Darla LaVella Bartell Price was born February 12, 1975  in Fresno, Ca. Darla departed from this life of 50 years to her new life October 7, 2025 at 11:30 pm.   She is survived by her husband Roy Price;  children,  Cheney and Piper Bishop;  her parents Lawson and LaVella Bartell; brother Scott Bartell, wife Jennifer, and children Josiah, Zachary and Addi;  her sister Robyn Calara and son Eli.    She is preceded in death by her grand parents Joe and Lavelle Phillips of Easton;  Henry and Selma Bartell of Bakersfield,  and her brother-in-law Rene Calara of San Francisco.

Darla grew up in Clovis and attended Lincoln Elementary School, Kastner Intermediate, Clovis West High School, and graduated from Fresno Christian High School in 1993.  She received a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Child Development from Cal State Northridge June 2, 2000.

Her  business education was self taught as an adult learner from her Dad along with the 13 "YELLOW BOOKS FOR DUMMIES" that she studied as she pursued each new idea for business.  She received her Water Safety Instructor (WSI) Certificate at Fresno City College in 1994.  She studied in England one semester through Fresno City College, taking excursions to several countries while there.

Her Mom made sure she had piano lessons, tennis lessons, and dance lessons.  Piano practice time was every day after school while Mom was cooking dinner so she could hear to make sure she was practicing. One time from the kitchen Mom heard her make the same mistake several times over. Mom went to correct her, only to find Darla on the floor replaying a recording of her practice session over and over. Oh Well,  MAMA TRIED.   Darla loved to water ski, snow ski, and swim.  She and her Dad bonded by being a part of the Indian Princess program where they went camping, had field trips, lots of crafts and just had fun hanging out with their Dads.

During her formative years she lived with her family on Birch street in Clovis. The kids on the block called themselves the Birch Bunch.  They spent a lot of time being kids; riding bikes, digging tunnels in the fields, swimming,  and playing Barbie dolls. A highlight was the raucous Christmas parties hosted by a different family  on the block every Christmas.

Darla was always active and on the move but her grades did not always reflect her intelligence.  So Mom and Dad had her tested.  And, No, formal testing did not qualify her for ADD but she did qualify to be a member of MENSA, which means being a member your IQ is in the top 2% of the general population,  and you are a part of an International society for highly intelligent people.

So her parents decided to ignore her impatient habits like leaving the gas station before fully filling her gas tank, saying it just took too much time to wait till it was full.  She even left once with the gas nozzle hanging onto the car.

Speaking of cars, she "borrowed" and wrecked her brothers jeep. Another time took a short cut through the mud to Fresno Christian High School in her Dad's GOAT -N-NEER, got stuck in the mud and had to be towed out.  Her first car was a red Honda Civic for her 16th birthday from her Dad.  And, Oh she also wrecked that car once near Los Banos and drove it  home with the hood smashed in.  The license plate read "Little Rascal".   There was another cliff hanging accident in Malibu when the card slid on mud, sending it to hang on the edge of the cliff.

Darla grew up attending People's Church and accepted Jesus  as her Saviour when she was 13 years old and was baptized at People's Church. She adored her youth pastors Pete and Elaine Gavrillis who were a lasting influence on her life.   Attending Hume Lake Christian Camp from Wagon Train through High school was a high light every summer.  She traveled to England, Austria and Hungary on mission trips with the youth department.   She always treasured the many family friends from church  among them the Froeses,  Roberts,  McHenrys,  Stoltenbergs, Armstrongs, Daniels, Collins, Tapleys and the whole youth group. She often expressed how much she valued the strong support and fellowship of  the community of believers,  and how important it was for the foundations of her faith and of her family.

Her business ideas started with her first lemonade stand on Birch and Chestnut Streets when she was about 8 years old.  The next was when she was determined to win a pink radio tape recorder for selling the most candy boxes for Lincoln Elementary School.  And  she was beaming when she proudly marched home with the pink radio.  It is still stored somewhere  in her attic.

Throughout her teen years she loved babysitting and working with children.  When she moved to Santa Monica to live with her brother Scott, she worked at the Bel Air Bay Club and worked as a Beach  Club counselor for children   She then started teaching private swim lessons at children's homes.  At that time she noticed that the beautiful pools at the big prominate hotels in Santa Monica and Pacific Palisades rarely had anyone swimming in them.  So, she said " why not ask if I can rent those pools to use for teaching my swim lessons??"  So that is how she started her first swim school, Family Life Aquatics in Santa Monica, and created her "I can save myself" swim method. It wasn't long before she invited her Dad to accompany her to Los Angeles  to accept an award at a ceremony for BEST OF L.A. swim schools.  While operating her swim school she managed to live rent free for 7 years in Pacific Palisades by house sitting for Betty and Bob Irvin while she taught swim lessons and attended college.

She also did dog walking on the side,  up to 6 dogs  at a time, because she loved dogs as well as children.  The first person she dog walked for was Maggie, a 90 year old lonely widowed shut in.  She told Darla she hated when it rained because it made her so lonely.  So every time it rained Darla took her flowers to cheer her up.  There after Maggie said she looked forward to the rain because she knew Darla would be coming to visit.

Then there was her "Puppy Smuggling" side job.  She would purchase a puppy in Fresno, transport it to Santa Monica, then sell it for a profit.  She even tried her hand at being a Bail Bondsman for a time.  And she added video making at Sermon Spice to be used by ministers illustrating their sermons.  She even got her license to perform a wedding ceremony for a young bride and groom, Jeremy and Shelley Borcherding.

She operated her swim school in Santa Monica under the name FAMILY LIFE AQUATICS for 10 years.  There she taught children of some of the famous how to swim, including those of Sylvester Stallone, Sugar Ray Leonard, Jennifer Grey, John Ridder (from 3's company),Jack Nicholson's grandsons, Barry Williams (Greg Brady from the Brady Bunch)),  Angela, Landsbury's grandchildren from (Murder She Wrote), Julia Sweeney (from Saturday Night live), and Garcelle Beauties (from Beverly Hills Housewives) to name a few.

One of her favorite pastimes while in Santa Monica was bike riding along the beach and swimming from Santa Monica Peer to Manhattan Beach pier.  While bike riding she noticed all the homeless people along the trail.  She started making sandwich lunches for them for a while until she noticed it was the same people showing up for lunch on a regular basis.

Darla weathered some dark storms for a time, but the sun and rainbows reappeared with the arrival of children Cheney and Piper Lu.  She moved back to her home town of Clovis in 2005 to raise her baby son and soon to follow daughter, and to be close to family.  She declared " Los Angeles is a great place to live but a difficult place to live as a new Mom with no family near by" .  She missed her family and always loved Clovis. Here she established her swim school under the new name BULL FROG swim school,  and single-handedly provided for her children as a single Mom.

Then entered Roy Price who showed up at a family gathering at Thanksgiving time.  They were married 4 years later.  Roy was a responsible Father figure to Cheney and Piper, and a loving life partner for Darla.  Along with his construction work he supported Darla in maintenance of her swim school pools and property.   When Darla wanted to change or remodel anything in the house Roy was the man —- wood floors, plumbing, kitchen or bathroom make over, painting , hanging a chandelier —-Roy was on it.

Darla's greatest joy was family.  She moved back to Fresno because family was important to her.  She planned fun birthday celebrations for everyone one in the family and made every effort to gather the family together for every holiday.  She loved getting the family together and said she liked to make it easy for everyone by either catering or having Mom cook.  Cooking was her least favorite activity.  But she loved to go to restaurants.  Darla was truly the spark of the family.  Everyone knew when Darla arrived the party had started !!

She purchased the former location of Jan Thomas Swim School in  the summer of 2020.  She actually learned to swim at this location when she was about 4 years old.  Before relocating to the new property she was renting hotel pools and doing home lessons.

The day the news hit that Jan had the property up for sale Darla was bombarded with texts, Facebook posts and phone calls about the story.  She  brushed it off because she didn't think there was anyway to make it happen.  Then a few weeks later, Jan called and asked her to come over. This led to the purchase of the property.   Darla had great respect for Jan Thomas and considered her a very close friend and mentor.

From February to November joyous sounds of children splashing, laughing, screaming and singing can be heard from the pools at Bull Frog Swim School,  which has made the difference between life and drowning for thousands of children.

She trained many energetic, enthusiastic young people to be swim instructors using her "I can save myself" method that she created.  This has provided summer jobs for many high school and college young people.

Her love of dogs led to her collection of beautiful cream golden retrievers. The first was Maloof, a majestic loving lion of a dog.  He fathered several litters of the most beautiful puppies.  So another business was born.  And of course Roy built the biggest dog house ever with a balcony and play yard for the puppies.

She was a member of the Clovis City Chamber of Commerce and a community leader.  She was on channel 30 news several times promoting water safety for children.  Bull Frog was awarded the Silver Metalist Best of Fresno by Central Valley Magazine in 2024.

Bull Frog Swim School was a successful thriving business which reflected the spark of Darla's personality.  You might see those big green dancing bull frogs celebrating the graduation of new little swimmers, or see them dancing in the park, or on  any street corner, or at Clovis BIG HAT DAY,  or dancing on a float in the Clovis Christmas parade. Once a driver was so focused on Sir Fearless Frog that his car leaped over a fence wrecking the car,

For her family and friends Darla was a spark of life and a shining star.   If you remember the song of not so long ago— "catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, never let it fade away ,  catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, save it for a rainy day. Just in case you feel you want to hold her, you'll have a pocketful of starlight."   Ovarian cancer stole her away from us too soon.  We do not always understand God's timing.   Darla is now gone from our sight and living in her forever home with the Lord, but she will be forever loved and living in our hearts, never forgotten.

The family would like to thank her many friends and family for their caring and support with meal trains, flowers, special hand made gifts, beautiful cards, written  notes, text messages, and phone recorded prayers that she was encouraged by during some long nights.

We give special thanks to cousin and retired doctor, Linda Bartell who was there for Darla and the family almost every day. And for our hospice nurse Mike Davis and Dr. Hailu for their guidance and wonderful care to make her last days as comfortable as possible.