As we told you last update, we have been working for the last two months on a MMAP project in Spring Creek, Pennsylvania (about 40 miles southeast of Erie). Our project at Miracle Mountain Ranch is now coming to a close. These last 8 weeks have been extraordinary, and it will be hard to leave this place. We have experienced so many things that have just “blessed our socks right off”!
[NOTE - This update is loaded with pictures. To utilize space, some of the pictures are inserted in a small format. To get a clearer image, just click on any picture to get a larger view of it. To return to the blog just use the back arrow to get back to the blog page.]
THE PEOPLE
The other two MMAP couples with us on this project are deeply committed Christians who (like us) enjoy all of the awesome things that being a part of MMAP has to offer. Although we had never met either couple until this project, they have become dear friends and we will be sad to leave their company. We hope to meet up with both couples again on other MMAP projects.
Gary and Vonda were the MMAP coordinators for the project. When Gary retired from his teaching position in eastern Oregon 9 years ago, they sold their home and began RVing full time. Two years later they joined MMAP and have completed 37 projects around the country in the past 7 years. Gary was a high school shop teacher and has been a wonderful mentor for Jim during the rigors of this project. Vonda, the embodiment of a godly woman, is a new friendship Helen will forever treasure. With a sparkle in her eye and a spunky sense of humor, she has kept Jim on his toes.
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| Vonda took this picture of Jim cutting up after a hard day's work. Between his cut-ups and her sense of humor, we have all had a lot of laughs. Who said getting old was boring? |
Dave and Patty hail from Florida, and similar to us, live there in the winter and travel in the summer doing MMAP projects. They have been to Miracle Mountain Ranch on two other projects. They have been with MMAP for 6 years and this will be their 23rd project. There is nothing Dave won't tackle when it comes to these construction and remodel projects. He has been a great work partner. Sweet spirited Patty has a wry sense of humor. She too has become a very dear friend for Helen.
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| Jim continued to keep us laughing. (Vonda named him "Fuzzy Wuzzy". And Dave said he has now found a way to grow hair instantly.) |
The camp has a full time staff of 14 who live at Miracle Mountain year round. Many have children and home school them at the ranch. Each staff member has stepped out in faith to continue this ministry by living solely on donations from personal supporters. And as one staff person said, "God is always faithful. He may take us right to the edge, wondering just how He will provide all we need - but He always comes through!"
Along with the staff, there are 23 young apprentices and several interns that are the backbone of the success of this camp. These young people come here from all over the United States to work at the ranch. The apprentice program is a year long curriculum that incorporates study of the Word of God and work, learning how to run a camp, how to train and care for horses, in addition to ministering to summer campers. Some of these apprentices are invited back for a second year of extended leadership training. It has been our pleasure to get to know many of these fantastic young adults. Added to that are summer counselors - also dedicated young Christians – who come each summer to volunteer to work with the hundreds of camp kids coming and going at the week-long camps throughout the summer.
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| Alissa - 1st year apprentice - works in housekeeping. She is also the oldest daughter of staff members, Mark & Shari Carpenter. When I took this picture, she had taken a recent tumble resulting in a possible ankle fracture...but she still smiled through it all! |
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| Tim-1st year apprentice-from Florida. He works in operations and helped the guys with some of the project work. He is tremendously gifted in electrical, mechanical and construction abilities as well as being a young man after God's own heart. |
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| Cathy Piger (staff), Brittany (intern) and Emilia (1st year apprentice from Rochester, NY) are part of the landscape ground crew. These ladies are amazing in the amount of work they can accomplish. I think they can work circles around most men. And each one has a deep committment to God and how He is working in their lives. |
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| This is part of the kitchen crew - They make scrumptious meals and desserts to feed hundreds each week. Their kitchen is so clean you could eat off the floors. Again, all godly young women and dedicated to the ministry of the ranch. [From L-R: Zoe (intern); Connie Cooper (staff); Sarah Armstrong (staff) and Katelyn (1st year apprentice from Ohio)] |
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| Caleb (1st year apprentice from Florida) is cleaning the hooves of this draft horse. The horse is one of two used at camp to teach the kids vaulting. He is big...but gentle as a lamb (the horse, that is). |
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| Jim with our "favorite" counselor! This is Briann, from Wisconsin. As soon as she introduced herself and started talking with us, we immediately fell in love with her. She is SO MUCH like our oldest granddaughter, Erica. She is the oldest girl of a large family (8 brothers and sisters) and is a home-schooled kid. This is her second year to volunteer as a summer counselor and her desire is to come back to the ranch next year as an apprentice - if (as she says) God so wills it. We wanted to take her home with us! |
There were so many other people we didn't get pictures of - but they will all be in our hearts and minds. They are all deeply committed to God and dedicated to the ministry of the ranch.
Throughout the past 8 weeks we have witnessed many examples of the love of Christ working through the staff, interns, apprentices and counselors into the lives of the children attending the camps. This passion for the outreach the ranch offers is summed up in a story the director, Matt Cox shared with me - It seems that one staff couple makes it a point to have a weekly "date night", going the same night, same time to a restaurant in Erie. Of course, they have been waited on by the same waitress, and they have also made it their priority over several encounters with her to share about their ministry at the ranch and to show her the love of Christ. A few weeks ago they asked her if she had ever considered sending her children to camp. She replied that this would be a near impossibility, as she has five children and lives on a limited budget. The staff couple said, "What if we could make it work?" She said she would discuss it with her husband (who, of course wanted to check out what type of camp experience the ranch offered.) The ranch was able to "make it work" and last week all five of their children were able to attend camp. HOW GREAT IS THAT? Well...what is even greater is that their oldest daughter accepted Jesus as her personal Lord and Savior. NOW THAT'S GREAT!! The scripture verse is so very true - "In this mountain shall the hand of the Lord rest."
THE LOCATION
The setting at the ranch is spectacular.
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| The 3/4 mile gravel road to the ranch winds through the woods |
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| Turning onto the ranch driveway headed for the "Town Hall" |
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| You are greeted with the ranch sign at the entrance waterfall/pond |
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| On the 700 acres are several fields where hay is grown. This particular field is right behind the RV sites and each night, 14-16 of the ranch horses come down to spend the night grazing in the field. |
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| A shot of the RV sites - they provide us full hookups with lots of trees for shade |
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| Right across the road from our sites is a large pond - stocked with fish and loaded with beautiful water lilies and other aquatic plants. Every Thursday night during the summer the campers come down for an evening bon fire. |
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| Sunset at the ranch |
The set up of the camp itself is like experiencing a town in the old West.
THE ANIMALS
The horses and all the other animals at the ranch made it an enchanting experience for us.
One of Helen's favorite past times is to "bird watch". Vonda shares the same passion for birds....Guess it's true that "birds of a feather flock together"....anyway, the variety of birds near our RV sites was fantastic. Each of us bought a couple of bird feeders at the local hardware store and it didn't take long to attract some of these birds to the feeders
Besides birds at the feeders, this little guy thought he would take advantage of the "free lunch":
These are some of the other critters we got to watch:
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| Mamma duck with new babies living at the entry pond |
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| Goats in the critter corral. |
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| The big and the little of it......One of the draft horses sharing space with one of the miniature horses used to pull the carts |
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| Zoe "sizes up" the two draft horses |
THE MMAP WORK
Although there is a lot that has been done over the years by other MMAPers, and a lot more that can be done, the variety of remodel projects our three men were able to accomplish in these past two months was very impressive.
The first job was to reside one of the bunkhouses. The men sided it with cedar siding and then ripped cedar planks to make the batting. They stained the wood with a mixture of diesel fuel and used oil. The smell only lasted a few days and the results were great. (The ranch makes it a point to reuse as many materials as possible to make their funds stretch as far as possible.) The building started out as an "ugly duckling" and after a week and a half of hard work became a "beautiful swan".
The next project was to convert one half of the inside of a storage building to additional bunk space. Without this added space the camp would have been unable to accept 8 additional campers. All of the stored "stuff" was removed, drywall was striped from one wall. The other walls were bare studs. All walls and the ceiling had to be insulated then sided with OSB. The guys also replaced two very old windows with double paned insulated windows and built bunks. Again, a week and a half later and the building was ready to house the 8 additional campers.
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| The storage building will have the left side turned into a bunkhouse |
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| Lots of insulation needed |
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| Ceiling and walls to be insulated and sided |
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| New windows |
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| Add built in bunk beds |
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| Truly a "professional" crew! |
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| And here we have it - ready for campers! |
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| Our three MMAPers were joined by Clark (a special ed teacher from Missouri) who came to the ranch to volunteer his time while his kids were in camp. His assistance was greatly appreciated. |
After the three weeks in June of working these two projects, we took a 7 day break, then returned to began the next project in July. This time the guys tackled the big job of building office space for the operations staff inside a huge existing metal barn. They were able to frame in the office spaces, build stairs to the upstairs area that will be used for storage, install flooring in the upstairs and run electrical wiring. Again, our three MMAP men had assistance from other volunteers - two fathers who had kids at the ranch as campers and as apprentices.
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| The front of the barn will be converted to office space. The back will be utilized for wood shop, welding, mechanics and vehicle maintenance. The ranch hopes to add these things to the apprentice program curriculum in the future. |
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| Some of the metal siding had to be removed to install new windows, then replaced. |
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| Gary and Dave discuss the plans with Roger and Mark, the ranch directors of maintenance and operations. |
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| Jim works on framing the office space |
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| The work is coming along nicely! |
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| Gary adds stairs to the upper storage loft |
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| Scott (2nd from left) is an opthomologist from Atlanta. He and his wife came to the ranch with their four children to work as volunteers while the kids attended camp for a week. He was an much needed helper to our guys. |
After we leave, the finishing of this job will have to be done by ranch staff if they want to occupy the space this winter. If they can't spare their time to finish it, this will probably be a MMAP project for next year.
Our MMAP projects for this year will conclude with this project. Gary and Vonda will go to another project in southern Pennsylvania. Dave and Patty have one scheduled in Indiana. God willing, we will be continuing the Great Adventure with approximately seven weeks of sight-seeing in and around New England and an additional two or three weeks checking out Washington, DC, Williamsburg, VA and the Blue Ridge Mountain area of North Carolina before heading south along the coast of South Carolina to experience a little more of the deep south in Charleston and Savannah, GA. We will then turn our face to the west and head on back to Arizona for the winter (with a day or two to stop to see friends and family in Texas.) Our next update we feature the sightseeing we did in Pennsylvania and New York these past two months, and no doubt we will have more pictures and more adventures to share with you of what we will see in the next couple of months.
As a conclusion to this update, we hope you will be able to enjoy the following videos and pictures. The first video is of the mares that come down each evening from the corrals to spend the night in the pasture behind our RV.
(NOTE: This is the first time we have tried to include video in the blog, so if you are - for whatever technical glitch - unable to view the video, I have also added some still shots of this evening ritual. It's not as good as watching a video of it - but there are still some technical issues I am trying to learn to incorporate in our blog, sometimes not too successfully.)
The second video features the Drill team made up of ranch apprentices. At the end of each week's camp, the staff and campers put on a rodeo for the parents. The rodeo starts with the drill team and following that, Director Matt Cox presents his "Sermon from the Mount" to the crowd. Then the rodeo concludes with the campers showing their parents what they have learned with the horses, and the evening wraps up with a sumptuous BBQ prepared by the ranch kitchen staff.
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| Matt Cox preaches from Bosco. He does this "Sermon from the Mount" at all the rodeos that conclude the summer camps as well as taking Bosco on the road and preaching at local fairs and other venues. |
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| One week, Matt's "Sermon from the Mount" included little Brisket, Bosco's corral buddy. The message was about mentoring. |
As we previously said, we have truly enjoyed all the horsemanship and other happenings at Miracle Mountain Ranch. But as we prepare to leave this place, we have a closing thought-
Although fascinated as we have been each evening watching the magnificent horses gallop past our rig and into the field behind us, and amazed as we are to watch the many talented ranch staff, apprentices and volunteers who work with these grand animals, we are nevertheless reminded of Psalm 147: 10-11:
"His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse, nor his delight in the legs of a man; the Lord delights in those who fear Him, who put their hope in His unfailing love."
Praying that each of you is a delight to the Lord.
Dave and Patty hail from Florida, and similar to us, live there in the winter and travel in the summer doing MMAP projects. They have been to Miracle Mountain Ranch on two other projects. They have been with MMAP for 6 years and this will be their 23rd project. There is nothing Dave won't tackle when it comes to these construction and remodel projects. He has been a great work partner. Sweet spirited Patty has a wry sense of humor. She too has become a very dear friend for Helen. 
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