Dude hasn't been able to go to a Vacation Bible School in the past as my work schedule impedes on my ability to get him to and from. But this year, Cara told us about her church's option which met in the evenings. They combine with a Hispanic church in Littleton, which was awesome, so we decided to join Payton and Brady this year. All the Dutch toe head kids and the dark haired kids praised them some Jesus together all week long. He had an absolute blast and wishes he could go every night. Bless all the volunteers who put these camps on. It's certainly a lot of work and chaos, but so wort it.
"Hey Babe," I said. "Wanna roll around in the mud with me on Father's Day?" His answer was emphatically, "Yes." And so we did just that. Well, we rolled around with Anne, Kevin, Anne's cousin and sister-in-law too. It was awesome and more enjoyable than I ever could have possibly imagined it to be. You see, a mud run isn't exactly something Gwen would be prone to do. But some force came over me while I sat at work pondering what to do on Father's Day and THIS is what I came up with. Part of me wanted to jump out of the moving car on the way there and run for the hills (mountains), but I put my big, adventurous girl pants on and stuck with my decision. So glad I did. We all had a blast and our skin was left extremely exfoliated. And parts of us, to remain unnamed, were a bit chaffed from the constant presence of running while covered in mud and small pebbles. But that's part of the glory of the experience.
Who knew, as Seniors in high school, that we'd find ourselves swimming in mud together in Colorado. I love it.
Throughout the 3.3 mile course, there were multiple obstacles. Large mud pits with hidden sink holes, were just one of the treats we ventured through. Others included jumping over 6 foot high hay bales (which contributed to the chaffing), monkey bars, net towers, wooden walls, tires and an awesomely awesome air filled, slip n slide that spanned what seemed like 1/4 mile. The highlight for sure.
My dad took these pictures. I think he might have peed his pants at the sight of his daughter actually going through with said mud run. One of his proudest moments I'm sure.
Note my son in front of us. This is the closest he would get to us. He was absolutely in awe of the fact that we chose to get dirty. Pretty sure we lost some of his respect that day.
"Daddy, you dewty. Mama, you dewty too. Go way."
They're kind enough to provide ice cold water nozzles for those who don't want to dirty their car seats. I gave my shoes away to charity.
My mom arrived last week in order to join our fam for a 3 day trip to a Wyoming Dude Ranch. I've been looking forward to getting the heck outta town for weeks, but I had no idea how much we would all fall in love with life on the ranch. We've been home for over a week and I'm still gloomy about the fact that we couldn't ditch suburbia and stay there. Forever. What made us fall so deeply for this 300,000 acre sanctuary of bliss?
The above photos are from a cattle ranch 20 minutes outside the dude ranch. The kids were picking up cow pies (knowingly) and chucking them in the stream. And then subsequently licking their hands. I threw my intuitions out the window at that point. Everything was fair game. Poop and all.
This is to warn you of the airstrip you're above to drive over.
Our home away from home. Directly over a rushing river. Come on.
Below are countless (I apologize) images of the highlight of the weekend for my dear son. This child is afraid of rolypolys but fell head over heels in love and adoration with the 120 horses on the property. He would talk to them, pet them, feed them, brush them, giggle at them....I've never seen him so immediately drawn to a creature with no qualms or fears. We were blessed with a 2 hour period of time with Miss Lynne (his cowgirl). She gave him a one-on-one with the horses and allowed him a chance to learn how to ride and lead horses around the pen. He was over the moon and did so well. So, forgive on onslaught of photos. It was a rather special weekend for the Dude.
These front 2 white horses would not leave each other's side. Dude rode one of them and the other needed to be tied up to watch. It was darling.
He loved him his cowgirl. At first he referred to her as "his farmer." We educated him at that point.
Home, home on the range. Where the deer, the antelope, my children, the horses and the chicken play. Where seldom is heard a discouraging word or a whine or a screaming cry. And the skies are not cloudy all day. And people make us food. And clean the dishes.
A big part of me feels like God intended life to be like what we experienced here. I have a better understanding of the passion so many people feel for a rural way of life. No TV. No Internet. No cell service. No skyscrapers. No pollution. No video games. No Walmart. No traffic. Everything there was as it's meant to be. Free and endless entertainment for kids -the young ones and the adult ones. Natural, relaxed and unbelievably beautiful. Of course it's not for everyone, but I felt so incredibly at peace and happy there. I couldn't run errands or get on Facebook, so I didn't. I long to go back and wonder if some day we might just find a plot of land in Sedalia or Evergreen by a stream and call it a day. Weirder things have happened.
Our crew currently lives in the middle of the Michigan woods in a log cabin. We called Denver home (thus the name of this blog) for 17 years until 2019, when we uprooted our unsuspecting children and dog to this new life in the Midwest. After a loooong hiatus, we're back in this simple internet space trying to document life from our quirky perspective. Thanks for being here.
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