Summertime

Well, I guess its about time for another update. The days of summer seem to slip by without so much as a pause - and to think its the end of July already! The crops are ripening, and we saw several combines in the field on our Sunday evening drive home tonight! Sometimes it scares me to think that time is ticking by that fast - what have I done that has made it worth while? Every time I think that, it spurs me to make a better effort to spread the Love of my Saviour Jesus Christ with others - but unfortunately, due to lack of discipline, that "spur" never lasts until the next opportunity arises - usually this is somewhat of an evening event, and by morning, I've lost the zeal - why? To think that because of His great love for us (as rebellious children) He sent his ONLY Son to the evil earth - to be mistreated in every way known to man - without retaliation - and to die by one of the most agonizing means that was available at that time. For me - who can't even remember to tell someone about the great story. For me - who can't even get myself out of bed in the morning a few minutes early to read the love letter that He has written for me. I am humbled to think that I couldn't even walk home with a letter from Trevor in my pocket when we were dating - I'd pull it out and read as I walked back to my dorm - yet I have the love of God poured out to me in a book and I don't even bother to "fit it in" to my busy schedule. Now I pause to think - if I erase Him out of my day to day living (as it seems I have been doing) - what would it be like if He erased His presence from my day to day living? My life would be a mess. The tender mercies - which some would choose to refer to as fate - are never ending. From the family and friends that surround me, my health, my more then adequate possessions to the many times when a split second has saved me from great harm. Fate? No - I cannot call it that, His hand is present in every second in my life - so I must try to make His love evident to others in every second of my life.
So this is my desire - to be able to resist the distractions of this world and carve out a time to simply learn of Him - the author of my life. That would be a bare starting point compared to the devotion He deserves.
I've often thought of it this way: If a person jumped out and saved you from the path of an oncoming train (meaning certain death - although not to be thought equal to eternity in hell) and was killed in the process - would you not want to remember that person fondly every day of your life - knowing they were the reason you were alive? And if asked to do so, wouldn't you gladly put aside one day a week to commit to that person (ok - this is sounding slightly strange, but bear with me) - how come, if we could do that for another human who acted heroically, why can't we do it for our Creator and Perfecter, Jesus Christ? As far as He's concerned, He's done much more then we give Him credit for, right?

I guess that's just the reflection of my mind for now - I feel challenged to make MY Lord a bigger part of my life - since without Him - I would be nothing.

I came here with the intention of writing an update of the last couple weeks - but it hardly seems to fit - what was meant to be an introduction, led me to write much more - so the update will wait for another day :)

Summer Happenings

"God of wonders beyond our galaxy" I love that line (from the song "God of Wonders") Its just such a broad statement, but - its an appropriate reflection from my heart right now. Although I don't really know what's coming up in the future, I am at peace, knowing that He will take care of all. Sometimes I really get caught, not knowing when I need to make decisions and plan things and when I need to just let things work out :S I think we have a responsibility to be responsible, but not controlling...ok- so I am struggling with that, but I have just been thinking about all the wonderful things that He has brought into my life. -

- My wonderful husband who is not just my friend and intimate partner, but my helper in day to day things and even my teacher in some areas.

-The beauty of creation - my yard is so beautiful right now - and all because He created things of beauty - how can one look at the perfection of creation and not see His hand is in all things?!

-A family and friends to meet all my needs and more!

and the list could go on forever!

As far as an update - lots has happened that I haven't blogged about.

The week after our trip to NY was a bit of a weary one, but we made it through. One evening I helped Velma do some weeding in the garden. On Saturday, Trevor was working, and I had volunteered to help the Ag Society ladies in the food booth at the fair in Manitou. It was about 33C and very humid that day! I sat outside for a while and watched the horses, getting somewhat sunburned in the process! I also met a few people that I knew at the fair and had a nice conversation with the couple that I lived with two summers ago. Their daughter and two grand-daughters were there too, so I visited with them all a bit. It is nice to actually recognized people in the community a bit! I am starting to feel like less of a stranger now! Sunday was our anniversary, one whole year!! We had initially planned to grab a quick lunch, then go to the local mud bog (yes we're sorta redneckish) and then to Winkler for a nice dinner. After meeting, however, Alex and Velma said they wanted to take us out for lunch. Along with grandma and Julie, we all went down to the restaurant where we got married and had lunch. It may be the last meal for us there, since they are moving the building to the golf course in Morden. Its kind of sad that they couldn't leave it in the beautiful setting that it is currently in, but it is too far from anything to be a viable business! Pembina Crossing will be a thing of the past as of September 1st, so I guess the people who said we'd probably celebrate our 50th anniversary there are going to be out of luck!

After lunch we were too late for the mud bog, so we did a bit of a country drive, and then went to the Archibald Museum its located just a few miles from the Scharf home farm, and it had tons of artifacts from the area! Its unfortunate that more money can not be put into the preservation of our history in places like this one - which is so non-commercialized and real! We really enjoyed our tour through the many period furnished buildings!

In the past week, my raspberries have started to produce! Last week I picked the first couple of cups, on Sunday I picked 6 more cups, Monday Trevor picked 8 cups and tonight we picked another 8! There are many more to pick, but I'm tired and most of pans are full of raspberries in the freezer, so I'll wait until tomorrow night when I can bag some of the frozen ones and reuse the pans.

On Friday night we rode to move the cattle from the valley out to the far east pasture. It was a nice night, except for the fog of mosquitos that covered us and our horses. The ride was fairly uneventful. We first had to ride to Mary's (the name for the far east pasture) and bring back the 5 cows, 3 calves and 1 bull that were out there. There is a creek with a series of beaver dams along it that runs right down the middle of the pasture, so it was a bit of a toss up as to which side the cattle would be on. We chose to ride down the far side first. About 2/3 of the way down the pasture, we spotted the cattle on the other side of the creek - except for one cow on our side - we wondered if she had just found a way to cross the creek, since she was right across from her calf, so we put some pressure on her and after a bit of hesitation, she just jumped right into the pond (created by a beaver dam) and swam across to the other side! It was quite funny to watch! We trotted back down to the end of the pasture so we could cross the creek ( we weren't about to get wet!) and rounded up the small herd - we had no trouble pushing them through the bush with the two horses and my dog - they pretty much went without much help all the way back to the barnyard. We then went down to get the main herd of cows and calves to put out into Mary's. Three calves had stayed down in the pasture when Alex had closed the gate on the cows when they came up for water earlier in the day, so we had tried to get them through the gate to their mothers, but one ran back into the forest. I had seen its ear tag, so I knew which cow it belonged to. Since we didn't know if he had slipped under the fence and in with the cows while we were moving the little herd, we sorted his mother out of the big herd and put her back into the pasture the cows had come from so that her calf wouldn't be alone for the night, then we sent the rest of the cows out to Mary's. By this time it was dark, so we called it a night.

I worked on Saturday morning - a very slow day! I was happy when noon came around so I could go home and out to the farm with Trevor! We spent the afternoon working on Pinkie and then had supper with Alex and Velma. We took the long way around to get home - touring some of the local area to see crops and find the building site of the people who currently live in the house we plan to move into. We wanted to see how far along they were so we could estimate when we might get to move! So far there's just a basement, and it didn't look ready for them to move the house onto just yet, so we've got some time to wait I guess!

After meeting on Sunday, Trevor and I enjoyed dinner at Siggi's, our favorite restaurant and then went home for the afternoon. It was a cool and rainy day, and though we had wanted to go riding, our plans were changed! I invited the whole family over for supper and set out to make some soup for supper. I threw some soup bones and round steak in a pot when I got home and let them boil with some onion, celery and garlic while I cleaned up the house. Having company gives me a good incentive to clean the house!! We hadn't had company since we moved back here in April, so I really enjoyed being able to do some entertaining! I decided that it was a good chance to use the table cloth and napkins I had gotten as a wedding present - they match our main dishes wonderfully. So with that thought in mind, I decided to set the table rather nicely - but I was lacking one thing - a centre piece. My yard is beautiful and full of flowers these days, so I dug out my umbrella and a pair of scissors and set out on a bouquet making mission! I found some white and yellow lilies as well as a few red flowers (not sure what they are) and some white flowers that look like giant baby's breath. I only have one vase and its quite small, so I didn't pick too many flowers, but the results were perfect for my not too big table! I put together a salad and was flipping through my cook book looking for inspiration for a desert to use up some raspberries when Trevor saw custard and said - "Hey, I haven't had that for a long time!" So - I decided to make custard for desert. After I finished cleaning the house I finished making the soup. I strained the broth from the solids, removed the bones, cut up the meat and returned it to the broth, then I added some zucchini, carrots and a few more spices. I had cooked a combination of rice, wheat, barley, split peas and canned tomatoes earlier in the week as a side dish, and I always cook extra, so I used that in the soup as well. While the soup simmered, I mixed up biscuit dough and cooked two batches of biscuits. I then mixed up the custard (my first time ever making it!) and put it in the oven while we ate. It was a great time of visiting and enjoying fellowship with Alex and Velma, Andrew, Jaime and Julie. After dessert we all sat around and sang for a bit, and then visited until our company went home.

Julie, Jaime, Katie and I had made plans for a girls day on Monday, so by 1pm on Monday we were all at Katie's house and ready to head to Winnipeg for a few hours. We did a bit of shopping - enjoyed a latte at second cup (with a liberal dose of visiting included all along the way of course!) and then headed back to Morden. Julie was house sitting and the owners of the house had said she could have friends over if she wanted, so we took them up on the offer and enjoyed their spacious living room for a bit of a movie night. We also invited Dyane and we watched "Music and Lyrics" I have somewhat mixed feeling about this movie - it was good, but some parts were wrong and some parts were juts plain weird...oh well - I guess maybe next time we could pick some more wholesome entertainment. We also enjoyed Boston Pizza and spinach salad while we watched the movie! I didn't end up getting home until midnight, but I was very glad to have the time of visiting with other girls my age! We all need the support of our peers and the opportunity to share with our "girlfriends" so I think it was a very worthwhile day!

Tonight after work, I came home and helped Trevor pick raspberries, we had leftovers for supper and then went for a bike ride. We also discussed a couple of possible upcoming trips - but we haven't made any decisions yet. We're trying to decide whether to go to Regina conference and iron out details about a trip to Alberta in September. Time will tell...

This is my latest crocheting effort - I just have to finish the second bootie and make the bonnet to go with it. I'm making it for a friend's baby - who is already 4 months old!!

Long overdue

Ok, I'm finally going to post the long overdue blog about our New York trip.

Ah, and what a trip it was - and for those of you planning a 25+ hour trip with 4 adults, I don't recommend taking a Jetta, even if they are great on fuel, your joints, etc may never forgive you!!

So we started off bright and early on Thursday morning around 7:30, None of us had had breakfast so we grabbed Mc'D's breaky in Morden and headed to the border - Emerson. No troubles getting across and we were soon zooming down the interstate at 75 miles an hour. By 2:00 or so we had reached St. Cloud, MN and stopped at one of Trevor's favorite places, Taco Time, for lunch (ok, nobody start adding the calories we consumed this day, PLEASE!). Somewhere along the way (I forget where...it was all starting to blend together by this point!!) we stopped for Wendy's supper - it was a late supper since we'd be driving through the night. Andrew and Trevor traded off for the first part of the drive down, then after we got through Chicago, Julie drove for a bit. I didn't end up driving on the way down, but entertained myself by crocheting ( I finished the baby sweater I've been working on for a few months!!), reading (Shadow of the Almighty, by Elizabeth Elliot - very good book), doing crossword puzzles and sleeping. Andrew had brought his laptop along, so we took turns watching movies in the backseat. First Andrew and Julie watched Apollo 13, we had the audio running through the fm transmitter, so the car felt like a movie theatre, and trevor and I felt like we were blind people in the audience, but it was good entertainment. Later in the night, Trevor and I watched Extreme Measures. I am so thankful for the invention of closed captioning - I have never enjoyed movies nearly as much as I do since I discovered this! With my hearing disability, listening to conversation or a story is work, and I often loose interest in movies because I miss too much of the dialogue by either not paying close enough attention or not being able to hear. Now, no matter what the situation, background noise or not, I can watch a movie and enjoy it!

We stopped for another McDonalds breakfast around 6am somewhere east of cleveland. The end was in sight now, but I don't think our bodies believed us. The leg room was somewhat cramped, and so much so that the person in the passenger's seat couldn't even recline their seat to a comfortable position, so none of us slept very well. I think we all averaged around 4-5 hours of sleep on the way down and about the same on the way back.

We arrived in Lockport, NY around 10am and were thankfully able to check in early to our hotel room. We each took a turn in the shower and then crashed for a couple hours of sleep. In the afternoon we went out the the Fulwell's and enjoyed a time of visiting and then went to the site of the wedding and worked on the finishing side of the set up, as well as discussing plans and schedule for the next day. We attended the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner in the barn where the wedding was to be held. Andrew was a groomsman, and since Tim wasn't there for the rehearsal, Trevor was the stand-in best man. We then went back to the Fulwell's to consult with Ben and Susan of the final plans for the following day.

I went with Janie and Mr. Fulwell to the neighbour's where they were taking care of some horses while the neighbour's were away. I love upstate new york, it is beautiful - so green and many quaint little yards and towns!

We all crashed hard into bed that night, and morning came much too early! Julie and I shared a room with Grandma Brown and Trevor and Andrew had a seperate hotel room, so we all met for breakfast in the lobby and then headed out to the wedding site. Andrew had to be there for pictures, Trevor was the direct the traffic to the proper parking spots, and Julie and I were to help with the final set up and ensure things were in order for the day. The weather was beautiful, not too warm, but sunny and dry.

The ceremony was beautiful and concise, just like those who were involved. Mr. Hyland married the couple, and did a beautiful job of the message. The wedding was held in an 80 year old barn on Susan's grandparents farm. It was a beautiful setting, with hay bales and burlap curtains for the backdrop, tables set with red and white checkered table clothes, mason jars full of daisies, and small jars of strawberry jam for each person to take home (made by susan and her family, and topped with a piece of cute red/white gingham cloth, tied on with raffia. There were hanging baskets of white flowers on the pillars of the barn to brighten it up as well.

The meal was wonderful, with salad, veggies, scalloped potatoes, ham and turkey with all the fixings! Instead of a wedding cake, Ben and Susan served up home made peace and apple pies - yes they actually served each and every person! After a short program, people started to disperse, with many staying around to visit and help clean up. It was a delightful day! Since it was a morning wedding, there was lots of time afterwards to see some sights, so Andrew, Trevor, Julie and I hooked up with Hans, Barry, Heidi, Tim and Dan and headed for the Niagra falls. We bought tickets for the Maid of the Mist and enjoyed the ride into the mist of the falls for an up close look! It was beautiful! The power that that water has, just makes me think of how much more power our heavenly Father has, since just one river in His creation is that mighty and beautiful!

On Sunday, meeting was held in the same place as the wedding had been, it was a beautiful gathering of believers from across the country and I really enjoyed breaking bread in such a humble place as a barn - thinking of our Lord's birth - in the humility of a stable, all the way to His precious death and glorious ressurection! Once again the weather was beautiful! Even cooler then saturday had been, and with a bit more breeze. After a nice buffet lunch, we hit the road for our 26 hour drive back.

The drive home was mainly uneventful, I drove for a spell of 5 or 6 hours, including the city of Chicago - which was slightly nerve wracking, as Andrew's GPS battery died just before we reached the city limits and I had to keep my eyes open to make sure I stayed on the write track! It was 11pm and there was still much stop and go traffic, as there were some areas of construction, which restricted the flow of cars. I would hate to be there during rush hour!!!

We stopped a few more times on the way home as we had more time to spare. This included a stop at the mall in Fargo, a cracker barrel store along the way, and the mall in Grand Forks. I managed to find some deals on bath and body works soaps and a couple of western shirts in fargo - but managed to keep my spending to about $60! When we arrived at Emerson, the line to cross the border was over an hour long, so we detoured around to the little port of Snowflake, just south of La Riviere and had no wait at all to get across! It was a good trip, although we were all tired for the whole week I think! I'll post a few pictures, but I'll leave the rest of the catching up for another blog, as I need to get some sleep!! Julie has more and better pictures, which I may steal and post in the future - stay tuned!!