Some of my family went to Miracle Mountain Ranch last weekend. Steve and I were both kinda' dreading the drive, but soon decided it was totally worth it and thought we need to go back next year and have the rest of the family go too. :) So those of you who weren't there, start planning!
Ella Mae pretending to be the secretary with a 'clackity' old typewriter...
We went on a trail ride. I wasn't allowed to take my camera on the horse, so this picture will have to do. None of us were to excited about the helmets and the ride got a little monotonous because we had to stay 'nose to tail' and not go faster than a walk. But it felt good to be on a horse again anyway- it's been years (I think!) since I rode. The little ones had pony rides. Victoria was old enough to ride a big horse and that made me terribly nervous! We couldn't double ride so she was by herself. But the ones in charge were quite sure she would do fine, so I swallowed my tongue and ignored my churning stomach. Of coarse she did great and is now more horsey than ever!
Another thing we did was a confidence course. The first one was made up of five stumps and three 2x4's. We had to get everyone from one end to the other by moving boards while on the stumps without falling off. And pretend we were 300 feet up. For some reason, this touched me...young man reaching out to help the 'older' man. After we got through each part of the course, our guides would talk a little and have a biblical application to what we had just done.
The Wall. We had to all get across here. It was to high to reach the top and there were no hand or foot holds.
And this one was walking on a cable. Everyone had to be on this cable before we could move around the tree (without touching the ground) to the next cable. Balancing that many people on the cable with two loose ropes to hold on to actually went pretty good. The next one got interesting- there was one rope to hold. Picture four or so people losing their balance, falling forward and backward hanging onto the rope for dear life!
Went on a nice long hike. Slogged through/around mud. The kids caught salamanders and picked flowers and collected pretty stones. We were all tired and hungry when we got back and they had a great meal ready for us at the Buckboard Cafe'.
A shot down the 'street'.
Caught Mom and Dad playing. :)

Cool antiques...
The kids painted dolls...
Lou Sterrett. This guy was amazing with his horse! We had a 'Sermon on the Mount'.
This was a different horse that he was working.
The kids all seemed to feel right at home with the cowboys/girls.

Another one from the stables. Victoria in paradise...
From there we went to Faith Builders to see where Lisa's been working. We were all quite tired, but some of us stayed up late drinking coffee and talking. Drinking coffee and talking makes me happy. :)
Sunday afternoon in the library. Steve with Ronald Reagan...
....Josiah and Cameron with Webster's Dictionary. And we won't talk about the pet tarantula on someone's desk. It was real. And alive. And hairy. And no, I did NOT take a picture of it!
And a studious Ruthann.

We putzed home with a jerky, stuttery van and lots of prayers that we'd make it home. Thank you to anyone else who prayed. We got home in one piece with no problems!

~ellen