A Pictorial View of Our Lives

Christopher has a knack for finding unique bugs- can you find the beautiful moth here?

 Stephen has begun a donut business. He employs his brothers and cousins. This Mama is so happy there is at least one female involved! (Cleanup issues) And that the cooking has moved to an outdoor burner!

Matthew

Austin

Mervin

Sylvia

We had a very successful week of Summer Bible School in the town of Romney. Peak attendance was 80. A busy, happy week.

 Fence work for the garden and orchard has been happening this summer. Tear down the old, install the new. It has not yet been completed but it is exciting to see it progressing.

 Lots of canning going on this summer. Lots of green beans. Some peaches. Not as many peaches as usual because of the price this year.

 The boys enjoyed getting to know more of my cousins' children on the Summy side of the family. We had a reunion at Wilda Lake in VA.

 My sister Doris and family followed us home from the reunion and were with us for a few days. Here is one of her cutie pies.

 Speaking of pies- we made 100 for the Romney peach festival. After that ordeal, the weekly 16 or less seems puny. We made 50 crusts two days in a row, then 50 pies two days. They are asking me to do 120 next year. I'm having a hard time making up my mind!

 The boys and Grandpas did the bulk of the corn while I did other things. Not a super duper crop but enough.

Melvin

Grandpa

Grandma

Christopher

 My co-teachers and I took a couple of the girls from Kid's Club on a bike ride- the few that earned a treat. Sixteen miles of biking. Thankfully it was a continual slight downgrade. Even so, it was hard to sit for a few days.

 We took a trip to TN for a Troyer/Schwartz family reunion. It starts with a list, you know. We stopped in Gap Mills for lunch and business. All five boys were sitting on the bank eating lunch but one moved before the picture was snapped. Aunt Katie is 95 years old and has a large family. The family graciously invites other relatives to their annual reunion. I met relatives I didn't know I had this time around- my dad's cousins and their children. The aunts stay young by playing Scrabble. And the boys decided that this is a reunion worth going to again though they balked about going (as usual).

Aunt Katie

Cousin Barbie Schwartz looks on

Aunt Fannie

 Our latest venture was going camping with the church youth group.

 Peppers anyone? We harvested 3 (5 gal) buckets this week.

 I've been listening to a lot of webinars, helping me to understand the best ways for schooling our sons. One screenshot. Have you ever heard of a commonplace book? A wonderful idea for a profitable avenue of writing. Donna Goff has a lot of helpful webinars at her Mentoring Our Own site. Check it out if you are homeschooling.

 The men so graciously put up a laundry line for me this spring. If you've never been able to step out the washroom door and roll your laundry out on a line, you don't know what you're missing! It has been such a tremendous blessing.

Photo of first post set (taken from laundry room door)

Second post

In use

We are so rich! 

Luke 16:19-31 is my challenge for myself.

Of Busy Days

When I rose from my sick bed, life came thick and fast. It was rather ironic that when I made effort to blog a week of our lives I ended up being sick a lot of the time. That makes me a little leery of trying to blog another week. 

Last Saturday and Sunday we were at a reunion in Farmville, VA. My birth mother's family got together. We had a wonderful time together- as always. It was very special to see Aunt Ruth and Uncle Mark Yoder once again. They came from Colorado. 

My mother came from a family of six boys and six girls. Yes, a dozen children. One of the boys passed away and four of the girls.

L-R John, Lloyd, Joe, Ruth, Alice (Calvin came later and Ezra was not there)

Saturday evening we had an auction to cover reunion costs. That was a lot of fun. 

Selling a kitten- my little niece bought it

One of the treasures I found was a paperback set of Laura Ingalls books (with the gingham covers). When I got home I discovered that one book was missing from the set. (One of my cousins had found the set in the dumpster!) 

Over time I've picked up some of the books at thrift stores. Knowing I had a few on my shelves I decided to see if this particular one was one I had. Most of the books I have are pale blue paperbacks. But would you know, the very one that was missing from the set was on my shelf! It was the only one with a gingham cover that I owned. Needless to say, I was elated!

Selling the performance of the song," I'm a Little Teapot"

The Schwartz family was in charge of Sunday lunch. Sister Rachel took the planning upon her shoulders. We had grilled chicken breasts, baked potato wedges, Ceaser salad, green beans, rolls and custard pies (3 kinds- plain, rhubarb & Pina Colada). She had me pick up most of the groceries for the meal.

Rachel flew in Thursday. After shopping in Winchester, Thomas and I picked her up in Baltimore, (also leaving a car there for Rosetta who flew in Saturday evening). Then she and I made the pies on Friday. Brother Tim grilled the chicken Sunday morning. 

While at the reunion, our family sang- Sunday morning service. One of my cousins recorded it with her phone and put us on You Tube.

Our school program and picnic were planned here the same weekend as the reunion- which was very annoying. We, of course, were here for the program Friday evening. Stephen was the director this year and he did an awesome job. 

Sorry, I didn't get a pic of the director. Was sitting too far forward.

Saturday was cold and rainy so we opted to head for the reunion rather than stay here for an indoor "picnic" and games. My share of the food still needed to be provided. Too many things on one heap. Aarrg!

My parents went on from the reunion to Honduras to visit my brother and family for a few weeks. My sister Rosetta, her friend Mary and my niece Sylvia went along.

Monday was recuperating day for me. Jail Bible study was that evening and I was in charge of the study. Knowing beforehand that it was going to be my turn and how much was on my plate, I decided to hand out some questions and have more of a share time rather than me "preaching". Good thing I did because I was so terribly tired that day I wasn't able to think very deeply at all. Or even stay awake very much. Are reunions good for a person?

Baking for market resumed this week. Twelve pies and nine zucchini breads came out of my kitchen. Rhubarb, strawberry rhubarb and strawberry pies. A new one for me is baked strawberry pies. It's kind of a gamble to get it right. Any advice for me?

The boys have been diligently planting garden this week. They planted 186 tomato plants. Yes, you read right and it is not a misprint. They had started so many plants that this wasn't even all of them. I guess they didn't know when to stop. They also planted summer squash plants my dad had started and ten long rows of corn. The lettuce is ready to eat and there is too much to eat. Gardens are wonderful things.

Thursday evening I had three of "my girls" from Kid's Club over for the evening. The boys were helping me clean house in preparation for their arrival and I told them girls make me terribly nervous. I know what to do with boys but I'm not sure about girls! 

We had an okay evening then. The guys all went to my sister's house for supper and the evening so we had us a girls' party. I helped them each make a couple loaves of bread to take home to their families. They were pretty pleased to think they could make bread.

One mistake I made was allowing them to drive a vehicle around. Two of them had never driven before and they thought this was the best thing. They kept begging to do it again but once was enough to give me stomach ache. 

Yesterday was our donut fund raiser for youth funds. We made donuts on site in two locations. It was a lot of work and a very successful day! We had gotten a hundred pounds of mix. I envisioned selling individual donuts with the occasional sale of dozens or half dozens. Reality was that by 6:30 am people were stopping by wanting to buy dozens and we were not prepared. We made up all the mix and sold all but about five dozen. 

We had done a trial run for the church Friday evening so we could get a feel for what we're doing. So some of the mix had already been used. At our site we had a half dozen donuts left that sold while we were cleaning up. So we were completely sold out. People were asking when we'll do it again so we think we just might do it some more.

We were very short on help yesterday and then one girl ate a donut and got bad stomach pains so she couldn't work. We gathered round her and prayed and the Lord mercifully restored her to us before very long. We needed her help and He knew that!

My sister so kindly offered to make my food assignment for the fellowship meal at church today. It was so restful to not have food to make this morning. My week was so exhausting and even though I slept in a little this morning I was still very weary. 

Having missed two Sundays, I was way behind with where we were in our Sunday School studies today. We are studying Hosea and we ladies take turns teaching. As we gathered for class we realized that no one was prepared to teach. They all looked at me and said it would be my turn. I could have cried, but breathed a prayer instead, when they told me to direct the discussion. My brain was so tired I could hardly comprehend what we were reading. But people shared their thoughts nicely and we made it through. Thank you Jesus!


We brought Davis, my cousin's son, home from the reunion with us. He'll be here for two or three weeks. Last year it was two weeks so we were thinking that way again. But now there's a canoe trip "in the air" that he would like to be a part of, so he may stay another week yet.

Davis, Matthew and my nephew Mervin standing in a row 

What has the Lord done for you?

His mercy record (verb)! Tell what He's done for you!

Hey, it's warm and sunny after much rain here. What's your weather like?