She is from Sedona, Arizona. We adopted her on February 4, 2013. We named her Ginny Elote. She’s lived in Oregon, New Hampshire, Montana, California, Washington and Mexico. She has brought us many bundles of joy. Here is her story.

This story goes back even farther than February 4, 2013. This is a story of bonding. A story of women. A story with depth that is not measurable.

I was in Sedona Arizona for the Sedona Marathon.  It was a reunion of old girlfriends who had raised our children together in Darby, Montana.  A couple of us have stayed in Darby and the rest have moved on.  We’ll always have these ties that bond us even if we don’t see each other that often.

Mary lived in Flagstaff at the time, we all congregated at her house for the first night. Deborah, Yoko, Debbie, Mary and myself. We have a history. Sitting at ball games together. Traveling to away games together. Spending holidays and birthdays together. And, raising our children together. The five of us have a combined total of 12 children. We’ve seen each other through the hurdles of life. And even though I rarely connect with them anymore. I still feel a sisterhood that will withstand time.

We stayed in a time share just outside of Sedona. Sedona was the draw and the marathon was the excuse. I ran……no, I participated in the half marathon (lots of hills), the rest of them participated in the 5K (Yoko’s exercise routine includes not sweating).

We read a Barbara Kingsolver book before the trip and had a book club one evening. We ate out at Elote, a restaurant which I highly recommend if it is still there. Yoko bought us all shots of tequila. We hiked, Debbie stayed by the car, as she is not comfortable with elevation. We shopped, I stayed by the car, I’m not comfortable with shopping.

We talked about our grown children and where they were in life. We talked about being good mothers, too good in fact as we did not have one single grandchild among us.

NO babies we preached when they were in high school. GO to college we preached when they graduated high school.

Still no babies; they were out pursuing successful careers, or higher education, masters degrees, law school. Only one among them was married at the time.

While shopping at Garland’s Jewelry in Oak Creek Canyon just north of Sedona, Mary had her eye on a broach……. Is that the right word? A pendent?….. I don’t know; a piece of silver with a stone all resembling a woman in an artistic kind of way with a stick pen attached to its back. I do admit it was stunning. And stunningly priced as well. Mary’s eyes got big as an idea formed in her head.

We’ll all buy it.

Together.

Oh the ideas started flowing as the man behind the desk watched us create a plan to buy this piece of jewelry.

She’ll bring us grandchildren.

She’ll be our grandchildren totem.

Grandmother’s In Need. G.I.N. ……We’ll name her Ginny.

Ginny Elote, Deborah said. We all screamed Ginny Elote!

We’ll get her a journal, I said. To travel with her.

Who gets her first?

Oh, yes, who for sure?

Debbie……. She has the oldest child among us and he’s the one that is married. Most likely to have children first. We bought broach. This was not in my budget. I pitched in my share. I wanted to be a grandmother too. We bought the journal. Debbie packed it all up in her bag and took Ginny to Oregon.

It worked. Ginny produced. The babies started coming and yes Debbie did have the first, then the second and even the third before Ginny started traveling to other parts of North America.

But wait. There is more to the story. Eleven months after our trip to Sedona, Debbie’s first grandchild was born. Seventeen months later Debbie had her second grandchild. Then there was a very long dry spell. The longest we’ve had.

Ginny had been lost.

Unbeknownst to the rest of us, Debbie had lost Ginny. She searched and searched. Her last memory of Ginny had been on her backpack while flying to Montana. Debbie never found her. She had to do something as no one was having grandchildren. Debbie found our pictures from the Sedona trip. She found a silver smith in Arizona. The silver smith created an exact replica of original Ginny and that was when Debbie told us of the missing Ginny. Once Ginny was recreated and in the hands of Debbie, another grandchild was announced. Ginny to the rescue after a three year drought. Another grandchild for Debbie. After that Ginny was a traveling fool. Back and forth across the country she traveled. A baby born, another pregnancy announced.

Ginny is magical. As of today, we all have at least one grandchild. We mail Ginny back and forth and sometimes hand deliver. Debbie has the most grandchildren with seven. Last summer we exchanged in person from me to Mary at Deborah’s daughter’s wedding.

Ginny is currently in Montana with Deborah who is expecting a grandson this summer. He will be the fourteenth grandchild for Ginny.

We are planning our reunion trip. Winter 2025 to Mexico. The five of us; LaLa, Baba, MarMar, Mimi and Oma.

More great stories can be found at Wild About Books. Bonus news: I’ve also compiled all of my adventures into a book which is coming out very soon.