Bits and Pieces

First of all a big thank-you to everyone that took time suggest names yesterday!  Because of you I have now been able to settle on the name I'll be using for her.

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The children took the camera to the barn the last time they went to visit the kittens. Among the twenty or so pictures they took this was the best one.

Cats aren't really my thing, but baby kittens are so cute you really can't help but love them.

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I was searching for some new recipes to try yesterday and happened across one that boggled my mind. It claimed to be a breakfast dish where you were supposed to take a thick slice of homemade bread and pour a cup of coffee over it, sprinkle with a little brown sugar and serve with a hot dog sandwich. It went on trying to tell me that this is the traditional Amish Sunday morning breakfast.

After I gagged for a while I couldn't help but be amused at another weird piece of nonsense some people are trying to tout as fact. I'm not saying that there aren't any Amish people that eat that concoction but I have never met any that do.

Any Ideas?

I'm spending quite a bit of time working on getting my memories written in story form for the book series. Since I am changing every one's names to a fictitious one I have a lot of names rolling through my mind.

There is one person though that I can't seem to get a name to stick. So that is where you come in. Remember Edith?  I will be introducing her a lot sooner (as a little girl) in my book than I did on my blog and I'm searching for a fitting name for her.

It needs to be a very plain name and not something anyone would go. "Aww, what a pretty name," when they hear it.

Looking forward to hearing your ideas.

In Which We Find the Words

Almost a year after LV and I had those words running through our minds at communion services, our faithful reading of the Bible finally paid off. We found the words we had been looking for in Isaiah 1:13-14.
The new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting. Your new moons and appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a  trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them.

We read the verses and couldn't help feeling amazed that they were word for word the same as had been running through our minds. We read and reread them and wondered what we should do now. Simply finding those words had not brought the answers we were looking for. So we continued reading the verses that followed.

And when you spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when you make many prayers, I will not hear:  your hands are full of blood.

That verse sent a chill through us. But we kept reading.

16 Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil;
17 Learn to do well; seek judgement, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.
18 Come now let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

We didn't know what to do after we read that. We had both been baptized years ago but neither of us had felt any different. Since we believed that your sins were washed away at baptism and it was only a once in a life time thing we felt despaired at how we were supposed to finally find that cleansing we had been looking for. We both tried to live our life to be worthy of heaven but somehow it wasn't feeling like enough.

We read on.

19 If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land:
20 But if ye refuse and rebel, ye shall be devoured with the sword: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it.

We felt willing but didn't know what or how to be obedient. Once again we laid claim to Matthew 7:7  It had worked to find these words and now we were asking God to show us how to be turned from scarlet to white as snow. It had taken a long year the first time and we resolved to keep reading and seeking until we find our answer even if it took another year

Scare

LV's brother Melvin and his family left the Amish and joined a nearby Mennonite church. It was kind of nice to have his parents focus and fuss about them instead of being on our backs constantly to attend more youth singings and thinking I should join the other ladies when they went on their all day shopping sprees. I had loathed the pressure we felt to conform to all the nitty gritty things like that, that we really had no interest in what so ever and simply didn't do even though every one else did.

A few months after they had left the Amish we decided to hire a driver and go visit them for a day. LV's parents weren't too enthused about that and suggested that we at least leave Sailor and Rosebud with them while we go so that their young minds wouldn't be influenced in the harmful presence of being with their ex-Amish cousins.

We weren't too concerned about it but decided rather than go through more scrutiny to take them up on their offer.

We left early that morning and spent a very enjoyable day at Melvin's house. Around four that afternoon our driver came by to pick us up. He came to the door to make sure we knew he was there and then went out to his mini van to wait while we said our good-byes. The windows were all open and we heard his cell phone ring but didn't think anything about it until he came in acting all agitated. "LV's Mom just called," he said. "She thought we should know that the children had been playing in the sandbox nearly all day but someone just drove off with them."

The weird scream I heard apparently came from me as a horrible coldness pressed on me every where. I managed to drag myself to where I could sit and collapsed. This simply couldn't be true! Our little children had to be safe, we had left them with their Grandma. All manner of if only's were washing over me and I could hardly breathe.

The driver started laughing and said, "No, she just wanted us to know that they were going to the neighbors to help plant a garden and would drop the children off on their way home then. They just wanted us to know where they were so we wouldn't worry."

LV came and tried to get it to sink in that everything was okay. It wasn't until much later that he told me how that was the closest he ever came to hitting someone.

The harm had already been done though. After such a horrible shock I couldn't snap back that easy even though I was ever so relieved to know that the children were okay. It took days until I was back to feeling normal.

That evening when LV's parents stopped in to drop off the children I couldn't hug and hold them enough. They had their usual happy chatter about a fun filled day but all I could think of was that they were safe with me again and that I would never again leave them anywhere to have someone look after them unless absolutely necessary.

Morning Ramble

This morning after breakfast dishes were cleared away and all the morning work done there was a nest of baby kittens that needed to be looked at.  The children and I went to the barn to see them. They are so cute since they have their eyes open.

On the way back to the house we found Jewel Weed that had pods begging to be touched and exploded into delightful curls.

Leaves that needed to be dropped into the creek for a race to see which would appear on the other side of the bridge first. It proved to be the slowest race ever since everything is so very dry and the creek is moving at the speed of a slow trickle. We forgot which leaf belonged to whom by the time they appeared on the other side so we don't have a winner today.

Unfortunately I happened to leave our camera in our vehicle when we got home Saturday night and it rode along to work with LV this morning so we weren't able to get any pictures of our morning.

I was surprised to see what time it was when we got back to the house and already quite a bit later than what I like it to be when I do a new blog post. Hopefully by tomorrow I'll be back on schedule. But for some reason I'm not sorry for my wasted time this morning.

Daddy

Last night I talked to one of my brothers. He called to let me know that he had stopped in at our parents since he was passing through that area and found out that Daddy had a heart attack several weeks ago but is at home now and doing okay.

As you can imagine it was quite a shock to me to hear that, and I couldn't help but wonder why the three of us who have left the Amish weren't told about it.

When I think of Daddy I think of a strong healthy man who loved working. A constant whistle on his lips. He was one of the few people that can actually whistle while they are smiling. As a little girl I used to ask him to teach me to whistle the same way but even with all his patient lessons I was never able to master that art.

I can see him working in his woodworking shop where many beautiful pieces of furniture were crafted.

I can see him patiently training horses to be safe on the road with a family.

I can see him on his hands and knees crawling on the floor in the evenings with my little brothers perched on his back with a firm grip on his suspenders, enjoying their horse rides.

I can see him walking through the garden in the evening dusk hours with Mom as they looked at everything and loading his arms with vegetables to bring into the house.

I can see him pushing his chair back slightly from the table as he launches into stories from his childhood.

I can hear his voice as he sang all the songs he used to love so well.

I can hear his deep rolling laughter that seemed to bubble up from deep inside.

I can see him on the front porch swing after a long day of work swinging gently as he watched the stars appear in the sky and listened to the night sounds. Sitting next to him was a coveted spot for all of us as we sat quietly in the hushed evening and talked only in a whisper to not ruin the peacefulness.

These are the type of things I think of when I think of Daddy. I don't like to face the reality that he really isn't strong and healthy like he used to be. I know that having three of his children leave the Amish has not been easy for him but I would like to think he still walks around with his smiling whistle.

Plans for Today

Today is going to be extra busy which isn't exactly how I would like it to be seeing that we are in the middle of the worst heat wave this area has experienced in sixty years. Air conditioners aren't something you need here most summers but it would be nice to have one right now. If I would do what I feel like I would sit on the recliner with my feet propped up and have fans situated all around me.

Instead I'll be doing our general Saturday deep cleaning today and our weekly grocery run. We did set several pails full of water outside to warm up a little for an afternoon water fight, plus I promised the children I would help them play several games of Memory after lunch.

All this extra work today so that tomorrow we won't have to worry about anything except this:

Checking Out Possibilities

All the members were told to remain seated after church. Once all the children had made their way outside and the doors were safely closed the bishop got up to say what today's church "work" would be. They would be voting on whether or not to accept us as members of the church. Addressing LV and me he said if we still want to become members to leave the building until the voting was over.
We stood outside the door to wait until someone came to tell us to come back inside. We both felt a little funny to be becoming members since we had no intentions of staying in the community longer than necessary. After the voting was complete we were ushered back inside and informed that everyone was okay with accepting us as full members. they had a few questions that we had to answer with a yes and it was over. We were now members of the Mountain Grove Amish church.

The next week we headed to Pennsylvania to visit a new church and see what we thought of it. It was a different experience and we really liked it but weren't in a hurry to make a decision. We would go back home and think about it for a while first. We didn't want to make another move and immediately be swamped with feelings of regret.

When we got home LV's Dad came over to talk to us almost immediately. He had heard about the church we visited and tried to forbid us to even think of attending it. We would be on our way straight to hell if we would go to that church, and on and on until I felt sick and had to go find a place where I couldn't hear his drivel. I couldn't help but be proud of LV though as he sat cool and calm, totally unfazed as he listened to all the accusations and nonsense.

After he left we talked about everything but didn't change our minds. We wouldn't be making any moves right now until we knew for sure what we were supposed to do. We would continue reading the Bible and searching for that verse. Somehow we thought by finding it we would also find our answer.

Complying

Our first year of living in our new home was almost up and it was time to get our house Amishified. It had been nice being able to enjoy the convenience of electric lights and refrigerator and we really didn't want to mess our house up too bad by making all the required changes, especially since we had no intentions of living in this community for long and wanted the house to be market ready.
Instead of stringing unsightly copper pipes through out the house to hook up propane lights we opted to buy several floor model types that used a car battery to power the two light bulbs. The battery needed to be recharged every week but we liked it much better than our other option.

We built a small addition to the house so we would have room for a gas refrigerator and water heater. It was frustrating having to make all these expensive changes especially since electricity wasn't a total no no in this community. Farmers used electric for their barns and the well pumps were allowed to be electric as well. Only the women had to be totally with out the convenience.

We had everything in order though by the Sunday that they were going to accept us as members in the church. We had already made plans to go check out a different church back in Pennsylvania the very next week and the only reason we agreed to become members of this church first was to make our move to a new community easier.

Birthdays

My parents birthdays were both in the month of July. While growing up that always required quite a bit of planning and scheming on my part to find the perfect gift that I could make for them. Since today is tucked nicely between both of their birthdays I'm sharing the post I did about the first time I tried making a special birthday cake at the age of ten.

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Mom's birthday was always a special occasion. Daddy used to have a nice gift for her and we children would try our hand at creating something special too.

The busy summer days were passing and as her birthday approached I kept trying to think what I could make for her this year. John and David were making a wooden shelf with a cute little rail around it, but so far I still couldn't think of anything.

I dug through boxes of fabric scraps hoping that I would become inspired but nothing seemed to work. Then one Saturday as we were doing our weekly baking I found a recipe book that had colored photos of desserts. As I paged through it I found what I was looking for. A beautiful marbled layer cake with thick fluffy frosting.

I knew Mom had a doctors appointment a few days before her birthday which would give me the golden opportunity to have the kitchen to myself to bake the cake while she was gone and the mess cleaned away before she came home.

I took the cookbook to my room and pored over the recipe. I had visions of how pleased Mom would be when she saw and tasted the beautiful cake I was going to bake.

The day finally arrived when she had to go to her appointment. I kept watching out the window waiting for the driver to come. After what seemed like a long time I saw him appear over the hill. I told Mom he was coming and she hurried to get her bonnet and handbag and told me after I swept the kitchen floor I was free to play until it was time to peel potatoes for supper. I watched as they backed out the driveway and drove down the road.

I got the mixing bowl out and started on the cake. It wasn't long before I remembered I needed to preheat the oven. I opened the stove door that held the oven burners and pulled them out. After carefully tipping the chimneys back I turn the wick up and carefully struck a match to light them. As the flame caught the wick and started spreading around it I lowered the chimney. It got stuck a little bit and as I jiggled it to loosen it when it suddenly dropped down and snuffed my flame. I tried it again but the same thing happened. After numerous attempts I finally gave up and went down in the shop and told Daddy what my plans were and how I couldn't get the burners lit. He came and lit them for me, and after I had adjusted the wick until the flame was burning a nice blue like Mom always did I was finally ready to continue with my cake.

I showed Daddy the picture of the cake I was planning to make. He smiled and said "It looks really good," as he patted my shoulder and then went back to his work in the shop.

I glanced at the clock and was dismayed to see that I had wasted quite a bit of time trying to get the burners lit and decided I would have to cut a few corners if I wanted to have the cake cooled enough to have it frosted before Mom came home. I decided to make only one layer instead of two. It didn't take very long to make the batter, and I was feeling better about my plans again. The recipe told me to melt some chocolate chips and stir them into part of the batter. To save time I decided to just pour the chocolate chips into the batter and let them melt while the cake was baking and have a lot of cute little swirls in the cake. I poured in the chips and stirred it vigorously and then decided to pour another cupful of chips in to make it extra special.

As I poured the batter into the cake pan I had visions of Mom asking me how I ever managed to make so many little chocolate swirls in the cake, and how pleased she would be to find out how easy it was. I set the timer, and then turned to the frosting section in the cookbook to find the perfect recipe.

I wanted to try something different from the regular one Mom used to make, and it didn't take me long to find it. Lemon Flavored Icing. I got my bowl ready and dumped the powdered sugar in and added lemon juice. It wasn't turning out creamy and fluffy like I had hoped it would but I didn't have time to start another batch. The cake was now cooling in the refrigerator and I needed to get it frosted and hidden before Mom came home.

As I was washing the dishes I had used I thought of the perfect way to still make the cake beautiful. I would use food coloring. The back of the package had instructions on how to mix the colors to get a color other than the basic four. A lovely purple would look very pretty and be just the thing to help the cake become special since so far it wasn't co-operating with the one I had envisioned. I carefully measured in the drops of food coloring but instead of turning a lovely purple it turned into a sickly hideous brownish orange. I felt like crying as I looked at it.

There was no time to do anything because I heard the crunch of gravel on the driveway and when I looked out the window and saw that Mom was at home I quickly grabbed the cake and my bowl of frosting and ran upstairs to my room. I sat on the floor and poured the frosting on the cake. It was too thin and as hard as I tried to spread it evenly over the cake I soon found out it was impossible as it all wanted to pool around the edges. I hid it in one of my desk drawers and went downstairs and helped Mom get supper ready.

When her birthday arrived and I presented her with my miserable cake she smiled and beamed as if it actually looked pretty. She cut pieces for everyone. I was disappointed to see that the chocolate chips didn't melt and swirl like I intended that they should and since I had added more than double what the recipe had asked for the cake was crumbly. The icing wasn't much better since it had dried to a brittle lemony mess. Mom must have sensed that my dream cake had turned out all wrong because she asked for a second piece, commenting how nice it was to have a daughter old enough to make a cake all by herself.

I still wasn't happy with the cake, but Mom made me feel special and I vowed to make it up to her next year by making something really nice for her birthday instead of a cake.

Traveling Alone

There were several families going to a wedding. They were looking for more people to fill the small bus they had hired to take them. When we found out they would be passing close by the community where my parents lived LV suggested I might like to go along and stay for a week and then take the bus back home.

I was excited about the chance to go see them but really wished LV could go too. With our hundreds of various sizes of calves that needed to be cared for that was not an option.

After packing several suitcases we were on our way. Traveling all night we arrived at the place where Mom was waiting to meet us. We transferred everything and were once again on our way. It seemed strange to be visiting my parents in their a new home. Other than a few pieces of furniture nothing seemed like home.

Mom helped me unpack my suitcases in what used to be Mahlon's room. He had left the Amish for good a few months earlier and seeing everything that used to be his was hard. It was great being able to visit and work with Mom again but it wasn't long before I was really ready to go home again. I missed LV horribly. This was the first we had ever been apart for more than a few hours and I realized that as much as I loved my parents I could never feel "at home" with them again.

When the week was finally at an end I was happy to have been able to make arrangements with Mahlon to travel on the bus with me and help take care of the children. With three little ones plus my luggage I knew I needed an extra pair of hands and eyes to help keep track of everything.

The trip home was more of an adventure than I had bargained for. We left a trail of things behind us as we went and every bus station had something that belonged to us after we left. From one of Sunbeam's blankets to Rosy's favorite doll. But worst of all was at the St. Louis bus station. Everything was super crowded there and for a few desperate minutes Rosy had wandered off as we were getting in line to board the bus. Thankfully we were able to spot her before long and managed to all return home safely.

This had been a trip different from any I had ever taken and I was so very happy to get back home to where LV was waiting for us. That was the start of having our new home actually start feeling like home and my homesickness for Pennsylvania started to lessen.

Surprise Cupcakes

 Rosebud made some cupcakes yesterday and after they were cooled and frosted they had to be sampled to see if they are as delicious as they look. They were.

As usual Rosebud made her cupcake last a little longer. To her there is some kind of sense of victory to still have a bite or two left when the others have finished eating theirs.

A close-up.

Surprise Cupcakes

Your favorite chocolate cake recipe. A cake-mix will work just fine.

Filling:
1 8oz package cream cheese
½ cup sugar
1 egg
dash of salt

Mix filling ingredients together, beating until nice and fluffy. Set aside.

Mix cake batter according to directions and spoon into cupcake wrappers. Fill only a teeny bit over ½ full. Drop filling by Tablespoon full in center of cupcake. Bake at 375º for 20 minutes. Remove from cupcake tins and place on wire rack to cool.

After they are cool frost with your favorite frosting. I made a creamcheese frosting this time but any frosting will work. All depends what you are hungry for at the moment. I opened a can of cherry pie filling and placed a cherry with a wee bit of filling on top of each one for the final special optional touch.

The surprise part of these cupcakes is the filling will be totally enveloped inside the cupcake once they are finished baking so that when you bite into them you have a pleasant surprise to find a delicious filling!

Enjoy!

This and That

Teaching new things to our children can be quite interesting. Yesterday we had a discussion about; metaphor, analogy, and simile.  After I thought they understood what I was trying to explain they set to work on coming up with some of their own.

The results sent me seeking a place where I could chuckle without being discovered.

• A tree without leaves is like life without happiness.
• A sky with no clouds is like meat without salt.
• Balloons without air is like children with no parents to care.
• Corn without roots is like sadness with no end.

While the first three made me chuckle I could kind of see the reasoning behind it, but the one about corn has me totally stumped. I think we'll be needing a few more lessons!

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My friend Dana is having a giveaway on her blog in celebration of a milestone reached. Go check it out here and while there follow her link to her Facebook page for her crafts and like it. Once she has received enough likes she will be hosting an even better giveaway!

Samples from Sailor

 Several years ago a friend gave a nice camera to Sailor. He has taken quite a few pictures with it already and last night he asked me to upload the pictures to our computer. I had a lot of fun looking at the world through a little boys eyes. Here is a small sample of the pictures he took. From looking at all the pictures a few things were obvious:

He loves nature.

He loves his family.

He loves creating things. This is a cardboard engine contraption he built that actually ran across the floor for him.

A biplane that he built and spent hours zooming through the air all the while held safely in his hand. I had quite forgotten about that phase so this picture brought back those memories.

And judging from the amount of pictures of this dog he was a very special part of his life.

Grinding

While living on our farm we used to grind all our own feed for our cows. Our corn crib was designed to be able to back the grinder between the bins which made it a lot easier to scoop shovels full of ear corn into the auger which noisily and seemingly greedily ground it.

Sailor was fascinated with it and when ever he heard the grinder start up he wanted to go watch. I used to go with him to make sure he stayed at a safe distance. Even so he developed quite a throwing arm and managed to successfully toss a few ears of corn into the auger.

The feed grinder was one of our pieces of machinery that I disliked the most because of how very dangerous it seemed. I never missed it when we sold our farm and moved.

Last week one of my oldest cousins was grinding feed on their farm with the help of their 13 year  old son, Bennie. Something fell into the auger that wasn't supposed to and with out stopping to think Bennie tried to retrieve it. The hungry auger immediately grabbed him.  He did not survive.

I can not imagine the horrible heartbreak his parents and siblings must be dealing with right now.

Reading, Searching

With a new resolve to find those words we started reading our Bible. Not knowing whether they would be found in the New or Old Testament we decided to read several chapters of each every day.
We recalled a verse that we had memorized while going to school Matthew 7:7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it will be opened unto you.

We claimed that verse as our own and practically hung all our hope on it. We were doing plenty of asking and seeking. The only difference was this time all our asking and seeking was directed to God instead of people since we had no idea who to talk to about what we were experiencing. It seemed different to try talking to Him on our own. Almost a little scary.

We plowed our way through Genesis and Exodus with out finding what we were looking for. Somehow we spent more time reading the four gospels. They seemed a lot easier to read and we found them quite interesting. As we entered Acts and Romans we got bogged down. Nothing made sense at all, we didn't mean to be disrespectful but to us everything that came after the four gospels seemed like a lot of gibberish. Our reading slowed down. We still read, still wanted to know, but the urgent desperation had subsided for now.

Random Bits

Just for fun, today I am sharing little random bits about me that you may or may not know already.

• I have been a long time admirer of a nice Baked Alaska but so far have been much too intimidated to try making one.
• My housekeeping skills have evolved quite a bit. When I was nine I used to sweep all my dirt piles  through a crack in the floor. Some how it didn't occur to me that it was all gathering in the basement and would be waiting for me to clean it up on the day that Mom caught me sweeping everything down that crack. Sweeping has never been the same since.
• Shortly after we were married my sis-in-law gave me a book to read that terrified me to the extent that every morning when we were done with the milking I would hurry to the house and run full speed through our dark basement and breathe a sigh of relief when I reached the pleasant safety of my kitchen.
• I really like vegetables of every kind, and I'm still trying to figure out what we did that makes that all three of our children would rather eat broccoli than sweets. I would like our next child to be the same way but since I don't know what I did the first three times I'm not sure how to go about it to get the same results.
• I detest hand sewing but dislike buttonholes made on a sewing machine even more. When ever a button hole is required I will somewhat patiently sit on my recliner and do it by hand.
• I have stacks and stacks of great breakfast type recipes that I would really like to try sometime. But I am a totally lazy cook when it comes to making breakfast and 99% of the time I make our regular eggs, coffee, and cereal.

Seeking, Searching

It was time for communion. Since our year of proving time wasn't up yet they told us we could partake as guests but not as members. That was fine with us since we were beginning to wonder how long we could stay in this community, there was so much about that we really didn't like and already knew it is not the place where we want our children to grow up. We had heard the phrase; Out of the frying pan into the fire often but since moving we felt as if it applied directly to us.

Once everyone had gathered and church was ready to begin instead of the bishop giving the regular opening speech he asked for all the members to stay seated and everyone else to go outside for a while. We weren't members but were still expected to stay seated, we simply wouldn't get to vote on anything.

Once all the children had been herded outside the bishop rose and addressed everyone. He was very sorry to say that something had occurred between ordnungs church and this morning and there were some matters to be taken care of. He went ahead and said there were several teens who had done something they should not have and had to make a confession. What they had done was no sin, but simply something the church decided should not have been done. I felt sick as all around there were people sobbing at the awfulness of what had happened, including some that should have been making confessions for real sins but the focus was on this certain misdeed.

After the confessions had been made church resumed in normal fashion. That afternoon as everyone stood to partake of the bread and wine I suddenly felt cold and clammy all over. I had never felt such an awful feeling before. My stomach felt as if it were loaded with icy bricks  and these words kept going through my mind:  The new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I can not away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting. Your new moon and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them.

That evening on the way home from church LV was extra quiet. Once we had done our chores we started talking about our day. We were both surprised that the other had felt the same way that afternoon and had the same words running through our minds. We wondered what they meant and where they could be found. We decided they must be in the Bible.

LV announced that we would begin reading everything in the Bible until we found those words, maybe we would know why we had them in our mind and what we were supposed to do. It seemed like a huge task, almost like searching for a needle in a haystack but we had to know.

Vernie Update

Tucked into the middle of my busy fun filled day, yesterday, I received a phone call telling me that my Aunt Vernie was able to come home from the hospital and is doing very well.

I was very happy to hear that and with so many of you wondering how she is doing I thought I would share the news today.

A Lesson

With her pretty blue eyes and ready smile Sunbeam had soon earned her name. She brought so much joy to our new home.

One of her favorite things to do was sit in the sink to splash in water on those hot summer days. I always stayed right next to her as she splashed to her hearts content.

One hot and humid day followed the next and her time spent in the sink increased to several times a day. One afternoon she was once again splashing away when a thunder storm approached. She wasn't ready to get out of the water and so I simply closed the window and stupidly allowed her to continue playing.

A minute later when another bolt of lightening flashed even closer Sunbeam catapulted out of the sink as if she had been shocked. I felt like a horrible mother as I picked her up. I wished she would cry as she simply lay limply in my arms.

A visit to the doctor confirmed that she had indeed been shocked by that lightening. She soon seemed to be okay and there was nothing else that we could do for her except not repeat that stupid mistake. I still feel horrible when I think of it and we now avoid all water during thunderstorms, both outside and inside the house.

Little Things Giveaway Winner

It was a pleasure reading all your comments about the simple things that make life sweeter for you.

Turning to my trusty friend, the random generator, it is once again time to choose a winner.

The winner is......

Number 44

Donna said..........

I am enjoying teaching my daughter how to crochet this summer.

Congratulations Donna! Please email me with your address and which of the two aprons you prefer and I will get it mailed to you.

It's the Little things ~ Giveaway

I love all the little things that make life sweeter. There are so very many of them if I only take time to stop and realize. And recently when I discovered these cute little dish detergent bottle aprons I knew they would brighten up my kitchen and make me smile when ever I see them.

Since I like them so well I decided that today I will be giving one away.

If you would like to have one of these all you have to do is leave a comment telling me one of the simple little things that help make your life sweeter.

For a second entry place a link to this giveaway on your blog and then come back and leave another comment telling me that you did.

I will be choosing a winner, using Random generator on Tuesday July 5.

Winner will be given the choice which of these two little aprons they would like to have.

Disclaimer: The only compensation I receive from doing this giveaway is the warm fuzzy feeling I get from knowing that someone else will get to enjoy one of these.

 

Giveaway is now closed and a winner has been chosen.

Powerful Rising

One  Saturday I was going about my normal routine and had just finished making a nice batch of bread dough, enough for six loaves, when all of a sudden we were faced with an emergency situation and had to go dashing off to the hospital.

Before we left I placed the covered bowl of bread dough into the refrigerator to try to keep it from rising as quickly. That refrigerator wasn't very cold since it was only kept cool by a big stainless steel pan filled with water and ice in the top freezer compartment.

We arrrived at the E.R. and after a long time they were finally ready to see us. By the time everything was cared for and we got back home it was late. My brothers had helpfully come over to do our chores which we were really grateful for and we headed straight to bed, worn out from the unexpected events of the day.

The next day was our inbetween Sunday. We never ate big regular meals on inbetween Sunday's unless we had visitors so I didn't open that refrigerator since we kept our milk and eggs in our chest type fridge. With cereal, egg-in-the-holes, and a lot of popcorn and desserts the day passed and I never once thought of my bread dough waiting to be baked.

On Monday morning when I walked out on the sunporch to get milk and eggs for breakfast I couldn't believe my eyes. The bread dough had risen. It rose more than I even knew was possible as it spilled over the sides of the bowl and managed to push open the refrigerator door. There was bread dough every where as it spilled down over the shelves like a river and oozed out into a big unsightly puddle on the floor.

I gathered it up and tried to stuff it back into the bowl but it would no longer fit. Some how I managed to clean it up and dumped it out on the manure spreader. I would bake more bread later but this batch I had no intentions of trying!