Engaged!

This is old news, but in case you haven't heard, Darryn popped the question on Dec. 23rd and Danae (Mast) said, "Yes!"  A June 29, 2019, wedding is being planned.

Photo credit:  Esther Mast, Nov. 2018

Aunt Viola

This week Lyn & I made a trip to Walnut Creek, OH for a business retreat.  This was being held about 10 minutes from my Aunt Viola's house.  After a bit of encouragement from Mom, I decided to see if I could get up with her and touch base at least a bit.

Let me just say that it was the highlight of the weekend.  Aunt Viola seems to be doing well and at 80 years of age, was just hired this week full time at her job which she has worked "temporarily" at for several years.  She works at a factory where she does soldering.  It's my impression that she is very good at what she does and the company sees her as a great asset.

Viola spends the week at her daughter Leann's house more than an hour away which is near where she works, and then spends the weekends at her home in Sugarcreek.  It worked perfectly that she got back home on Friday about the time that we had a 2 hr. break.  I went to her house and she showed me around.  Here is the front door which my Dad made the glass inserts for.

From the inside

The light didn't want to cooperate right, but you can still see what a beautiful door it is!

She took me on her elevator down stairs and showed me two quilts that she has been working on for her children.  They are so neatly done.  I found out that she has put these together totally by hand sewing... NO SEWING MACHINE!!  She will have an Amish lady quilt them for her.

This one is called a Missouri log cabin (I think).  It needs borders on it yet.

This one is done and is being marked for quilting.

Her son, Lamar, and his family are living with her in Sugarcreek.  They have 4 young children.  Lamar has his office there at the house, and I was able to talk with him as well for a bit.

I invited Viola to join us for supper at the Der Dutchman, which she readily agreed to, so that gave Lyn & I another hour to talk more with her.  During this time, she showed us pictures of cookies that she decorated this past year.  These cookies were works of art.  The next morning I got a call from her that she had left something hanging on our truck mirror for us.  She mentioned that it was fragile so we waited until we were home until we opened it.  The gift was several of her "left over" cookies.

Look at the details...

This star one made her think of my Dad (her brother).....

My two teenagers wondered if they could eat them.  Ummm....No!  I am planning to preserve them and make tree ornaments out of them.  They will be a treasure to me.

I know that my Aunt Viola has not had an easy life.  There are many, many things that have been hard and disappointing and even things currently that are not as she would like them to be.  However, I was challenged by her ability to find beauty and happiness in life and feel like somehow her creative outlets have helped bring healing and balance to the craziness.  And it was a reminder to me to keep in touch with my aunts & uncles if I am able while they are still with us.  Their lives are rich with experience.

Fall 2018

I was thinking that it has been awhile since I've posted anything.  I started looking through my phone and found a few pics....

In September, Ericka & Dwight both left for Rosedale Bible College.  Dwight went as a student and plans to be there all year.  Ericka went back on staff.  She is the RD in the girls dorm and is also helping out with the Bridge Program.  In this program, students are 1/2 time students and 1/2 time involved in an internship program in a field/organization of their choice.  Ericka is helping oversee the intern part of this and is involved one-on-one with the 9 girls in this program.  This is a paid position.

As of June, Darryn is living in Columbus in an apartment with a friend, and started working for Miller's Furniture in Lancaster, OH.  They also have a store in Plain City.  It is a high end furniture store that sells custom Amish-made furniture (mostly from Holmes Co).  Think dining room tables and bedroom suites in your choice of wood, color, style, etc.  They also sell mattresses and a line of couches/chairs that you can choose your own fabric.  If you goggle Miller's Furniture Lancaster Ohio, you can see some pictures of the store.  He seems to be enjoying it and says he now knows what an "undertone" is when looking at colors.

He said he has currently sold the ugliest couch on record.  

Red paisley couch with cowhide pillows....

Why is he in Columbus, you might ask?  Well, you see.... there is a certain girl, by the name of Danae Mast, also living in Columbus that he really enjoys hanging around.  Her home town is Grantsville, MD, but she has two siblings living in Columbus and that is where she ended up in college too.

Renae is a junior and Devan a freshman at Greenwood Mennonite School.  It's very different to be down to two kids here at home.... and sometimes one or none depending on their varying activities.

And just for fun here is one of the two of us enjoying a night at the beach on November 7 for Jolene's birthday.  It was a beautiful 65* day!  Sorry, all you MN family!!  I heard you have snow that will stay!

Delaware State Fair

In case you didn't know, we have a few head of cow here on our small farm.  This year we had 4 calves.  We have a friend who takes cows to the fair every year and he invited us to take one of our calves along with his.  This also meant that we had to get the calf broke and halter trained.  Renae said that she was interested in doing this so the weeks before the fair, Renae spent every morning and evening working at training one of our calves.  She was doing this at our friend's farm along with other kids who were training calves.

On the first day of training the calf stepped on her foot 3 times!  She was too timid to tell anyone and the next day she got stepped on again.  Her foot had so much swelling, bruising, and was painful to touch that she ended up at the express care center.  Thankfully nothing was broken.

The calf had to be at the fair the whole time so that meant going down every morning and evening to take care of the cows.  It made sense to us why so many people set up campers there.  On the day of the "showing," Renae showed twice.  The first time she was judged for showmanship with other kids in her age group.  The second time she was showing the calf against other calves in the same breed and weight class.  This calf is a Simmental  breed and weighed around 460 lbs.

Leading Sadie (the calf) into the ring.

Trying to get her lined up.

They use the stick to get their feet "set"....

.... and then they rub their belly with the stick to keep them calm.  

We are happy to say that the calf got 2nd out of 4 calves in the class and Renae got 4th for showmanship in a class of 9.  For first timers, we were very pleased with these results! 

June 24

This was a special day.  There were 10 people from our church that wanted to be baptized.  One of them was Dwight.  Since it was warm, they all preferred the outdoor setting at our pond over the indoor baptistery.  Thankful for kids that are choosing the ways of Jesus!

His friends, Ryan & Austin, were also baptized.

Mt. Evans

On our last day in Colorado, we drove up Mt. Evans Scenic Byway.  If you ever have a chance to drive this, do it.  It is west of Denver just off of  I-70.  This road boasts that it is the highest paved road in North America.  The road is actually quite terrifying and not for the faint of heart.  I'm not sure that I, Jolene, would not have been able to drive it.  However, it was really neat and very amazing to be up so high.

The one edge is shear drop offs.

The driver really needs to keep eyes on the road at all times!

It was neat to drive through the different ecological systems. 

They say some of these bristle cone pine are more then 1500 yrs. old.

Summit Lake, above the tree line.

It's hard to see, but there are people fishing in the water.

The alpine plants were fascinating!

Bighorn sheep grazing near Summit Lake.

Looking down from Summit Lake to two more lakes.

These two were in a group of mountain goats near the top.

More goats at the top.  Note the elevation.

The structure in the background used to be a restaurant years ago.

They seemed very used to people.

This is what we climbed to get to the very top.  

There was a path that zig zagged it's way up the side.

Hard to read, but this marker says 14,258 ft.

Summit Lake below.

On top of the world 

We were thankful for a beautiful clear day!

Can you pick out the road?

They blend in so well.  This was a bachelor group.

We also saw a huge herd of elk (hundreds) "playing" down (way down) in a snowy field.  They were pretty small specks.  Unfortunately, they were at a spot where there was no where to pull off and zoom them in with the binoculars.

As cool as it was, it felt pretty good to get back down to lower elevation and a normal road!!  If you have vertigo issues and a fear of heights, you may need to close your eyes at times (unless you're driving!)  Ha!

Winter Park/Fraser, CO

The last three nights in Colorado, we rented a condo in Fraser, near Winter Park, which is a ski resort area west of Denver.  We had to cross this Continental Divide to get there.

Since is was the off season, it was very reasonable.  The place wasn't fancy but did have 3 bedrooms and 3 baths and was perfect for the 8 of us.  Over the roof tops, this was the view from our deck.

The altitude here was around 8500 ft. and the first night Lyn struggled with altitude insomnia.  It's not fun.  All of us were feeling tired and needed to chill the first day.  We did play some racket ball, enjoyed the pool & hot tub in the clubhouse, and enjoyed a bit of fishing.

The 2nd day there, we felt up for another hike.  We went on the Jim Creek Trail until the snow blocked the trail.

And on our last morning, we had an unexpected surprise stroll through the parking lot past our condo.

Just out looking for breakfast, I guess.