Escapade 2008 - Escapees’ 30th Birthday– Gillette Wyoming

Hays KS, Denver, CO, and then we were on to Gillette. We made a morning coffee break in Douglas, WY, where we visited with Frone Hendren. We will go to her house to visit after the Escapade on Tuesday. When we arrived at the fairgrounds we had a full hookup site and the Vagabond had to learn again how to hook up his electricity and hoses.

Our job at the Escapade was the CARE quilts. The fairground provided a real nice room for Cathy to lay out all of the workstations, cutting table, and quilting materials.


Cathy directed the volunteer women, who did the quilting, and sometimes gopher Tom.

She was assisted by Nita Marsyla.

The women spent all day every day sewing quilts up until Thursday when they held their annual BOF (Birds Of a Feather) meeting.
Tom took on the job of running the Quilt Lovers BOF quilt raffle. The raffle netted $556, which will be used for the BOF’s supplies for making more quilts for the CARE Center (Continued Assistance for Retired Escapees) in Livingston.
Here is a picture of the raffle quilt and its winner at the closing ceremonies.

They typically make two quilts for CARE to raffle and several smaller quilts for the CARE participants. They also make charity quilts for the community in which the Escapade is held. Here is a picture of Cathy delivering the 18 quilts to the Yes House in Gillette.
On Friday the 23 quilts for the CARE Center were picked up by their representatives at the Escapade. Finally there is some room in the truck again!

Tom gave a talk on Materialistic Minimalism which was very well attended and had only positive evaluations. About 200 of the 2000 Escapade participants attended his talk.

After the Escapade we had a 30th birthday celebration with ice cream and cake. Next on the agenda was the city’s 4th of July fireworks. We had great viewing seats in our campground, which was right next to the field where the fireworks were being set off.

Saturday was a day of rest and geocaching. We stayed over the weekend so that Tom could instruct two Red Cross Logistics courses on Monday. Tuesday we head out to Frone’s for a few days and then on to the national and state parks. This blog probably won’t get updated until we are back in OK