By Deb Peterson
“There is nothing more beautiful to me than the soft glow of a candle
or a flickering fire. When I want to add a little glamour, I add metallics—silver,
copper, bronze, or gold, the sparkle of a crystal wine glass. It’s magic.”
— Gayla Thompson
There once was a girl who grew up running through the woods south of Mountain Home chasing squirrels, collecting birds’ nests, pine cones, bee hives, and twigs. As young as five, she joined her dad on the family’s traditional Christmas rabbit hunt. She had all year long to choose the prettiest tree on the family’s 120-acre farm for Christmas, invariably the top of a 30-foot pine.
“I was my dad’s little boy,” says J.V. Martin’s only child, Gayla Thompson. “We rarely bought food. We caught or raised everything.”
But she was also her mother’s little girl. When Gayla stepped out of the flannel-lined jeans her mother, Frances, sewed for her, she stepped into frilly dresses with plentiful can-can petticoats, also home-sewn. She learned very early that she could be both tomboy and girly girl.
Her father’s sisters, the Martin twins, Irene and Eileene, were partly responsible for the Barbie doll in Gayla. When Gayla’s parents were out of town at frequent square-dancing events, Gayla stayed with her grandmother, and her aunts didn’t miss a chance to play dress-up with their niece.
“I was their baby doll,” Gayla says. “They dressed me up and let me play with their high heels and in their jewelry boxes. As a three-year-old, I was fascinated when they polished my fingernails and toenails.”
This very early training in both nature and glamour formed the unique signature look Gayla still sports today in her wardrobe and her decorating—natural and sparkly. She loves the soft tones of nature.
“There is nothing more beautiful to me than the soft glow of a candle or a flickering fire,” she says. “You will never see me decorate with red. Bright colors are just not part of my palette. When I want a splash of color in the house, I put a bouquet of flowers in a crystal bowl. When I want to to add a little glamour, I add metallics—silver, copper, bronze, or gold, the sparkle of a crystal wine glass. It’s magic.”
Gayla’s childhood home was decorated with treasures she brought inside from the woods, and this is the way she still decorates today, for Christmas and all year round—with twigs, nests, golden reindeer, lots of candles. She also leans toward an Asian influence in her decorating, incorporating symbols of peace, goodwill, and hope.
Gayla and her husband of 22 years, Mike Thompson, who Gayla describes as the “wind beneath her wings,” live in Gayla’s grandparents’ renovated farm house on the Blevins-Martin homestead in Mountain Home (which Martins will have lived in for 100 years in 2015), and entertain often at their house on the White River in Cotter, where they have been known to host large outdoor dinner parties under chandeliers hanging from the trees. Both homes are dressed in neutrals, natural fibers, hand-woven fabrics, and shiny treasures, as is their motorhome, which they drive across the country, often to visit stepmom June, daughter and son-in-law, Sherill and Vance, and granddaughter London, and sometimes “camp” in at Bull Shoals-White River State Park.
Gayla’s favorite room by far is the year-round sun porch on the river where the glass walls bring the changing seasons inside, where she can watch the abundant wildlife year round.
“I could live in a glass house if it were possible,” Gayla says.
An Adventurous Spirit
Gayla’s dad taught his daughter more than how to track rabbits in the snow and flush quail from the meadow. From him she learned not only how to watch the world around her, but how to step out into it.
“He taught me to be smart, independent, and cautious, but not afraid,” Gayla says. “I don’t know fear.”
Her father would say to her, “I taught you right from wrong, and you know the difference. Go out in the world, but be careful.”
She has followed his advice, adding a simple rule she uses to make decisions.
“If I can find three reasons to do something, I do it,” Gayla says. “If there are three things that are wrong with an idea, I don’t do it, and I don’t look back. I have never been sorry for a decision made using that rule, and I have no regrets.”
Instead, she has had a life of adventure—around the world. Her traveling started when she won an all-expense-paid trip to Washington DC in an essay contest at 16. Her gratefulness for the gift awakened in Gayla the desire to volunteer, as well as travel. Her bucket list is several pages long, spanning the globe, and most of the entries have already been crossed off.
At home, she has been a civic leader, serving in her twenties as president of the Cameo Club of Mountain Home. She was the youngest elected district president of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs. She has served on the Chancellor’s Advisory Board at Arkansas State University Mountain Home, where she also chairs the reception committee of the Performing Arts Council. She and Mike co-chaired the ASU Capital Building Campaign. Gayla serves on the state CARTI foundation board of directors and chairs the Splash Into Spring annual luncheon and fashion show. She is also a past president of the Baxter Regional Hospital Foundation, and served on its board for 10 years.
“The gift of giving is the greatest gift of all,” Gayla says.
Her generosity extends to the dinner table as well. She says, “My parents taught me there is always a spot at the table for one more.”
Natural Beauty
Gayla’s mother, Frances, is 98 now. Gayla still shares spa days with her mother, pampering her and all other willing residents at Good Samaritan Society, with manicures and pedicures.
“My mom always told me to give everyone I meet a smile,” Gayla says. “A smile is free and it makes everyone feel better.”
Gayla’s regular beauty routine isn’t much more than a smile.
“I love glamour and makeup,” she says, but her look is natural.
She has worn Clinique and Estée Lauder since she was in her twenties. Her routine is simple—Dove for cleansing and Oil of Olay for moisturizing her face. She uses Johnson’s Baby Oil Gel on the rest of her body. Her aunts, the Martin twins, taught her it was fun to slather moisturizer on her skin. She wears a hat in the sun.
“I love being a girl,” Gayla says.
“She’s the most girly girl I’ve ever known,” says longtime friend Barbara McKee.
Karen Bryant agrees. The three have been friends since high school and still meet regularly for lunch.
“I’ve never had a connection with anyone like I do with Gayla,” Karen says. “She has a quality about her that is always positive.”
“I wake up happy every day,” Gayla says. “I am positive to the point of being annoying. Mike calls it my bubble of happiness.”
There is no question that Gayla’s and Mike’s Christmas 2013 will be happy as long as Gayla is surrounded by nature and a good dose of glitter. If you happen to run into her, she’s sure to have a smile for you.
You can see a sample of Gayla’s style in the Dale Bumpers Great Hall at the Vada Sheid Community Development Center at Arkansas State University-Mountain Home through the holiday season. Gayla and Mike donated the Christmas tree in the center of the rotunda, and Gayla gathered friends to help her decorate it. You guessed it—it’s decorated with twigs and sparkly snowflakes. M! December 2013/January 2014
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