Day One at Chris and Katie's

Sunday, March 15^th

We tried to get ready as quick as possible this morning, and left to go to a Mennonite church. We felt awkward about being there at first, but soon became comfortable after several woman came up and welcomed us before sitting in their pews. In front of us sat a very curious girl with her mother. She turned around to look at us many times, but always smiled when we smiled at her. There was another friendly woman sitting in front of us with her adorable, cheerful baby girl.

The service consisted of many songs from both the Zion Praises and Congregational Hymnal, an adult devotional, and the sermon. During the end of the devotional, a girl handed us a note explaining that they kneel for prayer, but we didn’t have to. She didn’t want us to get caught off guard, which was very thoughtful of her. We did kneel for the prayers, but still got caught off guard by how quickly they kneeled and got back up.

Their singing also caught us off guard… a single note of a pitch pipe followed by an on-key hum, then a few men sang the first line, followed by a beautiful harmony by the whole congregation. They had one choir director, but no instruments, and sang parts whenever there were any. I have never heard anything so beautiful, nor so uplifting.
 

We were invited to stay for the meal afterward, but decided to leave since we had to go to the laundromat anyway, and figured we’d eat lunch near there. We ate at a pizza place called Slice of Brooklyn. Their personal pizzas were enough to feed an army, so we took the leftovers with us. Though it was kind of like a little hole in the wall place, their food was really good!

We’re currently sitting in a laundromat, waiting for our clothes to finish drying, and giving occasional advice to the trucker guy about doing his laundry since he had never gone to a laundromat before.

This evening we walked toward the end of the driveway and back up to their farm. It was way too cold and windy to walk much farther than that.
 

We didn’t see the cows yet because they were being fed, but Katie told us to go see the egg gathering room. Upon opening the door, a waft of warm, stinky air blew into our faces, and I saw a dead chicken next to the other door. I told my Mom so she wouldn’t look at the chicken, and we quickly grabbed two eggs and closed the door.

Planning to have a simple meal of cheese and crackers for supper, my Mom pulled out the delicious block of Kerrigold Dubliner cheese… only to find that it was moldy. She tried to cut the mold off, but found it throughout the whole block. That was the second block of cheese that we didn’t get to eat- one got left at the store, and the other was moldy!

Angry about the cheese and not having much else to eat, we finished off an entire bag of cheese puffs, and topped it off with Cinnamon Toast Crunch for dessert later on, with a few Butterfinger eggs mixed between. I also experimented with roasting a marshmallow Bunny Pole in the toaster oven.
 

 

After I had just finished eating my marshmallow, we heard a knock on the double door that joins the guesthouse with their house. It was Katie, asking if she could come for a visit. We happily welcomed her to come visit, and she was soon joined by her husband, Chris. We visited for about an hour, all about our families and some of the Amish ways. They have forty grandchildren! They both enjoyed the Butterfinger eggs, especially Chris. He didn’t talk much, but apparently has a good sense of humor (we read the past entries in the guestbook, and several people mentioned his sense of humor), and told us that we had made a mistake in putting the Butterfingers out because he had eaten so many.

It was a fun evening, and we hope to see more of them tomorrow!

After they left, we stayed up to play a couple games of Dutch Blitz.