Utah Hemophilia Foundation

Excerpt: The first time I held Elijah he was only four months old. I was trying to rock him to sleep, and as I looked down at his chubby cheeks and great big smile, I knew that he would someday become my son. The thing I did not realize was how soon that would happen and how much this precious little boy would change my life.... Elijah was born three days after Christmas.... His mother had him by C-section but something went terribly wrong. She was bleeding internally, but the physicians and nurses ignored the physical signs. Twenty-four hours later, she lost her life and the world changed forever for this family.... Elijah spent five of his first ten days at the hospital in intensive care where he received the diagnosis: severe hemophilia B. (read more…)

An intrepid team of eleven supporters of Save One Life, including founder and president Laurie Kelley, will attempt Africa's highest mountain—19,000 foot Mt. Kilimanjaro—this August. Their goal? Reach the summit and raise $50,000 for Save One Life!

The climbers will travel to Tanzania in early August to undertake this six-day trek (August 6 to August 11, 2011) from tropical weather up to sub-freezing temperatures at the summit, where oxygen is only 50% of what one can breathe at sea level.

You can join the effort by donating to support your favorite climber! Funds raised from the climb will be used to develop Save One Life's programs in Africa, including:

    * Supporting their outreach program in Zimbabwe
    * Establishing their post-secondary scholarship program in Kenya
    * Building capacity in Tanzania , to prepare them for Save One Life
    * Launching Save One Life in Ghana
    * Supporting African projects in their home office

For more information and to learn how to donate, please visit SaveOneLife.net

As I hope many of you know, in just a few months we will be holding our UHF Fore-A-Cure Golf Tournament. We are really excited about the continued growth of this event and all the great programs it helps support for the Foundation. I want to share that we have added some great new technology this year that will allow us to start the live auction during the tournament! We will be texting each player during the golf round with the current bid for one of our great items. We think this will add more fun and excitement to the event, raise more money, and help get those involved who are not able to stay for the entire live auction. However, this can't be pulled off if we don't have lots of great live auction items! So we need your help. (read more...)

Soon the kids will be back in school and, believe it or not, autumn is just around the corner. You know what that means?! It is, once again, time to plan for the Adult Retreat. This is a great chance to reconnect with friends in the community and learn about topics pertinent to those dealing with the challenges of bleeding disorders. This year’s event will be held Friday and Saturday, October 7-8, 2011, at, where else? The Homestead Resort! (read more...)

What is riding for the brand? Teens from the Utah Hemophilia Foundation found out on May 13-14, 2011 at the UHF Teen Retreat, set again at the beautiful Homestead Resort in Midway. The teens even created their own brands with the assistance of our amazing entertainers and motivational speakers, Hired Guns. These cowboys are the real deal, and we gleaned from their collective wisdom through music, cowboy poetry, horse gentling, and an interactive workshop. The UHF teens learned that riding for the brand means discovering and embracing who you are and what you're passionate about, and then using that knowledge—that "brand"—to keep you focused on achieving specific goals and becoming self-advocates for your own bright future. Each UHF teen drew a symbol to represent his or her unique brand and wrote down an important goal and steps on how to achieve it.
To read more and VIEW PHOTOS FROM THE TEEN RETREAT, click here.

The 2011 BloodRun has seen a lot of changes, the biggest being our new venue. This year we moved the race up to Wheeler Historic Farm in Salt Lake City...and we had 29 sponsors and 439 registered runners! Another change we made this year’s BloodRun was a new program called “Support a Runner,” in which family members, friends and neighbors could donate money and sponsor you as a runner. The "Support a Runner" program alone brought in $2655. Those participants who raised $100 or more earned a fabulous running mesh shirt that said, “Running circles around the rest by raising $100 for the UHF.” We hope that this program will continue to catch fire, and we’ll have many individuals “Support a Runner” next year! The 2011 BloodRun was our best race to date. I am so thrilled that we were able to raise $18,000!
(read more...)

Thanks again to the many families who joined us for the Family Fest and Resource Fair at the Homestead Resort in June. You made it the best Family Fest ever by coming and meeting with friends, sharing your stories, learning from one another (and not being afraid to go down the giant inflatable slide)! Let’s do it all over again next year (but have little hot dogs on toothpicks to eat). We for sure need to have Soda Pop come and do face painting again so Liam “Bill the Clown” Seolas can make another appearance! Our thanks again to our Industry sponsors and exhibitors. To read more or view more photos, click here.

Congratulations to those candidates who received scholarships for the upcoming academic year. Thanks to a generous sponsorship from Axiom Therapeutics, we were also able to offer the Robert Price Memorial Scholarship to three individuals. This year’s recipients include... (read more...)

Baby, oh, baby! We have a few new babies to welcome into our community. Shaleen and Dave Winslow are grandparents again. Their son, Brent, and wife, Anna, welcomed a second bouncing baby boy to their family this summer. Board member, Brian Chapman and his wife Laura welcomed little Isaac to their family in June, and Zac and Georgette Redford are looking forward to becoming parents in December. Congratulations on these new little additions!

Get well wishes go out to Charles Rhodes and David Ohlson. Charles recently had knee replacement surgery and David had an ankle fusion. Hope to see you both up and “running” around soon!