March 22 – “Silos”

OK.  Yes.  We did it.  “Once in a lifetime.”  “Don’t miss it.”  “You have to go.”  We have heard them all, and now we can honestly say we have done it.  We went to the Silos.  Magnolia Farms.  Chip and Joanna Gaines territory.  HGTV was even filming a commercial outside … with a drone camera.  Wow.  What excitement.

We had hear all sorts of horror stories about lines wrapping around the block and wall to wall people.  In fact we have even driven by the place once before and seen those lines.  But not yesterday.  Not for us.  No line at all.  Now don’t get me wrong, the place was really crowded inside.  But we could get inside.  Easily. 

On our way in we were walking up the ramp when what to our wondering eyes should appear but the wife of the guy who was our pastor when we lived in Denver.  Jean Cooper was leaving with some friends.  As if that wasn’t unusual enough, they told use our family had been the source of their travel conversation on the way to Magnolia that very morning.  Seems one of their group had just joined Josh’s church and they were making the connection with his stint as a youngster in Colorado.  We introduced the new member to Christi.  How’s that for a small world?

As I said the inside of the place was really crowded.  We twisted and turned and finagled our way around slowly.  Christi finally said she was taking the boys outside to let them run around before they broke something.  Here it comes.  No sooner had they exited the building than someone in the room finally touched something.  First thing he had touched the entire time.  He just wanted to see how much this scale costed.  And as this mystery shopper lifted the machine to check for a price, the metal bowl on top slid off its moorings and clattered to the floor, piercing the already loud room with a distinctive clang all its own.  What a knucklehead.  The poor guy stooped quickly to pick up the unbreakable object making such a racket.  And as he did, his beloved companion of 40 plus years?  Walked away.  Quickly.  Disavowing any knowledge of the poor sap who just knocked something over in the Holy Grail of HGTV-dom.  I – er - I mean “He” managed to get the bowl back in place to the overly-kind chuckles and knowing grins of the audience of shoppers. 

We didn’t buy anything.  Chris almost went for a couple of those candles that are tied together by the wicks.  She even picked up (and didn’t drop) a teapot or two.  I think the “Made in China” tags kind of dissuaded her on several objects.  A Magnolia mug almost made the cut, but $26 for a cup of coffee?  Even the baseball caps cost $26.  That’s a hefty profit margin.  Ah, well.  We took a selfie with the sign in the background.  Now we can remember it forever.

Revelation 11:16-17 says, “And the twenty-four elders, who were seated on their thrones before God, fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying: ‘We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, the One who is and who was, because you have taken your great power and have begun to reign.’”

Father, thank you for never forgetting about us.  Amen.