This summer has been wet and buggy, but it's coming to an end. For the past week or two, the mornings and evenings have been delightfully cool, the school buses have been running, and I'm ready for a new season. I didn't have any big adventures this summer, but I thought I'd write a newsy, circle-letter like blogpost about the past month. On August 3, my niece, Angie, was baptized in Mill Creek at Lancaster Mennonite School, along with three other young people from Crossway Mennonite … [Read more...] about Summer’s End: A Baptism, a Birthday, and a Wedding
Family
My Grandmother Alice
Tomorrow we will attend my grandma's funeral. My grandmother, my mother's mother, Alice Rissler, died on Sunday morning. She was ninety-one-years old, with limited mobility and an aching body. The week before she passed, her mind declined, and she lost the ability to talk, eat, and drink. Family or caregivers stayed with her around the clock. So when she passed in the wee hours on May 4, we were thankful she was free from her suffering, yet at the same time, it's still hard to believe she … [Read more...] about My Grandmother Alice
Cleaning Out the Attic
"Life truly begins after you have your house in order," Marie Kondo says. Right now, my mom is trying to put our home in order, the century-old brick house that my family has lived in for nearly forty years. She's starting with the attic. "In another ten years, I might be too old to do this," she reckons. The attic contains the debris of her child-raising years, such as a diaper pail and a wooden potty chair. My brother Andrew, the youngest, will turn thirty-five soon. Frugal … [Read more...] about Cleaning Out the Attic
February Fairy Gardens
Need a winter project while you're hunkered down, waiting for spring? Fairy gardens have been popular for years, and I always thought they look adorable. I had several vacation days to burn this month, so last week I invited my two sisters and their children to come and make potted fairy gardens together. During the summer, Brenda and Joanne both have beautiful flowerbeds and thriving vegetable gardens, and they keep houseplants year round. So I knew they would enjoy this. We started … [Read more...] about February Fairy Gardens
Merry Christmas! Plus a Gingerbread Cookie Recipe
"I can't remember a time when we didn't bake gingerbread men," said my sister Joanne at our annual cookie exchange last Friday. The year Joanne was born, my mother ordered a cookie cookbook from the Farm Journal magazine. Today, the pages of Best-Ever Cookies are stained and yellowed and the mustard hardcover is taped and worn (the jacket lost long ago), and Joanne has seven sons and one daughter, and but the Burkholders still make gingerbread men every year. For the last few years, Mom … [Read more...] about Merry Christmas! Plus a Gingerbread Cookie Recipe