Memorable Weekend

We spent the weekend at our cabin in Union County. My dad built the cabin in 1984, two years before he died and it passed on to his children.

Each spring we sisters go together to do cleaning and maintenance around the place. This year it worked best for us to go on Memorial Day weekend. That gave us an extra day to do the larger work project of putting drywall on one of the living room walls. Our parents said "someday" the walls would be finished and we've been working at it slowly the past seven years or so. This is how the living room wall looked before we started. (The end wall was done in 2007.)

On Monday two coats of undercoat were  applied to the new wall. We will go back June 16 to put the color coat on.

Our work was interrupted on Monday when I went outside and found a big black snake stretched out on the ground along the edge of the porch. It crawled under Leroy's truck and  coiled up on the spare tire. Poking and prodding didn't help so he sprayed some kind of chemical in there. That convinced the critter he didn't like it in there after all and he came out. It scolded us by sticking out its tongue at us and shaking its tail. We didn't want to kill it because black snakes are not poisonous and are actually beneficial since they keep the rodent population down and scare away rattlesnakes. But we didn't want it hanging around the cabin either so we chased it into the woods.

To quote my little nephew, "At least we saved our lives."  :-)



Encore

The Lancaster Mennonite Historical Society has asked me to be one of the story tellers at the Encore festival being held at the Garden Spot Village on June 4. Since this retirement community is located at New Holland, Pa., I decided to tell some stories from my book Annie's Day of Light. The book tells the story of the life of  my paternal grandmother who lived on the opposite side of town. The book is over 600 pages. It should not be a problem to fill my twenty minute time slot. Maybe we'll even sell some books. :-) We will be under a canopy so I hope it's not a windy, rainy day.

You can see the schedule here:

http://www.encorethefestival.org/artisan_alley.php

I'm Done!

At 2:15 this afternoon I handed in my resignation and walked away from one of my volunteer jobs. For the past three months I've been working on cleaning the house Gerald bought in January and began moving into in February. I tried to go once day each week but with him working nights and sleeping days there were some weeks when it did not work for me to be there any day. Today I cleaned the sink window and the two dining room windows. And that's it folks!

Kelly's family is planning to go do some painting this weekend. That will make a huge difference and greatly improve the appearance inside the house. But the layer of old stale dirt had to be washed off before it could be painted. I'm not much of a painter and don't enjoy it but I sling a mean scrub rag. So I scrubbed away and now it's ready for the painters.

Most of what Gerald has done so far was pressure washing the outside of the house, painting the shed, and cleaning up the landscaping. He has ordered some new windows and roofing materials, hoping to get that done sometime in the next month or six weeks and have it ready for his bride to move in with him by the end of July.

At any rate, I think I have done what I'm able to do and have worked myself out of a job.

Shower

The sound of wedding bells is ringing louder. A bridal shower was given yesterday for Gerald and Kelly. He knew about it and saw she got to the proper place as the proper time. She was not as clueless as we hoped. She said she suspected it because the weekend was too well planned too long in advance. They didn't usually make plans for the weekend before Friday and the plans were all in place by Wednesday. Even if she was not shocked by the surprise, the shower was a success. The object was to shower them with gifts and that part certainly happened. Some of the gifts can be put to use right away as he is already living in their house and was limping along with a minimum of towels, etc.

He watched some of the time while she opened and her sister recorded the gifts.

My gift was a wedding sampler I finished cross-stitching in February. It took me five hours to do the lacy border between the two clusters of flowers on the bottom corners. That should give you a little idea of the difficulty of the pattern. It was a labor of love and the last one I'll do.

Observations

Yesterday was a very full day and I made some interesting observations as the day progressed.
It was my regular day to work at the Lancaster Mennonite Historical Society. A group of Jr. High students was scheduled to come for a field day. I showed four groups of students through the museum. After the first set I shortened my opening schpeel and spent the time showing them objects to try keep their attention. A few of the students were interested and listened but most of them could have cared less about what I was saying. Give me senior citizens any day! At least they stand in one spot and listen.
After the tour we guides stayed in the room to answer questions while the students had a scavenger hunt. They were supposed to find the objects in the museum that were listed on their paper and write down something they learned about it. One of the boys asked me what the kerosene lamp was. After he was told how it worked he asked, "But what was it used for?" I told him, "For light!" He said, "Oh, for light" and scribbled the answer on his paper.
The next part of the field trip was a tour of the facilities. When they were shown what the computers in the library were used for they sat right down and tried them out. After the students left, one of the researchers who was in the library exclaimed about how much those young people knew. He said, "They didn't have to be told how to use the computers. They just sat down and did it. I don't know how to use those things." I just smiled to myself and thought, Maybe so, but they have no clue what a kerosene lamp is or even what it is for! I'm sure that man would have known (without asking) exactly what a kerosene lamp was and how it worked.

Observation: We are all ignorant, just on different subjects.

This is graduation season and we attended another one in the evening. This time it was Gerald's fiancee, Kelly, graduating from Harrisburg Area Community College (HACC) with an Associate of Arts degree in Early Childhood Education.

The ceremonies were held in the Large Arena of the Farm Show Complex in Harrisburg and was for all the graduates of the Lancaster, Lebanon, Gettysburg, York, and Harrisburg HACC campuses. We got there early enough to get good seats and reserve enough for Kelly's family.
The speeches were not as long and boring as they were at Gerald's graduation last year and it only took an hour and a half instead of three hours. Another great difference I noticed was that it was completely secular. There was no mention of God at any time and no prayer of any kind. Gerald's Alma mater is a Catholic university and there was a religious tone throughout his graduation. At this one the idea seemed to be you are your own master and the world is your oyster. I'm sorry, but human wisdom and efforts are not strong enough to be a solid foundation for life.
Observation: I'm glad Kelly has a solid foundation on which to build her life. We congratulate her for finishing her course and graduating with the highest honors. On July 30 she will add three more letters to her name (MRS) and change it to Stauffer.

Wild Weekend

We spent the weekend in Ohio with our daughter and her family. We left Friday afternoon and got there just in time to attend the high school graduation of our oldest grandchild. Here is Jeremy with his diploma. It seems like just yesterday when his mother graduated from high school. The longer the wheel of time turns the faster it spins.

On Saturday we went to a 10,000-acre nature and wildlife preserve at Cumberland, Ohio, called "The Wilds." They have a lot more animals now than they did when we were there in 1998. It was too cool for the giraffes to be out but we saw two kinds of Rhinos, Cheetahs, Bison, Zebras, African Wild Dogs, Oryx, Sable Antelopes, Takin (from China), Trumpeter Swans, Camels, and other rare or endangered species. My favorite was the baby White Rhino just born this year. Unfortunately, my photo is fuzzy. This is the Asian Rhino.

We took the two and a-half hour tour in an open bus so we could get better pictures but had to switch to a closed bus when rain moved in. Since the animals are on open range we were not able to get as close to some of them as in a zoo where they are in pens but it was great to see them in munching on the grass in natural surroundings.
If you ever are in that area, it is a worthwhile tour. In the meantime, you can learn more about it at http://www.thewilds.org/.

Mother's Day News

Mother's Day was great. Gene invited us for dinner and cooked the meal himself. I thought maybe he'd grill something but he made lasanga and salad. It was very good. And I didn't have to cook--or do dishes afterward. Gene and Leroy did those.
The most exciting thing this Mother's Day was the announcement Gene made just before we ate. He and Amy are expecting their first child in December. It was not a total shock as we knew they were ready to start a family but they saved the announcement for Mother's Day.

Grandchildren do not come to us as easily as they do to some people. We have six adopted and three natural grandchildren. The youngest of those is six, so we are excited about having a baby in the family again. One thing I have learned, being an expectant grandmother sure is a lot more comfortable than being the mother. If this one comes a bit early it could even be on my birthday.