Our week past

It's another beautiful (!) Lord's Day. I am sitting on the deck listening to the songs of birds, the hum of insects, the mooing of cattle, the pecking of a woodpecker and -oh dear!- the roar of four-wheelers. The scent from the tulip magnolia is heavenly. 

This is the one that was budding in my last post

We had some really gray days this week. Some rain and thunderstorms. We needed moisture so I wouldn't want to complain. Gray days make sunshine so much more appreciated.

The log pile got cleaned up this week. It was a project that was started in February. We had a load of logs delivered this winter and had hoped to get it all cut up and stacked before the Faith Builders project. It didn't happen then but this week it was finished. It is such a good feeling to see it completed.

Completed stacks

Thursday evening we helped with the Kid's Club in Romney. There were 50 children there that evening. I had an interesting little girl that stuck with me all evening. Izzy seemed like the type who might need to fend for herself a lot. She has very decided opinions about life. She received a bracelet as a reward for being at Kid's Club four times. We were discussing the word on her bracelet- Courage. She said, "I know what courage is." I wondered, "What is it?" "You punch 'em good," she responded with clenched fists.

We also baby-sat a 5 yr old boy Thursday for several hours. The boys took him along to school when they went for music class so he could meet his parents there.

Friday we had the great privilege of having Thomas' aunt and husband come to visit. Christ and Lizzie Esh from Juniata County PA. Lizzie is Thomas' father's youngest sister. There were 11 in that family. (Interestingly, my mother came from a family of 12.) 

We were discussing how it is to keep hungry mouths fed. Lizzie said her oldest sister had 16 children and we were imagining how it would be to feed that many. She said she visited her sister once and was helping her butcher chickens. Lizzie thought they were butchering in preparation for preserving the meat. But no, it was just for the next meal(s). 

Christ & Lizzie spent most of the day with Thomas' mother and then all three came to our house for supper. 

Here are some more photos, shot today, of scenery on the place here. Spring is such a gorgeous time.

Another tulip magnolia

Weeping cherry

Forsythia

Weeping peach

I am so excited to see these plants poking up once again. Our family really likes rhubarb.

We also got some flowerbed cleanup done and bushes pruned this week. Ornamental grasses were cut down and hauled off. (That should have been done in the fall.) The compost heap got turned. Old hay was picked up off the pasture. We are getting somewhere! Yea!!

This patch wasn't cleaned up- it's just another photo

Sheep shearing was the event in focus last evening. Our friends who have sheep graciously allowed us to come watch the procedure. They also invited us to dine with them. They furnished grilled burgers and all the fixin's. I took a potato salad. She made a pea salad and some apple pies.

We had the rare privilege of meeting an Olympic skater at our friends' house. She is from Moscow. She showed me some of her performances on You Tube. Wow! She skates as one of a pair. Her male partner and she synchronize very well. Some of the maneuvers they do could be really dangerous if they went wrong. But unfortunately, she is very undressed for the shows. 

What did you enjoy this past week?

What is your favorite spring food?

A verse that came to mind while watching the shearing-


He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.  (Isaiah 53:7)