Turnages turn love into booming wedding business
By Cathy Primer Krafve Bullard Banner News

DeeDee Turnage knows something about love; that's love with a capital L. The soft sparkle in her blue eyes reveals a tender soul.

She and her husband of 38 years, James, owners of Elmwood Gardens, south of Frankston, have lost count of how many young couples they have hosted on wedding days that happen every weekend in the Texas Ballroom or the beautiful gardens surrounding cottages from the 1800s.

When it comes to creative weddings, she has seen it all.

One of her favorite stories happened at the last moment of a wedding when the officiant asked the standard question, if anyone had any reason to object to the union.

"I do. I won her fair and square in a poker game last night," announced a cowboy at the back of the crowd who approached the groom and the astonished bride carrying a sixshooter. In the mock-gunfight that followed, designed to give their international guests a big Texas welcome, the groom established that he alone would be carrying off the bride.

"He was the same groom who arrived in a helicopter," laughs DeeDee.

She also chuckles when she remembers the wedding for a groom who was from a family of acrobats that came all the way from Florida to Elmwood for the big day.

"There were six big, strapping brothers," she says, describing how they managed to limbo within inches of the floor wearing tuxedoes. They also enjoyed testing the rafters in the Texas Ballroom.

And there's the story of the doves.

"It is almost a spiritual thing."

Since brides sometimes want a pair of doves released at a special moment near the end of the ceremony, DeeDee and James have a pair of doves trained for this purpose.

Being involved in detailed pre-planning for each wedding, DeeDee always knows if a dove release is scheduled for the event and assigns one of the staff the responsibility.

One beautiful, sunny day, as she stood in the back behind the wedding guests seated in the garden, a pair of doves flew over in formation at the perfect moment.

Her instant thought was that perhaps the couple had added that detail at the last minute.

Realizing that it was impossible, she then ran quickly to the barn to be sure her love birds were tucked safely away in their home.

Finally, she realized that it was an act of nature, some kind of spontaneous special blessing.

Since then, she noticed that pairs of doves have often flown over weddings at the perfect moment.

"They always start from the west and fly directly over the wedding walk," she says, adding that perhaps there is a simple explanation for doves flying the same route or lingering in the woods around Elmwood.

They always come in pairs.

"This is gonna sound corny," she says in a conspiratorial whisper, "but this place feels spiritual to me; I think so many ministers have given blessings here.

"Every weekend, there's another blessing in the garden."

Some of her most tender moments are spent with young brides who have no family or whose mother is deceased.

Tender and tense moments come with the territory.

With more than 22 years of experience in the mental health field before moving to East Texas, DeeDee is well-equipped and experienced enough to handle any brand of crises that can come with the stress of planning a wedding.

"Elmwood Gardens evolved out of a dream to make a beautiful, peaceful, restful place for people to come and I couldn't have done it by myself," she says, adding that "James is my hero. He is a tender, gentle soul. He is so encouraging."

Her eyes light up as she talks about her own true love.

They were high school sweethearts.

She was a Bohemiantype free-spirit and he was conservative.

She never noticed him until one day in class when she needed a pencil.

"When he handed me that pencil, all of a sudden, I thought, 'Wow! This guy is something.'"

She went to his best friend and dropped a hint.

Within 10 minutes, he had asked her out.

They were married shortly thereafter in a simple chapel wedding.

"We didn't have (wedding) colors back then!" she laughs.

They were fresh out of high school, but she was a year older than him.

Their first child was born 13 months later.

She remembers her father asking her why she was "robbing the cradle."

"But I was the immature one," she says now. "James was so much more mature than me."

They've been best friends ever since.

It was James' love of the gentle pastures, rolling hills and piney woods that first brought them to Elmwood over twenty-five years ago. They grew up in Houston and were living there, but he kept returning from hunting trips with dreams of owning a horse farm.

"He is big into horses," she laughs.

She dreamed of a wellness retreat center where people could come to rest and heal.

When they finally got up the courage to follow their hearts, they had a choice.

They had enough money to either buy a livable house or to buy acreage with a run-down house.

"Someone was looking out for us because we didn't know anything about East Texas or land," she says with a smile referencing their 32-acre spread, now covered with trim pastures and gardens overflowing with flowers, statuary, and gazebos, making the perfect backdrop for lovers.

In fact, one parcel of land they wanted fell through at the last minute and they ended up with Elmwood Gardens instead.

The place was covered in "scrappy" woods at that time and it took them five years to make the house livable.

One morning she woke up to find the glass of water on the table next to the bed frozen solid.

"I thought I was gonna die here," she laughs.

She credits their neighbors, Helen and Sammy Overton, of Brushy Creek, with teaching them the things they needed in order to survive in their new country way of life.

The Overtons taught them how to plant, how to grow vegetables and can them, how to endure hardships, and most importantly, "how to cook cheese grits!"

These days James' dream of living with horses is realized, according to DeeDee, who adds that she is still a little skittish about horses after all these years.

Not only is James in charge of the horses they own and hitch every weekend to their two wedding carriages, but he has built a business putting shoes on other people's horses, taking him throughout East Texas, including Jacksonville, Athens, Chandler, Brownsboro, Bullard, Frankston, Flint and all parts in between.

James was instrumental in the recent expansion of the Texas Ballroom, overseeing the project and doing much of the work himself.

They are joined by a staff of 10 regulars, who come as needed, all having specific skills and not afraid of hard work, according to DeeDee.

Take, for instance, a day last January when they had a morning and an evening wedding planned for the same day.

Naturally, that was the day it also decided to rain non-stop all day; a freezing, drenching rain.

"Our job is to make the most difficult crisis look like a piece of cake," says DeeDee, "We have to do that. It is the most special day of their life, after all."

So, the staff pitched in, wearing full rain gear and got the job done.

"The brides, I have to say, were sweet as could be. We made it happen. The guests loved it. That's what it is all about."

Afterwards, she adds, they got lots of compliments about both weddings.

They always get compliments about the food, too, according to DeeDee, who likes to brag about the two certified chefs she keeps busy.

There is certified chef Margaret Wilson who also works for the Palestine ISD where an entirely different side of her creative skills is challenged.

There is certified chef Alyson DeHaes who DeeDee describes as "full of life" and also passionate about food.

There is chef Michelle Freeman of Frankston who works at Burk's Hardware during the week and spends the weekends creating feasts at Elmwood.

Then, there is Julie Abston, a retired gourmet food teacher, who DeeDee brings in solely to garnish the food when it is prepared.

"I push 'em hard," DeeDee confesses, "I'm so happy when I hear that they've even garnished the left-overs (that go home with the family after the event)!"

Not only does their regular staff work hard, but so do the regular vendors that DeeDee sub-contracts for additional services.

"We are like a onestop shop. We can do everything; cake, food, fireworks, limo, DJ, doves, butterflies, horse carriage, ministers, flowers."

The bride can do every detail herself or she can just show up and celebrate.

These days, with weekends booked for weddings over a year in advance, DeeDee and James are enjoying hosting events during the week that allow them to develop new ways of expressing their creativity and hospitality.

One of her favorite events recently was hosting the Regional Real Estate Conference.

Participants filled hotels in neighboring East Texas cities, but the speakers stayed in the cottages at Elmwood Gardens.

The speakers turned the week into a working vacation.

Each evening after the day's seminars were over, they gathered in the hot tub and cooked out on the grill that James pulled up nearby.

Elmwood Gardens has the effect of bringing people together. Perhaps that tendency is rooted in the history of the place. DeeDee likes to explain how two of the cottages came to be next door to each other once they were refurbished on the property.

The land originally belonged to "Doc" Morrow who was a veterinarian. One of the Morrow girls was best friends with the Quick girls who lived down the road.

"They used to keep the roads hot running back and forth to see each other," tells Dee Dee, the way she heard the story.

It gives DeeDee a lot of pleasure to see those two cottages right next to each other now and to understand the love and the sacrifice that all of the cottages represent.

"There're just good vibes around this place," says DeeDee, "And love. Lots of love."

Make that love with a capital L.