They had some at the funeral that you could take.  There were two different ones.  One tickets said, "This is a FREE TICKET, Not good for anything.  It's just free.  On the back was a winky face emoji.  The other ticket said, "This is an ETERNAL FREE TICKET, give a complement to someone today.  This one also had a winky face on the back.  Tom was always trying to get people to smile and he was very successful at it.  At the funeral we were told that he was made a Priest's Quorum advisor in his 70's, and of course, the young men loved him.

The family had created a beautiful program for him with many pictures from his life.  The following is a paragraph from his obituary:

Some have wondered what made Tom Carlile tick–why he was the way he was, where the indomitable optimism and generosity came from. Few know that Dad had had a profoundly sacred experience when he was lost alone in the Uinta mountains for two days and two nights as an 8-year-old boy. This event motivated him throughout his life, and can be best summarized by the hymnal phrase: “friends on earth, and friends above.” Dad knew with certainty from that experience that he was not alone in this life. This was the fuel for the “light” of Tommy Carlile, and he shared the light with all he met for the rest of his days.

At the luncheon there was a paper on each place setting with an article entitled: "Tommy Carlile's Story of Being Lost in the Uinta Mountains: Click on the enlarge button to read the article.  He had a very spiritual experience that impacted him throughout his life.