Mom’s window, facing East
After Costa Rica, home briefly and then to the ranch. As my cousin, Janet, said, “Wait. Just. A. Minute. Costa Rica to South Dakota for Spring Break? You’ve got that flipped!”
We loved it. We went for the college’s Spring Break. Wynn stayed in Santa Fe for her own school. This is the first trip I’ve made in over 20 years without children. This is also the longest I’ve been able to spend on the ranch in years and years. As many of the photos are worth a thousand words, I’ll get out of the way and let them speak for themselves and our time there.
It takes 14 hours to drive from Santa Fe if you only stop briefly at the Barnes & Nobles Bookstore in CO and for gas in Lusk, WY. We always drive in one day, leaving early in the am.
Noé and I arrived just in time for wine, cheese, and crackers.
Woke the next morning to this sunrise.
And this sign, as we walked to the ranch house for coffee.
Mom loaned me her pink Carhartt’s and Noé, Dad, and I headed out to see all on the ranch that we’d missed over the past year.
Mom’s Little Free Library at the top of the lane.
Two beloved horses—Josie, on the right, inspired the mare, Mame, in Meadowlark. Josie’s son, Frankie (Ol’ Mr. Blue Eyes) is one of Mom’s BFF’s. To say that she adores him would be an understatement.
Joanie and Frankie—A love story.
Josie’s coat in the sun.
Wink’s Washout—Now open for Summer/Fall 2017!
One of the things I love about Mom and Dad’s ranch house is that it is filled with bits of beauty from our own family history and from around the world. Some beauty to share.
Mom’s other window facing East.
Smiling tea pot and cups. The first was Bo’s and mine as children. She’s added for the grands throughout the years.
Mom’s bookshelves of treasures, including teddy bears made of my Grandma Mary’s fur coat (one really doesn’t wear them anymore…), needle and quiltwork from dear friends, a doll made my by Great Grammie Lucille with her own hair, a pair of bootie’s knitted for Wyatt, duckies that represent the grands, and gifts from around the world.
Mom’s vintage marble collection, started in Cascabel.
Jeans hung out to dry.
Pregnant mamas ready to give birth.
We spent a gorgeous afternoon with my cousin, Missy, who has taught in a one-room schoolhouse, grades K-8, for the past several years. Her students are the most fortunate in South Dakota. Here, a storm moves in during our time there.
Storm moves in. Atall School. ©Missy Urbaniak
Storm over Atall School. ©Missy Urbaniak
Mom brought the kids books from Arizona. They surprised her with a birthday party!
Missy’s sons, Bailey, Everett, and I found the school library. While Mom and Missy worked, we found loads of books for the boys to read next. Such treasures from when my own boys were this age that brought back such memories of our reading together. It was all I could not to curl up and start reading to them in that moment.
Bailey, Everett, and books!
View from ranch house on porch facing East. Prairie Parlour on left.
Memories of the Cascabel Ranch and Mexico.
Memories of Mexico and Cascabel
It was a week of wonderfulness.
South-facing Porch
May 4, 2017 at 10:38 pm
These pages ooze happiness. These pictures drip color. No need for captions. Smiles tell it all.
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April 24, 2017 at 5:10 pm
Beautiful images, people, sentiments. Thank you!
April 30, 2017 at 9:49 pm
Dear Laura, so wonderful to spend that time with you this week. A real blessing to share time together.
XOXO
Dawn
April 24, 2017 at 3:23 pm
Absolutely love it…. I love how you cherish the little things in life so much. In that respect you and I are much alike. I find so much peace in mountain views, sunsets, wild life, music, art. We are lucky.
Tommy
April 30, 2017 at 9:50 pm
Dear Tommy, I can absolutely see how you cherish the little things in life, as well. All of this shines through in our conversations and what you share and post. Very grateful to share our journeys.
Here’s to sunsets!
a hug,
Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 7:28 pm
Love your posts. I really love the picture of the colored glass balls. Where did you find them? Are they difficult to hang? I still have the paper flowers you pointed out to me at the San Antonio Mexican Market, the old “Market Square 9 (?) years ago. When we met you with Michael.
April 30, 2017 at 9:53 pm
Dear Janine,
Aren’t those glass balls gorgeous? I simply love, as well. No, not difficult to find at all. Even if you start with Googling, “Hanging glass balls.” A few of these are called “Witch’s balls,” which have a historical context that I love. You will be able to find on Amazon and many catalogs. There is one place I love to buy them in Santa Fe. My own house is filled with them, as well. How wonderful that you still have the paper flowers from the San Antonio Mexican Market!
Thank you for sharing the beauty,
Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 5:23 pm
How beautiful.
I makes me happy to see that how deeply you cherish these moments and days.
Having lost members of my family I look back and think of my time with them as a great,golden treasure.
Best
Connie
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April 30, 2017 at 10:02 pm
Dear Connie,
As I read, I thought of your own life journey with all of it’s great, golden, treasured moments and feel so deeply grateful to share both of our journeys together.
A huge hug,
Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 2:55 pm
Love seeing the wonderful photos! ❤️❤️
Sent from my iPhone
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April 30, 2017 at 10:02 pm
Dear Shirlee, wonderful to hear from you!! Sending love across the miles! Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 2:35 pm
Nice spending time on the ranch with you and Noe and your parents, dear Dawn. Lovely photos!
XOXO
April 30, 2017 at 10:03 pm
Dearest Liz, I just love this! So glad you could join us on the ranch! Much love, Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 9:53 am
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Thank you for the Ranch Tour! You remind me a bit of Scarlett O’Hara and how she found so much of her strength from her family home.
Love,
Glenda
Sent from my little device to yours
April 30, 2017 at 10:05 pm
Dearest Glenda-Girl, so glad you could come to the ranch! Yes, so much strength from family home. Now, I’m off to make clothes out of the drapes!
Love you, Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 5:17 am
Lovely!!!!! Awesome u all had the time together!!!
Sent from my iPhone
April 30, 2017 at 10:05 pm
Dear Mary Main! Finally, we made it to the ranch for more than 24 hours. Absolutely wonderful. Love to you! Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 3:36 am
Oh my, Winkie! How beautiful…including the people. Warms my heart!
Love you all,
Nancy “Yates” (Bartlett)
April 30, 2017 at 10:06 pm
Dearest Nancy, our shared roots of beloved places and people. All we need is Daddy riding up horseback with little Jean in her sun bonnet in front of him in the saddle.
LOVE YOU,
Winkie
April 23, 2017 at 3:03 am
I loved my visit on your family’s ranch, Dawn! I can feel what an incredible time you and your beloved family spent together! Thank you…
April 30, 2017 at 10:07 pm
Dear Mary Jo, I am so grateful to share our family ranch with you. Thank you for coming to visit! Hugs to you across the miles, Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 1:32 am
Dear Dawn,
Your wonderfulness for a week
left me with a desire to tweak
a thought or two to you
as spring coaxes me out of the blue:
I lost my Mum last September;
She joined Dad after 21 years of carrying the parent spirit along,
And on my new journey I remember
A few things which help spur me along…
Your running race,
Photo colors of shared culture and heart,
Stories of family together and apart,
A week on the ranch with timeless grace.
While spring dewdops dance daily,
Bugs and birds sing gaily,
I am thankful for each dewdrop you sent,
Not knowing the uplift it gave where it went.
Such are your gifts as you record and impart,
Those things you observe of which you are part;
I thank you for keeping the pace that you do,
And sharing your bounty again and anew.
My Mum left us with the Bette Middler song “this ol’ house”… ain’t gonna need this house no more…
She’d just mowed the lawn and talked to the neighbor across the road,
Was about to run an errand, and sat down,
Was changing her second sock,
When she had the knock,
And stepped through the Good Lord’s open door.
So from New Mexico’s autumn brown
I flew 38 hours with a heavy load,
Compiling Mum’s eulogy from the many pieces sent me and a long life-story’s store.
I wrote the eulogy up above the world’s oceans and sorrow,
Amid the stars,
Through the clouds,
The endless, stretched out night,
And into the longest dawning light of the tomorrow.
They came Dawn, from far and wide,
To honor her at the graveside:
There met the faces of the cultures of Mum’s life –
Aboriginal, refugees,
Political assylum seekers and PhDs,
From Pakistan, Iran and Perth,
The Kimberly and Eastern States,
And all us relations by birth,
And those by kinships bestowed,
And those by kindnesses that glowed
In lives she had reached out to touch.
It was greater by much,
By much more and many than I can explain
And the world stood still under the sunny, gum-tree sky
And the birds sang on and took our vision up on high,
And the fresh cool air gave way to warmth and heat,
Reminding the mighty gathering ’twas time to go and eat.
And eat they did, little by little,
Telling tales and stories, strong and brittle,
Known and new of a bold, blessed life,
Of friend, sister, mother, Nana, daughter, aunty, wife.
This last winter has been a new kind of cold to overcome,
It’s a life changer when you become the next generation’s matriarchal Mum:
And to the occasion I must rise,
As my first granddaughter lies,
Just a couple of joyous weeks away,
For a spring birthday in May.
Best spring blessings to you and yours, and always thanks for keeping my on your mailing list.
Tanja Burns
April 30, 2017 at 10:33 pm
Dearest Tanja,
I can’t see the screen through the tears…
Your amazing spirit, and your Mum’s, shine through each precious, polished, raw, exquisite perfect word.
I cannot thank you enough for the gift of this poem, to be printed and into my journal to be treasured.
Sheer beauty.
I send such love to you and yours.
Such gratitude for you and our shared journeys.
Such hope for your new granddaughter (and for a photo!)
Tears continue to stream down my face and I look out the window at the blur of green and blue of the sky and trees, as my fingers move across the keyboard.
I cannot thank you enough.
Much love,
Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 1:10 am
Lovely family time, Dawn! Thank you for sharing. Xo peggy
Sent from my iPhone
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April 30, 2017 at 10:35 pm
Peggy, so good to hear from you!! Here’s to our shared South Dakota roots! Love across the miles, Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 12:53 am
Be still my soul! Thank you for sharing pictures of you all and the ranch! I know Joan and Dean were so happy to have you home for a week! My love to each of you. As always I continue to miss the time we had together. I love you!
April 30, 2017 at 10:37 pm
Dearest Cathy, I am so happy that you could come to the ranch to share this time with us! Wine, cheese, and crackers? It was truly beyond wonderful. The first time in years I’ve been able to go for more than a whirlwind of a day or two. Absolutely treasured. So grateful to you! Love and miss you, Dawn
April 23, 2017 at 12:45 am
Tremendous! And good for you for catching up (and good for us fans too). Xoxo
April 30, 2017 at 10:37 pm
Harlan! Thanks ever so much for your encouragement which inspired me to treat myself amidst all to composing this! XOXO
April 23, 2017 at 12:08 am
We love reading your Dewdrops and especially about Arizona and the ranch there. SO MANY terrific memories. Wish youall had stayed longer. Keep up the good work that you do and keep us on the “mailing” list. 🙂
Sharon & Roland
April 30, 2017 at 10:47 pm
Dear Sharon and Roland, yes, SO MANY terrific moments in Arizona and Cascabel, places and people with us every day in our hearts. True. Thank you so very much sharing in old memories and new.
Much love,
Dawn