My favorite cousin, Charlotte Glenn-Frey and I. 

Tuesday morning the cell phone rang.  It was our daughter Tiana calling from home in Wisconsin.  We were enroute home after a weekend visit to see my parents in  Ohio. 

“Mom, Charlotte called and said she’s at Cracker Barrel and went ahead and got a table.”

Oh dear, here we were stuck in a traffic jam close to the Scioto Downs (horse race and casino) on the south side of Columbus.  We were a 1/2 hour late and there was no end in sight of all the backed up traffic.

“Call her back and tell her to wait.  We are stuck in traffic.”  I didn’t want her to give up and go home.   I wasn’t really worried.  I knew Charlotte wouldn’t do that.  She wanted to see me as much as I longed to see her.  She is that kind of cousin.

Jonathan asked me, “Mom, do you know this woman we are meeting at Cracker Barrel?”   Yes, Jonny, I know her!  Smiles

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Since our Daughter-in-law is so interested in family history and is making an effort to record what she can for her children’s sakes, I bought a little booklet that is entitled: “Mom, Share Your Life With Me”.  This book has something for me to write for every day of the year to record my memories, starting out with the day and date of my birth on Jan.1st to other memories throughout my life. 

I haven’t filled very much but Jan 21st had me stumped.  “Relate an experience or memory of a cousin.”  Hmmm.  Who is or was my favorite cousin?   I began to think about that one.  With all my 25 cousins, I had none my own age.  The one that I knew the best was old enough to be my mother.  In fact, I think she is older than my own mom, so she doesn’t count.  Linda?  We saw a lot of each other, but she ‘s about 8 years older and always “hung out” with my oldest sister and brother.  Debbie is only a year older than I am but she developed earlier than I did so ditto with her….she was Gwen and Randy’s buddy.  I don’t recall of either of these cousins being stuck up or anything but we never were close.  Ruby?  She was a sweet girl and I always looked up to her but we rarely ever saw each other and she too was several years older than I.  Martha Jean?  Same story.  Michelle?  She spent a couple of summers with my Grandma Glenn, she was 3 and 1/2 years younger but whenever we got together, she, my sister Pam and I were friends.  But really none of these are any that I consider a favorite cousin.  Sad but true.  And of course most of my cousins I wouldn’t even know if I met them on the street.  I just don’t have any favorite cousins, I guess….BUT wait…..Charlotte!  Bingo!  I started reminiscing and know that that’s not true.  I do have a favorite cousin.  Let me introduce her.

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It was back in the early 70′s, I am not sure of the exact year, that I met Charlotte.  I was about 10 or 11 years old.  Our family went to Johnstown, Ohio for the first Glenn reunion with my Dad’s cousins.  This was people that we barely even knew existed.  I am sure that we probably looked odd to all those Glenns.   I doubt they had ever heard of a Mennonite, let alone seen any, but if Charlotte thought we were weird she never once let it show.  She was probably 21 at the time but she made sure that we were not neglected and that made a huge impact on me.

I really do not remember much about that day, but I vividly remember Charlotte and her 2 sisters: Janet and Bev. Their dad was my Grandpa’s first cousin, making us 2nd cousins, once removed….but we are closer than that I think. 

Janet introduced us to the new wonder: Invisible zippers.  We were amazed!  These new zipper were hidden in the seam.  Wow!  My life has never been the same. 

Beverly, on the other hand, has Down’s Syndrome so that was a new experience for us.  We knew of another person like that but we had never really met anyone like that up close.  Charlotte took the time to explain what her problem was and I was impressed of her love for her youngest sister.  We found her amusing, like when she played lawn darts and ended up getting her own leg by mistake but she didn’t make us feel uncomfortable so we were all just fine.

After that reunion, Charlotte and I began to write letters on occasion.  She was truly interested in our family and made an effort to keep in touch, most of the time.  She was there when my brother died in ’80.  Was there at our wedding in ’81, and my sister’s wedding in ’83.  She was the only cousin that bothered to give me a baby gift when Susana was born. (I had lost track of most of my cousins by that time.)  I still have the little shawl cape with a hood that her mother had crocheted for her to give to me.  I will treasure that always.

She was there for my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary do-dah.  Yes, she is that kind of cousin and I love her for it.

  Here is my favorite picture of her.  With my Mom in 1993.  Beautiful, isn’t she? 

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We arrived at Cracker Barrel at noon, Kaitlyn fell in the parking lot on the way in.  I bent down to help her up, looked in the window and saw Charlotte smiling back at me.  I took Kaitlyn straight to the restroom but soon heard someone ask “Does she need a Band-Aid?”  Ah it was so great to hear that voice again.  It has been nearly 8 years since we were last together.

Needless to say, our time together was way too short but we needed to get on home so we parted a couple of hours later.

Yes, Charlotte IS my favorite cousin.  Hands down, she wins the prize.  I have found that age difference doesn’t matter if you love someone.  I love you, Charlotte.  Thanks for being that cousin. 

I finally got caught up with my work to be able to do Lanet’s quilt top.  I had made Ben a froggie one; Sue’s has fairies so I decided to make this one with kittens.  Their Mommy is a real cat lover so when I saw a quilt with these kittens in a quilt magazine in the library I knew this was it.  I bought the (Panels) blocks online but no way was I going to buy any of the other stuff it required so I got busy raiding my stash and this is the results:

  Actually I am very pleased with it.  Now the chore of quilting it. 

This afternoon we spent having a picnic at Jump River wayside with Kurt and Marilyn Shores’ family.  Their daughter Dalila just turned 14 and her wish was to have a picnic together so she could be with Lavina.  Of course, this suited Jonny really well as their Benji is one of his best friends.  The children played in the water while we adults visited.  A very pleasant afternoon was enjoyed by every one of us.

  Kurt and Marilyn   Kendra, Dalila, Lavina

  Benjamin

Jacob

  Angela (see “Tears of the Rain” by Ruthann Stelfox

  Moriah Sue

  Caleb

  Anna

  Kendra

  Vernon and Kurt

  Playing with the pump

Well, have a good weekend, folks. 

Have you ever seen the hand of God in something that may seem trivial to others, but means so much to you that it almost makes you cry?  I would like to share something that makes me feel so small but yet so loved by our Heavenly Father. 

As I walked out of the door of our church that balmy Sunday last Fall,  I looked over at our Ford 15-passenger van in the parking lot and something akin to fondness enveloped me.    Our van had served us faithfully for almost 7 years and still had plenty of mileage left on it.   Besides I was very partial to that shade of gunmetal blue. 
I also took note that the paint was peeling from the roof where a recent trip through the car wash had really done a number on it.  The thought crossed my mind that perhaps we could get it repainted while were were in Guatemala since we were planning to drive down there soon anyway.  We know of place there where they did an excellent job on some other of our vehicles and weren’t too expensive.
Little did I know that before the day was over, our van wouldn’t be needing a new paint job.  Neither would it serve us any longer.  Several hours later it was laying on it’s right side after rolling 2 times  and now it is parked outside our house looking very forlorn indeed.

Although, I have peace about what happened that afternoon and I am extremely grateful for God’s protection through it all, every time we come home from somewhere,  I see that  wrecked van parked there, I feel a wave of nostalgia and sadness wash over me.  The children tease me that I say the same thing; “That poor van!”   

 

Vernon had threatened to take it to the junk dealer but I didn’t want him to, as I was sure there were parts that are perfectly usable that someone might need….someday.  (I remember having to fork out $800 for one of those long side window when one of our children broke one in Guatemala.)  I  tried listing it or pieces of it for sale online but the listing never really came together so was never posted. 
In the meantime, we bought another van from a friend that was selling his for a cheap price.  It is a 12 passenger, white and very rusty but we knew we needed it until something better came up.  We kept looking on Ebay for a replacement but unfortunately they are all out of our price range.  Also, none of them really appealed to me.  They just weren’t the “right” color.  Finally, we sort of dropped it, figuring we would deal with the problem later when we had to.

Then, in February, while using the Internet,  I decided to check Craigslist NW Wisconsin.  I typed in Ford Van and lo and behold, there was a E350 maxi van  almost identical to the one we rolled.  No rust, since it had recently been brought up from Colorado.  Only difference was its a V8 instead of V10 and has a CD player instead of cassette.  WOW!

Quite frankly, I really wanted that van.  The price was a bit more than we felt that we could pay but it sure beat the 6 to 10 thousand dollars most of them were going for on Ebay.

Of course, I wasn’t sure if we really NEEDED it or not, since we did have this white one, but Vernon was also excited about it and gave me the go-ahead to contact the seller.  Over the next week, I kept praying about it, asking God to show us clearly if we should buy it or not.  I didn’t want to get it without His complete blessing as I felt that part of my wanting it was for sentimental reasons.

The seller, Scott, told me that he had used it for a cargo van and didn’t sell it to a Day Care center that had been interested because he thought it was not good enough to haul children.  I told him our story and that Vernon was a mechanic and knew how to fix vehicles.  We also discovered that the pieces of the interior that needed fixed or replaced was from the left side.  The side of our rolled van that wasn’t bashed in!

We drove a couple of hours up to Lake Superior to look at it and decided to offer what we felt we could afford.  It has high mileage, plus the windshield needed replaced, besides a few other things like the heater and air conditioner wasn’t working.  Scott was asking a good bit more than we offered, and he declined our offer.    He said he didn’t think he wanted to let it go for that but said he would contact us if it didn’t sell.  We told him that was fine and that we felt he no doubt could get more for it from someone else.  Still, as we drove away, I felt a little sad that it hadn’t worked out but I was at peace that we hadn’t forced an issue where God was saying “No.”  Besides, there was the possibility that Scott would contact us later. 

We left and had started back down the highway  when Vernon suddenly thought he should turn around and go back into town to fuel up.  While we were at the gas station, Scott drove in.  Since he lived only a couple of blocks from there, I thought perhaps he was going into the convenience store to buy something and didn’t think too much about it.  Vernon was inside the store paying for the gas but when got back into the van he asked me if Scott had talked to me. 
I said “No, he hadn’t.” 
Then Vernon told me that Scott had come looking for us.

He said that when we left that he immediately felt he should have sold it to us.  He and his wife talked about it and decided that they wanted us to have it, so he decided that if we were still in town and if he could find us, that he would sell it for what we had offered.   That is IF we were still interested.  IF????!!!!

I could’ve cried right then and there!  Now, I do not have to worry whether we did the right thing or not. 
When I asked Scott how he found us, he said that he thought he’d look at the gas station because we may have decided to get gas, but if we had gone down the highway he knew he’d never catch up with us.    Who but God could’ve nudged Vernon to turn around and go back when he did?  If we had fueled up first before we left town, Scott would have missed us so God’s timing was perfect.

Now we have another van that looks right at home in our parking lot!  And on the other side of the house we have most or all of the parts and pieces we’ll need to fix it up.

  Little did we know that we would be the ones that needed the parts.   Here Vernon is “Robbing Peter to pay Paul.”   

 

 

 Isn’t God good?  

HE even knew it was the right color! 

  So this helps it seem as if

 

this hadn’t happened:

 

 

Imagine my family’s surprise this morning when these 2 dear children walked into the Library this morning!  I had my camera in my pocket ready to get Lavina’s expression but just as I was coming into the restroom where she was cleaning, I heard her cry out: “You aren’t supposed to be here!” and knew I was too late.  They came in from the lower level so I missed their arrival by a minute or two.  They walked into the women’s restroom and he asked “Is this the Men’s?”  Lavina, not seeing who it was, said “No”.  I think she was wonder what man got mixed up, when she came around the corner and saw Susana and Adam and I missed her moment of surprise.  Oh rats!  I didn’t have my camera ready for Vernon but his eyes got really big and a huge grin stretched from ear to ear!

  Adam getting a welcoming hug from Kaitlyn

They started out Wednesday night from PA driving a Jeep out for Delvin Weaver.  (Susana’s uncle)  They got to Abbey’s (his sister) in Ladysmith about 3:30 AM.  They stopped off to see Melisa for a bit before heading up to Silver Bay, MN with Abbey for the funeral of their “adopted” grandfather, Dean Anderson this afternoon.

Adam had called me last night so I knew they were coming.  Can’t wait until they come back.  Plans are for them to return tonight.  Its about 4 hours up there from here.

I’m seeing spots.  I have been cleaning the stairs in the library.  Each tread on the first set of 12 steps have 168 and 4 half spots.  The bottom set has 164 spots for 11 steps.  I added them up to 1804 + 2016 + 48 half spots = 3844.  These have to be scrubbed hard in a circular motion to get clean so I usually only do a couple each time.  I only have 2 more to go.  It sure makes my arm and wrist very tired and sore.

  Before  after

Here’s a picture of Vernon and I in Ruth’s iris garden;

We stopped at Ace Hardware on the way home.  Their trees were 50% off!  I had noticed them earlier and had wanted to get a couple but couldn’t see my way clear to pay $70.00 for any.  I had made up my mind that I would choose a Zestar and a Honeycrisp apple tree.  So, today, I got my wish!  I could hardly believe my good fortune.  We took the last Honeycrisp there was so if we had come any later, I probably would’ve missed out on that.  (Kendra Lily had told me once that if I ever plant an apple tree she wanted a Honeycrisp. ) They also have a number of Sweet Sixteen that I want to get get if they are still available later on.  These trees are the only ones that I have ever seen for sale that had apples on them.

Well, its time to get back to work.  Have a great day as you serve God in your corner of His vineyard.  Kimm

Actually, there’s nothing to it.  Just climb the ladder and do the job.  Just don’t look down!  Yikes….its a long, long way to down.  I kept asking God to keep me safe.  (I’m afraid, I was very repetitious, but it wasn’t vain.  ).  Anyway, the ladder job is finally done.  Today, I plan to start the sponging with dusty rose.

  getting there…..

  How do people climb ladders which no fear of falling?

  Up on third floor at last.

I’m up about 12 feet from the landing that my ladder is on, which is the second landing from the top.  I was afraid if I fell, I might not stop until I at the basement level!  There are 39 steps from the top to the bottom.. 6 landings.

It doesn’t pay to look down.  It really is a long way down.

I am finished with the ladder part.  Praise the Lord!

One plus is that while I was painting I was listening to Alexander Scourby read the Old Testament.  Got from Genesis to half way through Deuteronomy. 

Just a little photo journal of how the painting is going.

.  How am I ever going to get up in that corner?

Reaching up as far as I can go with extension.

  What a job!

  To give you an idea of what this job is like.  See all 5 sets of stairs?  By the way, there is another one yet just around the corner to the right  that isn’t pictured.  You’ll have to imagine that.  There’s a wall in the way so I couldn’t get those in the picture. 

  Next big question:  what to do about this?

  And this?

    Or this?   Sometimes I think we’ve bitten off more than we can chew!

Well, where there’s a will, there’s gotta be a way.  Until then, Kim

We’ve been cleaning the Rusk County Community Library since the first of the year.  We work 2 hours 3 times a week.  From 8-10 AM on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.  This has been an interesting experience for our family.  You may read one of my earlier posts to get an idea of what we do.

Someone asked me what perks we have by doing this job.  Not much really, other than the monthly paycheck and maybe getting an edge on the withdrawn books that they send down to the lower level  where these books are for sale for $.25 and up to $2.00.  But I’d say our biggest perk is getting to know the librarians.  Before we started, I thought the head librarian was somewhat intimidating but it didn’t take me long to realize how funny and nice she is.  The more we know these ladies the more I like them. 

This morning as I was sweeping the walk outside I something mentioned to Kris about the nasty Canadian goose residue on the walk.  She nodded and wrinkled up her nose and made some comment about how bad it was.  When I went back into the library, I noticed a hoe propped up inside the door.  That was a new edition to the collection of 3 snow shovels and the special shovel that they have parked there getting in my way.  (The special shovel is the one they used 15 years ago to break the ground for the new library.)  Anyway, I noticed a note taped to the hoe handle. 

Reading it, I got my laugh for the day:   

I just love Hollis’ sense of humor.  We have a lot of fun times with her and her crew:

  Hollis Helmeci—Can’t you just see the fun in this woman?  (Whoops, she didn’t have her glasses on, I guess I’ll try another shot later.)

  Kayleen   Kris Farley Kris took Nancy Reidner’s place as Children’s Librarian.

Betty and Lavina have somewhat in common lately.  She has a hammered dulcimer and a mountain dulcimer and Lavina has her harp.  Both are trying to encourage the other to learn to play their instruments.  They hope to play together someday. 

  Betty  (Notice Vernon servicing the vacuum cleaner and Lavina getting ready to leave.)

Last but not least is Jane Shimka, a favorite of mine.  She is such a gentle, sweet woman. 

Well that’s all for this post.  Tootles

The last time I’d posted I had planned on adding some pictures but I didn’t get it done so I decided to start a new post.

When I dust the shelves at the library sometimes a book will catch my eye.  This time it a “Better Homes and Gardens—The Complete Guide to Bread Machine Baking”.  I pulled it off the shelf and browsed through it.  The pictures were mouthwatering.  Now I have had a bread machine for several years and I’ve never been able to turn out anything that pretty.  Usually I ended up with a sunken crater or an overgrown mushroom that melted down the outside of the pan.    This book was chock full of scrumptious recipes and a lot of pictures to go with them.  I decided to check the book out and pull out my bread machine.

Here are some of the results: Basic White Bread (1-1/2 lb loaf)

  Garden Patch Bread (2 lb loaf)

  Pumpkin Pecan Bread (1-1/2 lb loaf)

I did buy Bread flour instead of all-purpose and think that perhaps that is why they turned out so well.  Also, instead of dipping the measuring cup into the flour I spooned the flour into the cup as the book says to do.  I do want to try one recipe with our regular flour using the Basic white bread recipe and see what difference it makes.  But in the meantime, we have to eat what I made first.  Unfortunately, that’s not hard to do.  I am embarrassed to even say how many slices of the Garden Patch I ate.    Not good for the waistline, at any rate but ah….so delicious!

Lavina has been saving her money for a number of years to buy a harp.  Her daddy wasn’t sure that she ought to, not sure it was good stewardship, but when the next door neighbor’s daughter-in-law gave Lavina a gift toward her harp fund, he crumpled.    Btw—that daughter of ours seems to be a little gold-digger.  Everytime we go yardsaling, it seems like people automatically pick her out and “give” her something for free.  I think its those beautiful eyes and cute smile with the pug nose thrown in.  Anyway, when she opened up her envelope at home it had $120 in it!  Whoa!   The neighbor lady thinks the world of Lavina and she has her helping her a lot.  So, Vernon told her that she could buy her harp.  She was soooo excited.  Here are some photos when she first opened the box, etc.

Of course it needed tuning so we did that. 

     Funny thing is that we all love to play around with the harp….even Vernon.  He said to me the other day, “I think that’s the best instrument we’ve ever had!”  Unfortunately, she didn’t get any instruction booklets with it so mainly we’ve been picking out songs by ear.  Tiana who is very musically gifted, sat down and with 2 hands played Scarbourough Fair, with no sheet music nor had she ever touched a harp in her life.  It caused a little bit of jealousy but before long she had Lavina down beside her and she was teaching her to play it too.  So, without any lessons or books, Lavina can play one song.  I am impressed and excited to think what she’ll be able to accomplish before she’s done.  No, I cannot play with both hands, but can pick out tunes.  Only trouble is that I get mixed up.  With a piano the notes go from low to high (left to right) where the harp the notes go from low to high (right to left) so I get confused which string to pluck.

Now for the major project I have going:  Painting up the front central stairway to the 3rd floor.  It looked like it still had the original (1913) paint.  Well, maybe not quite but it was very old and ugly.    Vernon and I did count about 5 layers though.  Here is some “before” pictures:

A place where the 5 original layers are visible    Going down into the basement.  Furnace room door on left.

  A corner where we hadn’t washed yet.

  Its not an easy job.  There are some problems that I am not sure how to fix.  Remember neither Vernon nor I are carpenters or masons.  The lower level seems to have some type of leprosy, although I think its mainly from being damp.    There’s a huge crack in the ceiling that I am not sure how to fix either.  I am afraid if I start to mess with it, it might come down in a big hunk.    Maybe I’ll have to leave well enough alone, unless someone tells me how to do it.  In the meantime, I still plan to paint it.

Since paint is so expensive I have been buying OOPs paint at Walmart for 1/2 off.  Every time I found a cream, white or light tan I’d buy it.  Different brands but mostly semi-gloss….then when I had enough to mix I did.  Added some bubblegum pink and now have a soft light fleshy color.  I bought some dusty rose and burgundy to go with it but its too bright.  More like bright pink and raspberry.  So I went and got a pint of black and did some experimenting.  I think I can manage now.  I am not interested in a girl’s bedroom up the stairs! 

Well, I think that’s enough for now except one parting shot of Kaitlyn riding Liz’s miniature horse yesterday. 

I have been feeling guilty at leaving this site unattended.  There seems to be so much going on around here and I haven’t taken the time to record it.  Since I am not doing a quilt a month, the drive to keep this updated has diminished.  Maybe I need to start doing quilt tops again. 

Well, the last thing that has happened around here was that our son’s family was here for nearly 2 weeks.  They are missionaries in El Chal, Guatemala and have 3 small children.  The oldest is only 20 days younger than our youngest (he turned 4 while they were here).  Their next child was born on my 50th birthday which made an extra special birthday present.  (Not all of my birthdays turn out bad.  )  Then their 3rd baby, another sweet girl was born in Jan. so we had loads of fun holding little baby.  Our oldest daughter, Susana came out with them from PA to help DIL drive and take care of the children on their trip back to PA.  Our son stayed here, was joined by a friend and neighbor from El Novillero (where we lived 13 years in Guate.)  Those 2 are presently at the Guatemalan border with 2 trucks waiting to cross into Guatemala tomorrow.  DIL and children flew back to Guatemala 2 weeks ago.  I am sure they will be overjoyed when their little family has been reunited.  For your info–I have been given very strict orders not to plaster their names and photos on the Internet so that is the reason I don’t.  I want to stay in his good graces and enjoy my grands so I obey. 

I purchased a used camera on eBay: Canon Powershot SX210 is, and am trying to get used to it.  It is a point and shoot but also has manual settings so I need to learn all the bells and whistles. 

Its time to go to church and I am not done.  I want to upload some pictures and add to this so if you read it and there aren’t any pictures, please visit me again and get the rest of my post….until then, tootle do.

Last fall, Vernon found an ad in the Ladysmith News for bids to clean the library.  It had a huge list of things that needed to be done including: vacuuming, sweeping, mopping, cleaning cobwebs, restrooms, disinfecting the railings, door handles, dusting, and washing windows.  When he showed it to me, he asked if I was interested in making a bid on the job.  Frankly it looked a bit overwhelming but I told him that if he would help with the cleaning, I’d be into it.  We certainly could use some more income and it would be something our entire family could do together.

I went up and evaluated the building and of course, I figured we could handle it. 

So, we submitted a bid and didn’t hear anything for a couple of weeks so figured someone else must’ve gotten the job. But about the time that we shelved it, Hollis, the head librarian called and said they accepted our bid.  This was in Sept. but the job didn’t start until January.  We were to do it 3 times a week.

On Jan. 3, found us at the Library at 8 Am.  Hollis let us in and we plowed in.  It was dirty so we had a lot of work to do to “whip it into shape.”  We soon discovered that we had underestimated the job but after a week, we sort of developed a routine:  Vernon and Jonny do the vacuuming which takes nearly 2 hours for them to do, Lavina cleans the 5 restrooms, Tiana cleans the lower level and I dust, sweep and mop and help whoever needs help.  Kaity follows us around or sits and enjoys the children’s nook.  She loves riding the elevator too.

Here are some pictures of our new job.  We do enjoy it and have learned to know the librarians in a way we never would have otherwise.  We work Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 8-10:30ish.  The librarians claim the building has never been so clean since it was new.  When we asked for pointers on what we could do to improve, Hollis said, “We are still reeling from shock on the good job you are doing!”

Now that’s reward for a job well-done!   

Kaity in the children’s cornerTiana mopping the lower level

Jonny vacuuming

Vernon vacuuming and cleaning the cobwebs

Lavina doing restrooms

Me doing the front foyer.  Sometimes I have to dry the floor after I mop it because just mopping alone makes it look streaked.