8-year-old cancer survivor and others benefit from the Broncos ...

Football coaches often talk about playing with heart. The Boise State Broncos also emphasize living with heart.

The football team and the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Idaho on Saturday for the second straight year granted a cancer patient?s wish, providing an unforgettable experience. Binky Williamson, 8, of Forest Park, Ga., was a coach for the day on the Broncos? sideline.

Stephen Kinsey of San Antonio, Texas, was the first wish coach last year.

?Ambassadorship? is one of the blocks in the Broncos? goals pyramid.

?It?s just important for people to do things for others,? coach Chris Petersen said. ?It?s one of those things where you think you?re helping somebody else and most of the time you?re getting more back in return.?

The wishes are the most visible example of the Broncos? outreach, but it?s a year-round effort. Players are asked to perform two hours of community service per semester, but already this fall the team has contributed more than 400 hours (about four hours per player).

Linebackers coach Bob Gregory led a service trip to the Dominican Republic during spring break that involved football players Chris Potter and Jonathan Brown. Potter, a junior wide receiver, was named to the American Football Coaches Association Good Works Team earlier this year.

The football program is heavily involved in the athletic department?s annual Serving Up Wishes dinner, a benefit for Make-A-Wish that has generated more than $1.25 million for Idaho wishes in its nine-year run. Players also work with the St. Luke?s Children?s Hospital, Drug Free Idaho and Operation School Bell, and often visit local schools.

Next week, the Boise State president?s office will host a visit from stroke survivor Sam Frankel of Averill Park, N.Y. ? a high school student and longtime Broncos fan who hopes to attend college here. He has received a phone call from former Bronco Kyle Wilson, who now plays for the New York Jets.

Players say they embrace their status as ?role models? and are happy to give back.

?It is a really big deal to us. ... It?s something that hits you right when you come in, and it sticks with you till you?re done with this program and all the way through your life,?? senior defensive end Jarrell Root said.

Binky is the latest beneficiary of that approach.

He endured a 47-day hospital stay and seven-day drug-induced coma last year as he fought Burkitt?s lymphoma but recently hit the one-year mark cancer-free. His oncologist considers him cured.

Binky?s visit with the Broncos, his favorite team, included going to lunch with the wide receivers, attending practice and having his own locker in the locker room.

?It made me feel special,? he said.

Said his mother, Jonelle: ?He came out of his shell. He was happy. His exact words were, ?I feel like a celebrity.? ?

The whole family ? including Binky?s dad and two siblings ? took part in the trip. The Williamsons have family in Idaho, some of whom they hadn?t met, which made for a memorable Thanksgiving.

?They all want to move here now,? Jonelle said, surrounded by her blue-and-orange-clad family. ?Of course, after we go back (to Georgia) looking like this, we will have to.?

Chadd Cripe: 377-6398

Source: http://www.idahostatesman.com/2011/11/27/1894825/broncos-making-goals-off-the-blue.html

sean hannity jose reyes kroy biermann nene leakes duggars danny woodhead forgetting sarah marshall

Drought kills thousands of Christmas trees

Pat Sullivan / AP

David Barfield checks one of his saplings at his Christmas tree farm in New Caney, Texas, on Nov. 8. Only a handful of the 500 saplings planted have survived the drought this year.

By RAMIT PLUSHNICK-MASTI, Associated Press

NEW CANEY, Texas -- Dry, brown grass crunches underfoot as David Barfield walks through his 45-acre Christmas tree farm pointing at evergreens covered with brittle, rust-colored needles.

"Dead tree, dead tree, dead tree," he says, shaking his head at dry timber he hoped would be chopped down by parents with excited children.

Instead, Mother Nature delivered the Grinch in the form of a historic drought that has killed thousands of trees across Texas and Oklahoma. Some died of thirst. Others were destroyed by wildfires, whose breadth and intensity were magnified when wind swept the flames across parched landscape.

---

?

Most farmers plan to import trees from North Carolina to supplement any they have left, said Marshall Cathey, president of the Texas Christmas Tree Growers Association.

They say they aren't planning to raise prices because consumers are reluctant to pay more than $40 or $50 for a Christmas tree, especially in the poor economy.

'Depressing'
But families hoping for a homegrown tree to cut down will have a harder time finding one, and dozens of farmers are struggling. Possibly most painful for these growers are the deaths of the youngest saplings, which guarantee the drought's effect will be felt for years to come.

"It's depressing, it really is," said Barfield, 53. "This was going to be our retirement."

He and his wife, Karen, 49, bought the farm about six years ago with dreams of retiring from Texas' oil fields and spending their final years peddling the Christmas spirit with fresh-cut trees, marshmallow roasts and hayrides in a red-and-white sleigh. They planted 20 acres of evergreen trees.

Now, barely two years after Karen Barfield retired to work the farm, she has returned full-time to her job selling explosion-proof enclosures to the oil industry. David Barfield has increased his hours doing part-time electronic work. Instead of selling some 400 homegrown trees as they do in a good year, they will be lucky to sell 100 ? nearly all Frasier firs brought in from North Carolina.

Climatologist warns Texas drought could last decades. KPRC's Ryan Korsgard reports.

And they're not certain that will be enough to cover their property taxes. Barfield says he can only charge $50 for a North Carolina fir ? just $10 more than he pays for them.

"Eight (trees) died within the last week," Barfield said, continuing his walk through his farm in New Caney. "These were all green a week ago. The drought has been hurting us real bad."

But at least he and his wife have other income. Others have not fared as well.

"We lost probably 90 percent of our trees," said Jean Raisey, 79, who's run a 10-acre Christmas tree farm in Purcell, Okla., with her husband since 1985. The other 10 percent are dying now, she said.

"We've had to hire a contractor and pull all the dead and all the live trees," she said. "And we're out of business."

Cathey, who owns the 50-acre Elves Farm in Denison, Texas, a town about 75 miles north of Dallas, said he has spoken to many of Texas' 120 Christmas tree farmers in recent months. Long stretches of triple-degree heat, he said, harmed the trees as much as the lack of rain.

11 inches of rain this year
And the drought has been bad. In Texas, less than 11 inches of rain fell this year compared to an annual average of almost 24 inches. In Oklahoma, there has been about 18.7 inches of rain this year compared to a long-term average of 30 inches. All trees have been hard-hit by the lack of rain.

"There's hundreds of thousands of trees dying," said Travis Miller, a drought expert at Texas A&M University.

"We're looking at a ... one-in-a-500-year kind of drought, and so it's weeding out the ones that can't survive this kind of extreme conditions," he added.

For evergreens, which usually prefer wetter, more temperate climates, the struggle may be greater than for drought-resistant plants, such as the juniper brush, although it too is dying in Texas this year.

Farmers who planted evergreens native to Afghanistan ? and accustomed to a desert climate ? have had greater success than those who planted trees from the northeast United States.

Those who irrigated also are having more modest success, although that costs ? about $1,200 a month on a midsized farm.

Jan Webb, owner of the Double Shovel Christmas Tree Farm in West Texas, one of the driest areas of the state, said her Afghans have done well. Of the 400 she planted last year, only about 50 died. On the other hand, none of the 400 Leyland Cypress she planted survived.

It takes three to five years to grow an evergreen to a marketable size. Webb planted her first tree about three years ago and was hoping to open for the first time next Christmas, but with the drought, it will be at least two years before she has a homegrown tree to sell.

"We can't sell what's from our farm right now because they're too small," she said.

Yet the farmers are determined children will be able to see trees cut for Christmas ? even if they're North Carolina firs liberally placed in Texas soil. There will be hayrides and picnics. Christmas carols will ring out and colorful lights will cover the bare branches.

Bah humbug to the drought, they say.

Source: http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/11/25/9017465-texas-oklahoma-drought-kills-thousands-of-christmas-trees

aziz ansari aziz ansari corn maze icloud apple update apple update download ios 5