Home away from home
Moving across the country after every summer might seem like stressful idea, but for the LeDuc family it is paradise.
Over the past 10 years, native Californians Jonathan and Jen LeDuc have made Homewood their home base community while spending summers back in California at JH Ranch, a guest ranch for parents and their teens, husbands and wives, and engaged or seriously dating couples.
Jonathan serves as program director and men’s staff dean at the Ranch, whose office is based in Birmingham, while Jen stays home with Selah (9), Ansley (7), and twins Jedediah and Adelyne (3).
JH Ranch’s motto stuck in Jen’s mind since she and her husband started working at the Ranch in college: “I heard and I forgot. I saw and I remembered. I did and I understood.”
“The life changes we saw there is what keeps drawing us back,” she said. “We hear the testimonies of people that were changed, and it makes you keep going.”
The Ranch has specific programs for parent to teen, husband to wife, and newly engaged couples and more to focus on life purpose, problem solving, goal setting, relationships, family, spiritual priorities and personal standards.
Programs include outdoor activities like high adventure camp with river rafting, climbing Mount Shasta, mountain biking to the coast and high ropes courses.
The LeDuc kids’ favorite part of living on the Ranch is seeing new faces when guests arrive at the beginning of every week. They also love the horses, Jen said.
“I love that I get to raise my kids around 120 college students (on staff) that influence my family and have the same beliefs that I do,” she said. “I get to pull away from everything from the world and go to the mountains.”
The LeDuc family feels that close relationships they have at the Ranch are similar to the relationships they have built in Homewood. Because the Ranch’s headquarters is in Birmingham, many of the JH Ranch family have migrated to the Southeast.
Jen said they are always excited to come home to Homewood because the values of the people and like-mindedness of it are similar to that of the people of JH Ranch.
“I couldn’t imagine raising my kids anywhere else. From the soccer fields to the dance classes, our life is all in a couple of miles,” Jen said.
Nothing is too consistent for the LeDuc’s. They are excited for the change of scenery, but always ready to come back to Homewood.
“My family is graced that we can do transitional living,” Jen said. “We love the people of Homewood, and that’s why we stay here. Our neighborhood is truly what a neighborhood should be like in our minds. We count it as such a gift to live here.”
The biggest thing that keeps ringing true to Jen is the sense of community her family feels walking the streets of Homewood or living amidst a new set of 200 guests each week at the Ranch.
“The people are what make a place so special and our sense of belonging and being involved with something bigger than ourselves,” she said.