We seriously owe such a debt to so many for all we enjoy today. To say thank-you to those who have served and are serving or have lost theirs lives…just seems so little, so ineffective at expressing gratitude. But thank-you, anyway, from the bottom of my heart.
She has been to party after party recently, including one where all the girls dressed in pink and rode around in a pink Hummer limo. She had a party at her house with her school friends, too. Throw in end-of-year activities and a field trip to the zoo – and just the other day, she had her Kindergarten graduation, well, she is happy-busy! One exciting thing after another and she is still only at the beginning.
Oh, Gemma May – I miss that seemingly endless time with you back in our days of pre-school and hanging out. Everything was a squeal of delight, sparkly and happy. You entered the room like a shining star every single time I saw you, golden-red-haired curls bouncing and a smile so big it filled the house. You lived your toddler years on a perpetual-virtual red carpet, blowing kisses to the fans, a family who has adored you always.
Now, having graduated so beautifully from your Kindergarten year, I see a girl as lovely as a spring day, just like the morning of the day in May when you were born. You are a little more contemplative, more graceful and grown up. Your hair swings like light beams behind you, your eyes curl playfully as you tell me a fascinating story, your contagious giggle would disarm a London Guard.
You are SIX now, Gemma-Loo! I am so pleased with what a lovely girl you are. I am so proud of you and what a wonderful daughter and little sister you are to your family. And I sure do love any Gemma-time I can get, what with your very popular and busy calendar. You really are both sugar and spice and really everything nice!
NOTE: All photos by her talented-photo-taking mama. See more at www.maydae.com
What do Broccoli Cheese Soup at the Big Wheel, birthing classes at Howard Community with the Loftises on Thursday nights, Princess Diana, a really ornery Tilt-a-Whirl operator at Indiana Beach Amusement Park (now fancily called a resort), the song “He Means More to Me Today Because of Yesterday” by the Sounds of Happyness, and a beautiful morning in May with the lilacs in full bloom have in common?
My Stephanie. Second child, only preemie, the teeny-tiniest babe who caused faith to rise in my heart as I prayed to God for her in the dark night, me in the hospital in Kokomo – her fighting to breathe at James Whitcomb Riley Hospital in Indianapolis. Thirty-one years ago.
If an old friend lets you down
And a true love can’t be found
Till the blue skies come around
I’ll be right by your side
You weren’t due until June, very late June, very-very late June. But you came in May and it was beautiful and it was a surprise and it was meant to be. And every May since, we are reminded of the blessing and miracle and joy and completion and maturity and faith you brought with you, and what it caused in us.
No don’t forget me now that we’re apart
Just open up that great big loving heart
And you’ll always be
You’ll always be
You’ll always be a part… of me…
As middle names go, May wasn’t even on “the list,” and was perhaps a little old-fashioned for the times. But we named you Stephanie because of one our favorite actresses at the time (Stephanie Powers) and because one of my all-time greatest Bible heroes is Stephen (see Acts chapter 6). And May was for the month, the merry merry month of May. Because it was a magical, lovely time in our lives – all was right and beautiful and exciting and we anticipated your birth with great energy and expectancy. And yet, you were actually so unexpected on that Friday, 5 1/2 weeks before your “due date.”
Take your time to embrace romance
Teach your children how to sing and dance
Love may hurt but it’s worth the chance
I’ll be right by your side…
And haven’t you been so many unexpected things things since? Haven’t you just always done and became and created and produced and added to and on and surprised and delighted and shined and sang and wrote and been successful and just grown up to be an unexpected bundle on wondrousness? Haven’t you? Yes, you have.
Try to be the best you can
Show compassion to every man
And always take the higher ground
I’ll be right by your side
Journey far and travel safe
Make this world a better place
And keep that smile upon your face
I’ll be right by your side…
I wasn’t perfect this I would admit
I was always trying to make the pieces fit
Just know you’ll always be
You’ll always be
You’ll always be a part of me…
You’re a trailblazer and a trendsetter. The family looks at you to confirm cool because if it isn’t, you’ll be the first to know. Your children are awed by you, your husband reveres you. Your siblings recognize your gifts and your parents are pleased with how you turned out and in seeing God’s favor and blessing on your life.
And so I bring you the gift of these words and my prayers and wishes for you. The theme is this: I believe in you. And I hope you will open that gift with fearlessness and abandon, knowing you’ll always be a part of me, the best part of me.
Happy Birthday, Stephanie, amazing, blazing, sizzling daughter, strong woman and spirited girl. Your life was ordained and has so much value. I thank God for breathing into your lungs the breath of life, quickening your tiny mortal body 31 short years ago with the very power that raised Christ Jesus from the dead. That healing will take you all the way to the end with great fire and presence. Go get ’em, Steph! {love from your mom}
Don’t ask me how the time has gone
I’ve loved you since the minute you were born
So many times we have laughed and cried
I see you now it fills my heart with pride
You’ll always be
You’ll always be
You’ll always be a part… of me…*
*Pure Love, Rod Stewart
I love writing by inspiration. Love it. When it happens, drop everything! It does not happen often enough for my taste.
Yesterday, a late afternoon thunder storm rolled in and everything got very dark for half a hour and inspiration hit and for 20 minutes words-words-words poured out and arranged themselves with vivid color and texture and sound and I could taste raindrops and see flower petals magnified and I was inside the writing and the phrases just built themselves with a flow of loveliness that fell like magic raindrops.
Then something crashed with this crazy computer or with WordPress or something and ($#@!@#$!!!) and I lost.every.single.bit.of.it. All the magic dissipated and I had to be somewhere right then and I couldn’t even try to recall.
How can it be gone? It is.
Oh, sweet mamala. You make me laugh. And cry, sometimes, too, from laughing so hard. But mostly you just make me smile, and feel loved! My whole lifelong I have had a most amazing mom, but I only really-really got to know her deeply after my kids were older and she was my current age (too busy in life). Then I finally got to see her heart and understand her soul and mind and how much I really finally began to hope-hope-hope to grow up to be just like her. It is my aim and deepest wish to somehow attain to become as wonderful as my mom, if that is even ever possible.
I fear I’ll forget some important acknowledgements, but if I could just say to a FEW women I know…
Happy Mother’s Day to Heather, Amy Jo, Patrice, Candi, Pearly-Q and Marilyn. Your kids range from newborn to fully grown and I learn so much from you, time and again. But especially today, to my Marilyn. You raised 2 lovely, lovely children, who gave you more babies. A couple of months ago, you lost one – except that he isn’t lost, we know this. He has just gone on ahead. And today on Mother’s Day, since Jason isn’t here to join Kori in saying it, I know he knew and so I will say, You are one of the best moms on the planet and I know your children never ever have doubted your love and affection for them. So happy Mother’s Day, sweet Marilyn.
Dana, my sweet, you look at your children with such deep affection and reverence. I am inspired by your love for them and your capacity to love the children around the world. Your heart is big enough to do all God is calling you to, this is evident. So many children to come…
I also wanted to say Happy Mother’s Day to my little sister. Tami has not birthed any babies in the physical sense, but no one can deny the place she has held in the hearts of teenagers and kids everywhere as she and her husband have led youth groups and churches across the country. Everybody loves Tami and if anything had ever happened to us when my kids were little, she was going to have all 5 of mine! :) As an aunt, she is superb, and she’s carried my mommying burdens with me many times. So on this day, I recognize the nurturing gift and godly woman and mother figure she holds to many, many people looking for a spiritual mom. You are wonderful, Tami.
Stef – what an honor I have had to get to watch you become a mom when Sawyer was born, and to get to walk the halls with you for Wryder’s birth. The care and details you pour into these babies, how you invest in giving them a loving home and a wonderful life is amazing. I hope you can see that God trusts you with them – that you are the one He knew could do this. You are a lovely mama.
And my friend Stephanie, I have to say Happy Mother’s Day to her! Steph, you have proven that even though it is hard and there are battle wounds, you can blend and watch a family thrive. I love that you and your son joined yourselves to your handsome love and his children and are beating all odds. Yesterday to see the joy, the happiness, the this IS working for us, we are family: priceless! Well done, Stephanie!
Plus TWO nieces: My niece, Lori because she has LOTS of kids and never loses track of them or faith in them. And recently-lots of extra-mommying has been happening. Happy Mother’s Day, Lori. AND Elise-the-Niece gave birth to her baby boy, Blake Matthew, at 00:04 this morning. HAPPY Mother’s Day!
Tara was born just before Mother’s Day in 1979. I took her to church that morning, just 4 days old. I heard the Mother’s Day sermon and felt the awe of what had just been delivered to me. By God Himself! Beauty. These women – are so good at what they do, so far beyond what I ever was. I am constantly amazed as I watch them raise their own {8} lovely children.
Every Mother’s Day I think I should be thanking my 5 kids. Plus the ones who call me mom, now, the ones I did not have to labor over (blessed!).
To the 5: You are my trophies and my reward – heritage {!}, not for anything I could have or would have thought to do or be as a mom, but because God can only give amazing gifts, and oh, so He did! But you’re testaments to Him, He is so faithful and good and He knew I needed the ways each of you challenge me. I love watching your lives and seeing you become the glory of all God had in mind when he reached into my womb and created your little beings there. I love watching your families grow and seeing His faithfulness poured out over you, too.
Just recently got this photo in some of Dad Rhoades’s belongings after his death. I had never seen it.
Please give me all the way to the end to become the mom God has in mind and I promise I shall keep trying with all my might to get there. You are the proof that God is able to use feet of clay and everyday vessels. He is just so faithful. I am just so blessed.
Tara + Dave = Hunter and now Malakai, too (Doesn’t he just make this Mother’s Day all the more special?). Three men and a beautiful woman! Adoption, so amazing, so sweet. Our firstborn is blessed with a lovely family. I love you so.
Stephanie, you started the growing-family thing by marrying Tristan, then giving us our very first grandbebe, plus two more darlings: Gavin, Guinivere, and Gemma May. The Kelley family, head-turners and beautiful. I love you deeply.
Tredessa loves Ryan and we love him, too. And they are a family (we pray for many children for them in the future!). You are a joy and delight as you have always been. Love you lots!
Rocky and Jovan and all their little women, Averi-J, Amelie Belle and baby-Bailey fill the world with frills and fun. Rock-bo, you’re blessed and surrounded by love and respect, including mine.
Stormie, our sweet baby girl ~ favorite auntie and love of our lives. You are the final flourish, the grand finale, the ‘ta-da.’ Love you like crazy, baby girl.
Ryan and Tredessa are pregnant! They told us a few weeks ago and were going to make us stay silent for another month but they couldn’t wait either! Bebe is due in mid- December and we are so happy. :) So, Happy Mother’s Day to you, too, Tre-Tre!
As the music at the banquet
As the wine before the meal
It was 5:55 a.m. The sun had just broken through bright and I felt the earth move. Actually, probably less the earth moving than having that first, distinct contraction – that sign for which I had waited, wondering if I’d even know when you’d be coming. But there it was – a new sensation, so marked and unambiguous, I knew everything was about to change forever. I drank in the sun as it rose through my window. I looked at the clock and my heart palpitated with wild excitement.
Today is the day. This child for whom I have prepared and waited would arrive. Today – this baby that had caused me to exercise daily and eat so many vegetables for its’ health – now we would see.
Boy or girl? I didn’t know, but I was praying for a baby girl with blond hair and rosy cheeks (like the baby of one of my college Bible teachers). I had a vision in mind…
No one but Grandma and I even knew. It was our happy little secret all day as we went here or there. I wrote down contraction times and when asked by friends and church family, “When are you going to have that baby?” “Oh, maybe today, I’d tell them,” smiling so big inside about the best secret in the world.
5:55 a.m. and the clock spun wildly around until 5:55 p.m. when I told Grandma, “I need to go to the hospital now.” I am not sure how I knew it except that I was packing my bag and when a contraction would come, I’d have to stop what I was doing to breath through it. I was giddy with anticipation, feeling out of control.
But grandpa. He wanted us to wait and drop him at the church. So we left at 6:15 and drove {the almost opposite direction} to drop him at his office around 6:30 p.m. and then we were off to the hospital. Okay-maybe I am being dramatic, as it was only about a 10 mile trip, but when you are in transition…
We pulled up to the doors at emergency so my mom could drop me off and I was met with a wheel chair at 6:48 p.m. As we went over the bumpy grate going in, I said to my wheelchair-pusher, “Could you stop for a minute? I am having a contraction and need to breathe.”
“Oh, honey,” she said with great disdain. “You are never going to make it. This is your first baby and you will be in labor for at least 20 hours and if you are acting like this now, you will never make it.” I figured she was the expert and I thought if what she was telling me was true I would never be able to do this for 20 more hours. I was not going to make it.
But I also kind of wanted to hit her.
She delivered me to labor and delivery and you were born at 7:16 p.m. – just 28 minutes after my mom had delivered me to the door. I have never gotten over the fact that I didn’t get to smack that wheelchair pusher. I just never have.
As the firelight in the night
So are you to me
At two
You surprised me and showed right up and it was beautiful and mysterious and awe-inspiring and magical and spiritual and breath-taking and it was you and me, just us. And you looked at me, and I couldn’t quit looking at you and though we’d only just met, I felt so at home with your warm, fuzzy head. The smell of you, the contour of your face in the barely-lit room: proof of God’s love for me. A gift straight from heaven! I knew I was undeserving. I knew no one, no one, but God could have, would have entrusted you to me.
At three
As the ruby in the setting
As the fruit upon the tree
Oh, love story of love stories – my baby, my own, a sweet tiny, pink-bundled girl. Blonde-haired, blue-eyed, joy of joys. I wondered if I was actually allowed to feel this happy – because I was sure some one would take you away if they knew.
As the wind blows over the plains
So are you to me
Read about Kai’s adoption story here
And now, joy-child, beautiful woman with two sons of your own {I learn so much from watching you mother them, love them} – it is a day to celebrate your birth, to remember and recall that day thirty-four years ago with gratefulness and thankfulness to a loving God who drew my heart to His with the most loving-kindess imaginable in the form of a girl, tender and sweet, now a woman – wise and lovely. I do thank God for you. I do. So I wish for you (a prayer-wish, of course):
As the wind blows over the plains
So are you to me
So are you to me
It isn’t really black. I wanted a gray, but I hate cool, cold grays. That is prison. I wanted a warm gray, something I could live with. Almost like a well-erased chalkboard, but not. I also have seen beauty in charcoal briquettes – variations as they burn from jet-black to white hot, so I said, “I want a dark, almost-black wall. It has to be warm and ‘read black.’ But it can’t be cold and rigid. There has to be warmth and drama, and really excellent contrast. Contrast is key. But warmth for sure. Don’t forget warmth.”
You can actually Google that color and there are so many images of it. The best use of it is found at www.emilyaclark.com. It sort of looks dark brown when you open the can, but then it is gray-a warm charcoal (almost black) gray. I liked it so much, I did two walls. One in the family room (it used to be red). And the stairwell wall going upstairs. Two different rooms.
There are going to be white-framed mirrors filling this resplendent Urbane Bronze wall.
“Most accidents occur in the home,” we have all heard. Dang it. It’s true.
So Dave was painting the stairwell wall this oil-rubbed-dark-bronzey color that I am head-over-heels for {did I tell you about Urbane Bronze? Yes? Ok, then}. It came time to paint the very vital edge of it – the place it would meet the creamy-white of the ceiling. Of course, that has to be pristine in every way. There can be nothing short of perfection in the edges. The edges are the glorious contrast and distinction of this paint job.
But the ceiling over the stairs slopes down slightly from a 16′ high peak. And Dave could reach and tape a good portion from a ledge at the top of the landing. And he could reach the heights from the floor on his 8 foot ladder at the bottom of the stairs. But there were these 8 feet in the middle…
We tried something. It didn’t work like we had hoped.
Do not jimmy-rig a “quick” scaffold from found objects, plop a small ladder atop and think, “Wow-this is working great. No problem.” Because it might not actually be so, moments later.
Dave – shown here holding one of the frames that will be getting mirrored so I could begin to imagine the beauty of this Urbane Bronzed wall filled with white-framed mirrors. This is when we thought our plan was working, just minutes before it turned out not to be…
Anyway – it sort of collapsed, and a 2″ x 8″ x 6′ board hit my right cheekbone {very} near my eye at about 300 pounds of speed and force and Dave eventually (because I saw it in slow-mo) dropped onto the tile floor on his noggin and got a headache. My eye swelled like an egg, so I iced it for 15 minutes, removed some wood from my finger (which was bruised black by the iPhone I was still holding when the dust settled – even though my glasses were across the room, neatly folded and didn’t even look like they just been hit by low-flying lumber).
First I cried because I thought I’d killed my husband just to have my Urbane Broze wall. Then, we laughed about it {wearing an eye patch for the rest of my life because I’d lost an eyeball just would not have been my style at all} and just resumed our work.
But as the day wore on, my eye turned into a full-fledged, good, old-fashioned shiner and my face swelled up. Then Dave’s ribs started feeling sore and his ring finger turned a really terrible shade of gray – the exact shade of gray I wanted to avoid on my walls at all costs. It took us awhile, but we finally convinced him to go to the doctor.
But not before he started painting the next room and mowed the lawn and all that stuff. :) He just made an appointment for two days later and went on with life.
Blood work and x-rays and answering lots of questions revealed cracked ribs on both sides, a bruised head (no concussion, thank the Lord) and a broken, gray-black-purply ring finger (plus some very bad blood sugar numbers – I knew it). Nothing terribly serious, but I have a feeling the momentum to paint the whole house just got the air let out of its’ tires.
*Sigh. So close!
We had already decided to re-stain and paint the banister and railings to rid them of the awful orangey-pine look and even though that was going to be a project at a later date, but, since the wood that hit my face first shaved off an eighth of an inch of finish and wood on the railing top and broke a couple of spindles, too – that project gets moved up. Isn’t that fortuitous?
Averi is here for school today and she got a matching black eye to make me feel better…when I discovered that my normal everyday eye shadow contains all the colors in my black eye. Hmm….
Geesh. We are now most certainly a statistic of accidents at home, sweet home.
Frank Viola has been mentioned on this blog a few times, including, but not limited to HERE and HERE, over THERE and on THIS POST, too, during my first read-through of From Eternity to Here. I have read it…a few times.
And I follow him on Twitter. He has such a way with words, his writing just blows me away. I just ordered his new book from Amazon, God’s Favorite Place on Earth. Here is why I wanted to read it:
And this:
Why Read the Book? Conquering 18 Struggles
Using story, biblical narrative, and practical teaching, God’s Favorite Place on Earth will equip you to:
•Gain God’s peace and presence in the midst of your worst storm.
•Grow to the place where you are beyond being offended.
•Truly forgive and release those who have rejected you.
•Learn how to live life without fear of anything.
•Trust God when He doesn’t meet your expectations or doesn’t appear to fulfill His promises.
•Increase your faith and overcome doubt.
•Defeat discouragement with a new perspective on Jesus.
•Find out what Jesus means and doesn’t mean by the command, “Follow Me.”
•Be set free from a guilty conscience and delivered from spiritual burn-out.
•Learn how we’ve been misinformed about Mary and Martha and why this is important for your own walk with God.
•Handle rejection, misunderstanding, and unjust criticism, especially from fellow Christians.
•Be set free from bitterness.
•Discover what God is looking for beyond everything else, solidifying the vision for the Christian life into “one thing.”
•Identify what touches the heart of Jesus the most. (It may surprise you.)
•Be inspired to serve the Lord with renewed vigor and zeal.
•Have your heart awakened with newfound love for Jesus by seeing Him afresh.
•Find deliverance from materialism (consumerism) and discover the meaning of “wasting yourself” on Jesus.
•Respond wisely to well-meaning friends when they give you poor advice during your suffering.
These are just some of the many lessons you’ll find in God’s Favorite Place on Earth.
I am not telling you which 10 I am drawn to…Plus what Jack Hayford said:
“Frank Viola’s pen and voice are consistently both penetrating and trustworthy. Beyond his invitingly beautiful writing skill—which makes reading a joy and a sight-seeing tour that brings God’s Word into 3-D when he relates narrative passages, I’m grateful for the depth of his themes. Frank probes the ‘deep calls unto deep’ content of the Holy Spirit’s call within the Scriptures, and awakens that hunger that must be regularly fed to secure renewal in each of us. God’s Favorite Place on Earth is the kind of book I’ve discovered I need to periodically find and read; thereby keeping ‘the fallow ground’ of my own soul plowed, re-sown and watered, in order to continue fruitfulness and to deepen the root system of my spiritual walk and growth in Christ.”
Frank Viola has actually given us a sneak peek, a bonus chapter about Mary anointing Jesus before His death. AND a sampler is available here, 20% of the book. Who does this??? But this isn’t even the “free” stuff I told you about.
If you buy a copy of this new book by May 7th, and spread the word about it on your Twitter and Facebook and email, {read all the deets here}, Frank Viola will give you 25 books and audios for being part of his launch-team. See the list of free things here.
I don’t think I have ever seen so many things given away for free. What a blessing! Your summer reading and resources all in one place!
I just wanted to share with you because I already ordered my book and immediately (no shipping) got the other things as well and I wanted you to be able to get it, too. It is an amazing opportunity. Really!
Absolutely…not. But am I going to do it? Yes, I am.
So – I have this ridiculously ornate, gold mirror I have been using for many years now. I have used it in an early 1920s Craftsman, an 1800s Victorian, a 1970s split-level and most recently here, in the “sanctuary.” It has been flanked by barn art (I have a thing for barns), Victorian paintings and in this house, I just went for it and surrounded it with religious iconic paintings in more gaudy, gold, Italian-made, ornate frames.
That is weird, right? But it was the week of the earthquake during the World Series between the Oakland A’s and the San Francisco Giants in October of 1989.
We had a house guest and he wanted to go looking through junk stores one day in Norfolk, NE. There was a really odd one with tons of space and hardly anything in there that called themselves a tool store. All I know is I bought 5000 lace, paper doilies for $5, a Hymnal published in 1910 for $1.25 and 2 old-old, heavy, well-made frames (the small one was $2.00). But this? This gold one is the piece-de-resistance from that day. Measuring in at 4′ x 4′, it was a steal for only $5!
It is wood construction with carved wood details, and is actually three separate frames layered into one. Trying not to be too technical, but we used to own a frame shop, so I can’t help it. If you brought in a good piece of art and wanted something done in museum-quality, you would pay by the foot for each of the parts. Each! There is the outer frame, an inner liner that is velvet-wrapped (a framing detail rarely used these days and quite costly), and inside that, a thin gold-washed liner.
The outer frame is an over-the-top, heavily-ornamented, Italian Baroque. It is gold-leafed to the max, REAL gold-leaf. You can find, if you search, where the leaves of gold came together here and there, but it was done well, not spray-painted by a machine like most frames today. I couldn’t even afford that much gold leaf, if I wanted to do a project this big, now.
The dark parts you see in the carvings are where the wood, once carved, was stained a deep, dark mahogany. The leafing was on top. It wasn’t washed in later, as is common now.
I hauled it home, ordered a mirror insert, and voila. At every single house, Dave has cringed wondering whether the wall would be able to hold it, but it isn’t as heavy as it looks and every wall has been up to the challenge.
It was considered junk when I nabbed it in 1989. And not everyone could appreciate the style, for sure (I love Italian ornate), but there is one thing it has always been, all these 24 years of it’s time with me: authentic.
It really was from the 1960s, really Italian, really wood, carved-wood, gold-leafed Baroque, not some imitation of those (many of which are done nicely, but…). A real beauty. Aging, certainly, but true to its’ intent.
Now it is going to get a face-lift. I am painting it white – even the velvet. My daughters are egging me on. It will hang on a charcoal-colored wall.
I seriously doubt if this new look will have the stamina to last 24 more years. Much like an aging Hollywood beauty, once the face-lifts begin, more will have to follow, I am certain.
I know about furniture facelifts’ short life-spans because in our early marriage, in the 1980s when wood was so vogue, we spent much time and effort stripping all the antiquing and painting people had done in the late 1970s and thought: “What were they thinking, painting this beautiful wood furniture this color???”
And with all the painting going on these days – I hold my breath…because this mirror? Is never going back to its’ authentic, real state again. Much like Kenny Roger’s big round eyes which will never crinkle in warm smile lines like they once did, when I make this step, this is a white frame. It can’t go back.
Most people will see it next to the Home Interiors framed mirror or the Ung Drill I just got from IKEA and assume it is like those: fake, but fun versions of something from another continent. It will be sort of like having a Kim Kardashian next to an Elizabeth Taylor. Maybe Kim is beautiful, but it is hard to really tell and we never got to see her before every possible augmentation. But no one will ever doubt Elizabeth was drop-dead, breathtakingly beautiful, and real.
I will know my frame was beautiful all along.
It is going to look fabulous. It will be totally dramatic. I need a big change for fun (bye-bye, Under the Tuscan Sun house), but these changes cannot be undone. Ready or not….
I know. I am so silly, huh?
Somewhere, in one of the 6 large boxes of family photographs my camera-totin’-mama has been hauling around for the 50+ years of her marriage and children’s lives – there are pictures from THE family vacation of a lifetime. I’ll have to try to find some next time I go see her.
We didn’t do many big vacations growing up. We might take four days in St Louis to hit 2 Cardinal Baseball games and spend a day at Six Flags over Mid-America, or go see relatives a state or two away. Of course Camp Meeting and Church Camps were annual events. But extravagant travel was not part of my growing up years.
But one year, oh yes, there was this one year…
My Uncle Bill convinced my parents to join him and my Aunt Donnitta and their 6 kids (before number 7 came along) for a camping trip to Colorado.
The whole trip deserves its own blog, as it was a journey that took in the whole of Colorado. We went everywhere from Trail Ridge Road to The Royal Gorge and back again and camped beautiful Colorado that June in 1971. It was an amazing trip. I saw thousands of hippies, bought beaded Indian dolls and giant pencils at little shops filled with cedar boxes, shot glasses and state-spoons, was afraid we’d fall off a mountain cliff as we drove up-up-up and nearly froze in the early morning air – plus threw a few snowballs in the high country in the bright Colorado sunshine.
But the best thing of all?
Oh, I loved Buckskin Joe! It was a tourist-trap-type “ghost town” that was part theme park, part movie set (the actual reason it had been built), part peek-into-the-old-west, part pretend-you’re-in-an-episode-of-Gunsmoke. They had gunfights in the streets and swinging saloon doors and horses clopping down the road and cowboys with chaps and spurs and buildings to tour and trinkets to buy, not to mention – saloon girls!
Since I was regularly found watching the old black and white “Wells Fargo” reruns on Saturday afternoons at home, my mom took me to the “newspaper office” in Buckskin Joe and had a headline printed up for me on an old-fashioned news-form, “Jeanie Moslander holds up Wells Fargo Stage.” It looked so real.
It was originally built (a gathering of buildings from real Colorado ghost towns were relocated) in 1957 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for making movies.
Because westerns were an American staple at that time, Buckskin Joe was a bustling, well-known place. There were people coming and going and we got to observe several “bar brawls” and guns being pulled and fake-fights with cowboys throwing a drunk tumbling down the dirt streets. There was even a train that took you right out to look over The Royal Gorge – scary! Oh, it was imaginative and fun. I really thought I might run in to John Wayne while I was there. I hoped maybe Little Joe Cartwright or Heath Barclay from the Big Valley would show up, marry me and we could do our trading in Buckskin Joe regulalrly. :)
Cat Ballou (1965) Jane Fonda, Lee Marvin
True Grit (1969) John Wayne, Glen Campbell, Kim Darby
Barquero (1970) Lee Van Cleef, Warren Oates, Forrest Tucker
The Cowboys (1972) John Wayne, Roscoe Lee Browne, Bruce Dern, Slim Pickins
The Brothers O’Toole (1973) John Astin
Mr. Majestyk (1974) Charles Bronson
The Dutchess and the Dirtwater Fox (1976) George Segal, Goldie Hawn
The White Buffalo (1977) Charles Bronson, Jack Warden
How the West Was Won (1977 TV mini-series) James Arness, Eva Marie Saint
Comes a Horseman (1978) James Caan, Jane Fonda, Jason Robards
True Grit: A Further Adventure (1978 TV movie) Warren Oates
The Sacketts (1991) two-part television movie, Sam Elliott, Tom Selleck
Conagher (1991) Sam Elliott, Katharine Ross, Ken Curtis, Barry Corbin.
Cannibal! The Musical (1993) Trey Parker
Lightning Jack (1994) Paul Hogan, Cuba Gooding Jr.
I never forgot Buckskin Joe. So when we moved to Colorado, we added a trip to Buckskin Joe to the things we wanted our kids to experience.
Well, let’s just say, that by the mid-to-late 90s, the time we made the family trip, the glory days were past. I bet there weren’t 30 or 40 people in the whole town the day we went. There was hardly any staff. The buildings were primarily empty and just there to observe, as opposed to the 70s when each was interactive and filled with fun activity. There were still train rides and horse rides and some fun old-fashioned carnival style activities, and of course, still cowboy-days artifacts and the old Colorado buildings, but Buckskin wasn’t the same. Buckskin had lost its’ glory. Still I was glad to have taken my kids to a place that lives in vista-colored-infamy in my memories
In my secret heart, I vowed to one day return, buy it and put it on the most-desired-vacation map again!
Not long ago I decided it was time to take the grandbebes. My heart palpitated with the thought. We could drive to Canon City on a Friday. I would dress them all like Roy Rogers and Dale Evans and we’d hit cowboy-paradise first thing Saturday morning.
But alas. It is no more. When I googled to find out prices and hours, *sniff *sniff, I found out it got purchased by a private party. And this person has disassembled Buckskin Joe to move to his own ranch far, far away (Gunnison) – never to be enjoyed by me again. It is his, all his.
Some billionaire (William Koch), who has nothing better to spend his money on than my very heart and soul, is making my dream of taking my grandbebes to Buckskin Joe a dream that will never happen. Sadness. Deep abiding sadness. *sniffles
I’ll never forget you, Buckskin Joe, and the imagination you ignited in me. Happy Trails, old town.
Now – where else could I take the grand-girls-and-boys that dressing like Dale and Roy would be acceptable??? :)