Roseman Bridge Memory Shelf

In 2007, on one of our long road trips Himself and I visited Madison County, Iowa.  Yes… THE Bridges of Madison County, Iowa. 

I’m not sure if I’d seen the movie at this point, even tho it came out in ’95.  But I had read the book.  I’ll confess… I like the way James Waller writes.  Especially his essays. 

We visited all the bridges but we spent the most time at Roseman Bridge.  The mid-June evening was warm but not yet hot.  We were the only ones there.  We stayed until the mosquitoes realized there were tourists visiting.  Since the evening shadows weren’t good for photos, we were up early the next morning to get better light.  Again, we were the only ones there. 

Because of the movie, couples from all over the world now come to this quiet country bridge.  The inside of the bridge is covered with graffiti… but every inscription I saw were notes of love.  Notes in many different languages, from many different countries. 

We enjoyed our time there very much.

 

Ever since, I’ve wanted to do something with the photos I took.  But nothing really felt right until it came to me to make our own little piece of Roseman Bridge.

I looked at photos I took and photo stills from the movies.  I decided I liked the area right at the entrance of the bridge where Francisca left her note to Robert.  The angle was pretty and the hand rail on the bridge would make a perfect shelf. 

For visual interest I used two sizes of boards for the back; alternate 1x4 and 1x2.  The shelf is made of 1x4. 

The white paint on the Roseman Bridge is really heavy, so I used premium Kilz to paint the whole thing.  Three coats worth.

Now it was time for the fun part!  I printed off some of the lovely sentiments written on the bridge and traced them all over the shelf.  I then went back over the tracings with a pen as close as possible to the original writing. 

And I added one extra…Himself and me, with our wedding date.

For the vintage feel I used tacks to hang my photos.

The last thing to be put on the back of the shelf was a note… THE note:  “If you'd like supper again when 'white moths are on the wing' come by tonight after you're finished. Anytime is fine."    There is one change tho; the initials are ours.

One the shelf is a blue mason jar with wildflowers and my old film camera.

I’m going to give it to Himself as our anniversary present next month.  It is going to be our 31^st. 

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