This weekend marks our first wedding of 2013 and I am oh, so happy to be hosting Kayla and Jesse’s wedding at Spring Creek.  Daren and I have been working all spring to get the ranch ready for the upcoming events, pouring a concrete walkway, installing underground sprinklers, mowing, building a new split rail fence, mowing, more sprinklers and running power to the far corners of our main yard.  Did I mention sprinklers or mowing?  We installed a lot of sprinklers over the last month.  Daren’s Irish relatives should be proud.

Can’t wait to post some images from the wedding next week, but for now a few snaps from our last days of chores.

Tis the season for Rhubarb and thank you’s.  I received this thank you note via email today after this weekend’s reservation in the Spring Creek Ranch Cabin:

Sarah…that was the most AWESOME CABIN EVER!!!!   The deer were a wonderful bonus and all the little treasures we found there were awesome!  I must say this…I could not get my hubby to hardly leave the cabin!!!  We have an orchard with tons of work and the peacefulness of the cabin and the serenity and all – we just soaked it all in.  We needed it so badly.  Nothing compared to the refreshing we got from just staying in the cabin.  Thank you so much.  Love to you and your family!

Bonnie and Lyle

It seems rather fitting to share this time lapse video here and now, while so much is going on at the ranch- yet so little of it has been reported here.  Concrete, colts, children, sprinklers, fences, bridges, kittens- will soon grace this space, I promise.  As for the early spring hiatus from sharing the goings on at Spring Creek Ranch, well that is just because most of my days have felt like they’ve happened in accelerated, time lapsed imagery.

Every few days I say to myself, I really need to take the winter slide off of our home page because it’s nearly April!  And then I wake up to snow blanketing our yard, hiding our cars and making the daily, morning routine downright wintery again!  Hello sweeping the car off and making sure that the snowsuits still fit.

Maybe if I change the slide winter will take the hint?  Ah, but those glorious sunny and snowy days filled with skiing, snowshoeing and ice skating were so fun.  Its hard to erase those sweet memories just yet.

From crowd surfing to couch surfing to crowd sourcing, Amanda Palmer of The Dresden Dolls and Grand Theft Orchestra speaks in the most profoundly, articulate way about the art and the responsibility of Asking.

It’s been years since I sat next to Amanda in a German Philosophy class at that very upstanding University she mentions, but it fills me with such joy to see what she has chosen to do with her life and how she has stayed so very true to the ideals and perspectives that make her who she is.

Thank you Amanda, for saying so many of the things I believe to be true in such a moving way.  And please know that you are always welcome to stay at the ranch or in my own home.  The door is always open for you as you continue your journey of giving and receiving fearlessly.

Tiny flakes fall outside my window as I continue to give the same response over emails and phone calls, “Yes! There is still great skiing out there and plenty of groomed trails!”  Not to mention the Hot Air Balloon Festival this weekend.  I admit there is nothing like a brightly striped hot air balloon hanging, nearly stagnant against a bright blue sky to automatically put smiles on everyone lucky enough to glimpse it.

Rumor has it there will be some balloons launching from Spring Creek Ranch!

I’m not sure I’ll ever have a week filled with such an eclectic mix of experiences…ever?  In the course of one week, seven days I found myself at a dear friend’s birth of her third daughter, alone on endless groomed ski trails, in the Seattle Public Library, enveloped by the darkness of countless movie theaters (who says you can’t see every film nominated for Best Picture in one weekend?), in the loving company of my Sister-In-Law who lives in Italy, in search of the perfect bottle of scotch, and then having one of the most unusual dining experiences of my life.

Can we all say out loud together, “The Corson Building!”  I have never felt so welcomed, so well fed and dare I say, entertained at an eating establishment before.  Thank you, Wylie, Emily, Mark and Kyle and all the folks I met at our family style table of ten.

Oh, and then I bought a car.

Homemade pizza, chocolate ganache cake with four candles and two dear friends (thanks for coming over Nicole and Isolde!).  Birthday perfection for a January, jumping bean and now this Mama is off to rendezvous in Seattle with one very special sister-in-law.  Because even us Spring Creekers crave some City time.

What started out as a harmless walk through town, over the Spring Creek Bridge to meet with (the loveliest) potential wedding clients- turned into, what felt like a virtual ad for the Winthrop-Winter-Wonderland.

I passed sledders, ice skaters, bikers and skiers on Spring Creek Ranch property.  Men and women ranging in age from 2 to 65, they were all moving and smiling and it was really cold out.  But, it was also beautifully sunny and that makes all the difference now doesn’t it?  I, myself could hardly keep my hands gloved and in my pockets where they were toasty warm.  Every time I looked about I just had to take a picture… until my right hand became kinda numb and so I missed out on photographing Spring Creek’s enormous weeping willow which looked like, it really looked like an ice chandelier.  The willow that graces the Ranch House yard, was encapsulated in ice, each branch was wrapped in its own sparkling icicle and with the sun pouring through it… I can only hope that the right atmospheric ingredients confluence one more time this winter so that I can try to snap a picture.  Numb fingers or not.

Wild, Winthrop, Winter, Wonderland?  Winterland…Wonderthrop…WinterWonderWinthrop?  Bare with me here, I couldn’t resist!

Happy Friday morning sunrise, from our porch to yours.