Wedding Presents

I just received a wedding present this week.

Dan and I have been married nearly 8 years.

We are so blessed to have been given this gift.  It may not have been in the making for 8 years (or maybe it has, I don't know), but when this dear friend was making this gift and was ready to give it she thought it would make a wonderful wedding present for us.

And it is a beautiful wedding present . . . something I will cherish . . .

Look at this quilt!  It is my quilt of many colors!

Our local community theater group put on Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat in July and now that song just keeps running through my head--it was red and purple and yellow and green and . . . or however that goes . . .

Anyway, this quilt was made by a dear friend of my mother who we used to go visit in the Summer up on the Leech Lake Reservation.  She and her husband (a pastor) had a small mission church and my mom would help run a Vacation Bible School with the kids.

I was little enough to be in the VBS with all of the kids and we would go swimming and ride on her husband's pontoon.  They had a beautiful home on the lake right next to the woods.  They also had a special spot in their hearts for orphaned animals.

One of those was a fawn who would come running out of the woods for a bottle of milk when it was young and corn (I suppose) when it was older.  They had a special collar on it to signify that nobody should hunt it (that was when I was really little, so I don't remember exactly what happened with that one--probably someone did eventually decide that they didn't care about the collar :( but there are also tons of bears around there).  The other little orphaned critter they cared for was a porcupine.  His name was Thorny.  He would come out of the woods every night for a bit of bread and milk.  Duane would pick him up (he didn't want anyone else to chance it just in case, but Thorny was a really nice porcupine) and because of this I know that porcupines have really soft fur on their bellies.

I'll have to search through my parent's photo albums and find some photos to scan in from those days.  I also saw my first black bear close up at their place.  It came out of the woods to scavenge after a bunch of the VBS kids had a food fight the evening before.

Hmmmm . . . anyway, I'm sure Susie doesn't go on the internet much (if at all) and she may never see this tribute to her and this thanks (a card will be going out in the mail soon, though), but Thank you Susie!  This wedding present was well worth the wait and I didn't even know I was waiting for it--those are the best presents anyway--the ones from the heart that you never expected!