Doug Hayes turns 60 this year and when his wife Amy asked what he wanted to tick off his bucket list before his big birthday, he had no idea.
But after months of thinking about it – he finally realised what he wanted.
Doug, from Oregon, U.S, told Amy he wanted a bus so he can pick up each of his 10 grandchildren and take them all to school every day before coming home and going to work.
So the couple made it happen and just before Christmas, as their last ‘advent gift’, Amy and Doug presented the Grandfather Express – a small yellow school bus with the name on the side.
They spent months tracking down one that worked for them and eventually they found the bus, which is pre-decorated with magnets of letters and numbers on the ceiling.
All they did was add the signage and seatbelts to all the seats.
Five of his grandchildren attend Paideia Classical Christian School, which is so small, they don’t have their own buses.
The other five grandchildren are too small for school yet but he hopes to be able to take them in the future.
They children all live within 20 minutes of his house and the school is another two to three miles from there, so he plans to pick them up each morning, drop them off at school, head home and swap the bus for a car so he can drive to work.
Posting on Facebook, Amy said: ‘So there we were, enjoying a nice dinner out to celebrate Doug’s 59th birthday last June. Just for fun conversation I say, “Well, you’re officially going to be old next year, anything you need to check off your bucket list? Anything you need to do in your last year before 60?”
‘He was totally bamfoozled. If you know Doug at all, you know that he’s always outward focused – other people’s needs, desires, best good – service to all, always. What did HE want? What was on HIS bucket list. He was floored. Actually a little disturbed. He couldn’t even comprehend the question.
‘Fast forward a bit, and he’s STILL thinking about that question from his birthday dinner! Who knew he could take it so seriously? Then he turns to me one day and says,
‘”I want a bus.” Excuse me, what?!
‘”I want a bus so I can go around every morning, pick up all the grandkids, and drive them to school before I go to work. Just a small bus. We’d sing songs, talk, and it would be something unforgettable they did with their grandfather. If money were no object, I’d want a bus.”
‘Anything in the world. Money is no object. And the most this good man can think to ask for is an little, old bus so he can give his grandkids the memory of a lifetime.
‘If that’s the man’s entire, big-dreams bucket list, surely there had to be a way…..
‘Cousins’ Christmas Party was today and for their last Advent gift before our family “Christmas” morning, they got a bus. The Grandfather Express in now in service.
‘I love this man.’
The Grandfather Express will set of on its first journey once the children return to school after the holidays.
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