Denver, CO>Topeka Kansas

Twenty seven years ago a family showed up at Loon with three little boys for our seasonal ski school program.  What resulted was the beginning of a friendship that has spanned the years and filled our hearts with so many great memories.  The Reeds middle kid Brendan was placed in the group Mike and I taught.  Brendan was the most energetic, social, funny, and challenging 4 year old we had.  He took longer than the rest of the group to learn to ski, being content to socialize in the “holding tank” of kids who would rather roll around eating snow instead of learn to stop.  When we would send him up on the chairlift with random adults they would hand him back to us at the top speechless, or a comment about “piece of work” or “good luck.”  We eventually realized he was using the lift rides for practicing his swear words.  We spent most of our day yelling “brendan reed stop kissing girls, brendan reed stop sneaking candy, brendan reed stop skiing away from the group.” Despite all the work, Brendan was one of our favorites.  His parents became two of our closest friends at Loon and they would take us on ski vacation to ski with the kids and give us a chance to ski big mountains out west that poor ski instructors could never afford.  Brendan’s Dad Bob was a big mountain man looking guy.  He learned to ski by following our group ( and crashing into all of them when he stopped.) Many parents asked about the “big kid Bob” their kids would refer to who bought them all candy and sodas.  The Reeds were one of our first Loon families that became part of our family.  When we got married the kids from our original group were all in our wedding, with Brendan leading the pack commenting on how funny my hair looked and why was I wearing shoes and a dress with paint on my face.  Brendan has always been  character.  We loved his spirit and love for life that we named our first kid Brendan, after him, always telling the kids Brendan Reed stories.  Sadly this spring Bob Reed passed away unexpectedly.  We were heartbroken.  When we were planning our trip, Brendan sent us a text and said he was living in Denver and we better come visit him.  So 26 years later, we show up at Brendan’s house and he is all grown up, married to a great girl, Michelle and they are having their first kid in 3 weeks.  They both have their PHD’s and are research scientists working on cures for breast cancer and type 1 diabetes, not bad for the most hyper 4 year old I ever taught.  It was awesome having our kids meet him.  As we sat up until the late hours of the night catching up and telling them about the best parts of being parents and to enjoy the ride, I had to smile thinking that when Mike and I started our family Kate and Bob were a big influence on our parenting.  We watched what they did and how they interacted with their kids  and each and made them split wood and work around the yard, but also how they just loved being with their kids experiencing life.  We told them that throughout our journey raising our four, we have found several good friends who were a stage of life ahead of us and used them as guides and mentors and so far those people have not lead us astray.  Working with young kids as a profession is such a rewarding experience and it has been so exciting watching the crazy little four year olds grow up and have their own houses, cook us a great pulled pork dinner, do the dishes, and sit on the couch and reflect on life, family, and dreams.  I can only pray that my Brendan grows up to be as happy as Brendan Reed.  We bid our goodbyes after a great visit and headed east to Kansas.  Not finding much to do in Kansas we decided to drive straight through to Topeka.  When we got to Topeka we did a mystery room.  They locked us in a room that looked like a motel room and a murder had happened and we had one hour to work as a team to figure out who murdered her and find a key to get out of the room.  Had to sift through evidence, suitcases, dust for fingerprints.  Kids had fun and did a great job, Sam and Brendan have watched too much CSI they were great investigators.  Off to dinner at Sonic, could not pull the rv in so we had to order at tables and the kid brought dinner out on roller skates.  Camped the night at Shonee Lake Campground, pretty state park but lots of geese and poop so kids won’s swim.  Brendan liked it because it had great paths for his morning run. Off to find something to do in St Louis.