Mandi Haverkamp

Mandi was born in North Odgen Utah on the east side and lived there until she was about 11 years old. She was the middle child of 3 (2 girls and one boy). Mandi and her sister and brother were very close and spent a lot of time together growing up. In fact her brother lives in the Bridlewalk development in the Pioneer Park Ward. His name is Brian Pipkin.

Her parents worked for Amway in the company's pyramid organization. This was a very good job for them. By the time they were 28 years old, they quit their jobs and just did Amway to support their family. When Mandi was 11 years old, her parents hit the diamond level of Amway (super high up). From here they were able to sell their little home in North Ogden and bought a large home in South Ogden on the East side. This was so fun for their family. Her parents also started traveling and training.

By the time Mandi was in high school her parents were traveling extensively doing Amway. They didn't want to leave their kids at home, so Mandi and her siblings did homeschool. Being Non-Denominational Christians, they enrolled with Abeka (Christian homeschooling curriculum and videos). Because it was private homeschooling academy, Mandi and her brother were able to attend Bonneville high school for fun classes. (The one Mandi remembers best is art.) Her brother was only 16 months younger and he skipped a grade, so they attended high school and graduated the same year. This experience helped them be even closer.

I asked Mandi since they traveled so much where was her favorite place to go. She said Hawaii. That they went there to the islands of Maui and Kauai every year. She said she remembers one year in particular. They stayed in a hotel that had several different levels of pools all connected by water slides including a water elevator. She said that year they never left the hotel. Now honestly, who wouldn't love that!

After high school Mandi attended the ATC up in Ogden. Here she received her pharmacy technician certification. This was a great blessing to her. It gave her a way to get a good job without having to attend a lot of school. She really didn't enjoy school work. She says she isn't a school type person.

While she was living at home, working as a pharm tech, she was set up on a blind date with her first husband. They moved in together and later married. Then at the age of 23, Mandi received one of the greatest blessing in her life. She gave birth to a beautiful son, Kason. Things in her marriage didn't quite go the way she hoped however, and after 5 years of marriage, she and her husband divorced.

After her divorce Mandi was on her own with Kason for quite a while. Getting divorced was very hard, but Mandi knew the most important thing was creating the very best situation for her son. She said she really learned how to let things go. She learned to put her feelings aside so that her ex-husband felt comfortable being there for her son. She loves the fact that Kason and his dad are so close now and she says even though their marriage wasn't the best for them, Kason feels like he has the best dad in the world. What an amazing gift she has given to him!

Several years after her divorce Mandi went out to a bar with some friends for a night off while Kason was with his dad for the weekend. She noticed a handsome guy there who wasn't paying attention to any of the ladies in the bar. He was being himself watching a game on the TV. She loved that he wasn't being part of the meat market scene. She was so impressed that she sent her friend over to talk to him. She later came over to where he was watching the game and they started talking. But disappointingly, they didn't hit it off. He did ask for her number but she didn't really want him to call. She skeedaddled out of there quickly.

About a month later, she and her friends went out again to the same bar. He was there again. He approached her and they started talking. This time sparks started flying and after that they were talking and spending a lot of time together. His name, as you might have guessed was Matt Haverkamp.

Matt worked for Kiewit Construction as an engineer. It was a great job but he would be sent to a city for 6 months or so, to work until the project was completed, he would then be sent to a different city. After completing the project in Salt Lake he was being reassigned to a different city. Mandi and him talked about what they should do. Matt knew there was no way Mandi would leave the area. She did not want to move Kason away from his dad and she really liked her job at Wal-Mart working as a pharm tech. So they decided to give a long distance romance a try.

Even though the long distance romance was trying at times, it was also a lot of fun. Matt had a good job and he was a bachelor so he had some money and frequent flier miles to fly out to see her or fly Mandi out to see him about every 3 weeks. They also did fun things like both fly to Cancun or New York for the weekend. It was a very fun courtship!

After a while Matt and Mandi decided it was time to settle down. On one of their weekends away Matt took Mandi to Zion's National Park where they hiked the strenuous and gorgeous Angel's Landing. At the top Matt proposed. Since this was Mandi's second marriage she didn't really have a preference on their wedding. Matt however had grown up in a small town in Iowa and had lots of family and friends there. It was important to him that they get married in Iowa. Mandi said their wedding was a whole town party complete with a sign flashing inviting everyone to come to the marriage. She said she loved it and would never have wanted to get married anywhere else.

Not long after moving in to their current home in our neighborhood, Matt and Mandi celebrated the pregnancy and birth of their beautiful daughter Macie. Now at 18 months old, Macie brings a lot of joy and laughter to Mandi’s life. Mandi enjoys and loves spending time with her entire family now.

Shortly after Macie was born, Matt was diagnosed with a brain tumor. He had surgery and they thought they had gotten all of it. However, a few months later they discovered a small piece of the tumor had remained On the 31^st of next month Matt will go back in and they will find out if the tumor has grown in size or not. Once they will know that, they will know how to proceed.

Mandi says she and Matt have loved living here. She says everyone has been so nice and supportive of them in their difficult situation. They appreciate so deeply all the help others have offered from meals to babysitting (especially since they have an 18 month old daughter) She wants to thank everyone for all they have done.

I hope you will all take the opportunity to talk with Mandi and her family. They are so friendly. We are so grateful for their acceptance of all us LDS neighbors and their willingness to let us be apart of helping them through their trials. How lucky we are to have them in our neighborhood.