Ellie at the Farm, Part Two

“Your daughter is completely crashed out.”

I called the farm late in the afternoon to check in on Ellie and got the answering machine. There was a wedding at the farm that day (Susan and Ron occasionally host the weddings of close friends or family members at the farm), and I wanted to get all the details. I figured 1) the wedding wasn’t over yet, or 2) it was over, and everyone was so tired that they had gone out to a restaurant for dinner. A few hours later I got this return call from Susan (“Deppa”).

It seems when I called the wedding (or rather the reception) wasn’t over yet. Ellie just wanted to dance and dance then finally turned to Susan and informed her grandmother she was tired and needed to go to bed now. Susan took her upstairs, got her in pajamas, read one story then Ellie turned over and fell asleep. This is unheard of. She must have been exhausted.

Although I didn’t get to talk to Ellie that day, Susan told me a few funny wedding stories.

The bride and groom’s families arrived at the farm in a stretch Hummer, so Susan took Ellie and her cousins Zach and Logan over to take a look. The driver offered to let them in. “They have a living room in this car!” Ellie was impressed with the couch-like seats and TV, but couldn’t quite believe that there was also a refrigerator in the limo!

As this was her first wedding, Deppa felt it was important that Ellie have a good vantage point from which to watch the wedding. Ellie got to sit on the aisle in the fourth row during the ceremony. Afterward when asked how she liked the wedding, she told Susan, “The bride’s uniform was very pretty, and I liked how her veil matched the tablecloths.”

Ellie showed all their friends how her dress twirled and was very proud of the fact it was the same color as poppa’s new barn door. (He painted the main door red a couple of days before the wedding.)

And apparently, miss Ellie is quite the Dancing Queen. She was sitting quietly next to Deppa on one of the side chairs when a Conga Line started up. Susan leaned over and asked if Ellie wanted to join and Ellie jumped up and got in line and danced all around the room. Ellie later told me that she was proud that she did it all by herself, without Deppa.

She then continued to dance the night away until she crashed.

On another day, Deppa sent me an email about some of their adventures and included these additional photos.

“We made up a long and lasting story in the car about a pirate and a pirate ship that lasted many days. She kept elaborating on it and she had a parrot and the ship went on the dock and turned into a bus and the bad pirates came and they couldn’t see her ship because it was black and it was a very dark night. I can’t even remember all the parts of the story because it started in the car and continued to the swing, the dining room, the toy room, the barn, etc.”

Here’s Ellie at the Pinewood Derby with cousin Zach’s Boy Scout Troop.

Since Deppa has two grandkids close by and two that like to visit for long stretches at a time, she has a well-stocked playroom that Ellie really enjoys. Susan even still has some of Jeff’s toys from when he was a boy up there. Jeff said in a tweet, “The circle is now complete: My 3yo is upstairs playing with my original Star Wars toys.”