Our adventures in Lititz - Part One

Hear me singing..."Oh what a beautiful Morning! Oh what a beautiful day!" Really it was. Even if the air was a bit nippy.

This post is a long one. You are welcome to get a cup of something and kick back while you join me on this virtual tour.

Mom, Georgia and I piled into the car and headed down the road toward Lititz with just one stop to make on the way.
A huge barn sale.
Here is the deal on that. I forgot to take a picture of the barn sale because the deals were so good that I just got down to shopping.
But, to prove my good intentions,
here is a picture of the house that went with
the barn that the sale was in. Isn't it pretty?
(Pictures on this post will enlarge when clicked on...I recommend it!)

I thought so...snapped the picture...
and then I proceeded to get a pretty tealight holder, some wrought iron candle holders and a whole box of candy molds for just $3.00 total.
Am I good, or what??
So, any other picture taking had to be put on hold
for such serious business.

Next we headed for Lititz. Lititz is North of Lancaster City and is home to a Moravian Girls School and a very old Moravian Church.
Georgia's parents nearly sent her to school there as a young girl. They attended First Moravian Church in York all of her growing up years. Her mother was a member there until her passing two years ago. So, it was special to see the Lititz church and school as we drove through the town.

Now, understand that I have lived in Lancaster County for more than seven years and had not set foot on the streets of Lititz for pleasure. Business, yes, but not shopping. How could I have missed it? I guess it comes back to my aversion of all things "tourist". I am going to have to get over that! This town is a gem!
We found history, beauty and fabulous people there.

The event that drew us to Lititz today was an Open House of Pots by de Perrot.
This artist has talent fairly dripping from his fingers.
My brother, Allan and his wife, Beverly met Steve de Perrot at the Arts Festival in State College a couple of years ago. Steve quickly became Allan and Bev's choice for tile maker for their new home.

Let me just say that this is a real honor since my brother and his wife are both in the Art field professionally. Allan holds a Fine Arts degree from Penn State and Beverly is a Curator at Penn State's Palmer Art Museum. Allan has to be one of the pickiest artsy people I know.
He has great taste, though.


We approached the door with anxious anticipation and then were met by sheer beauty.




The yard was stunning too.



For more information about this artist and his work you can check out the web site at this LINK.

Next, we began a walking tour in the heart of Lititz.
I thoroughly embarrassed the "Moms" by asking shop owners for permission to take pictures and mention them on the blog.
The first store we visited was

This was a beautiful furniture store and the layout as well as the
furniture was pleasing. This horse was unique.

And then took a picture of the Thanksgiving Table display

If you are ever in Lititz, check them out!
They are easy to find and have parking in front of the store.

The next store we visited was mostly out of curiosity about the name.

What in the world was a Barking Lamb?
So we asked!! The owner of this store answered our question by showing us a
photo of her 70 pound poodle.
The store was named after this dog because it is big, white and very fluffy,
somewhat resembling a lamb(the dog, not the store). See its picture HERE on the web site.
Check out these hats!

And this unusual piece of furniture...have you seen one like this before?

There was an awful lot to like in this shop.
I particularly liked two chocolate sets and the Nesting Russian Dolls.
You can see them on her web site. I was busy looking and forgot the picture. Hey, I was just warming up to this photojournalist idea.

Lititz is famous for its Wilbur Buds. In case you are not aware, Hershey is not the only chocolate factory in South Central Pennsylvania.

The entire downtown smells of chocolate. Yum!
This was as we were heading into the candy store and museum area. Don't they look excited?

These are entirely edible:

And these shots of the museum area:


Want to order online? Go to the Wilbur Chocolate Website by clicking on THIS.

By now it was lunchtime. We had many choices of places to eat. Glassmyers was reminiscent of old town America. Mom told of her childhood days of playing Restaurant with her dolls and how, in her mind, this is how her restaurant had looked. A converted Victorian home made for a cozy and lovely luncheon experience. I thought of all of the Grace Livingston Hill books I have read and how this transported us into that time period.
We got there just in time because soon after the entire Restaurant was full!
I enjoyed a turkey club on pumpernickle bread. That was a first...but it was so good! A quick pic of the happy Moms as we came out for more exploration...


In Part Two of our Day in Lititz we will see more shops.

I would visit any one of the stores we saw today again...and I am sure that I will! I may become a tourist yet!

Many thanks to the store owners for their willingness to have photos snapped in their places of business. Thanks Moms for being such good sports and making the day fun!

Ladies Day Out!

The Moms,(Warren's and mine), and I are headed out on an adventure this morning . I'll be taking pictures and will be excited to show them later.
Have a fabulous day!!!!!
This is the day that the Lord has made. I will rejoice and be GLAD in it!
How about You?

Might as well Laugh!

Yesterday was one of those days! You know the kind where the harder you try to get ahead the farther behind you fall? Usually on Thursdays we are slower paced in the morning and kind of gear up for Co-op. Our morning started out that way and then took a crazy turn.
We had planned to go look at a potential building for our church but before that I wanted to stop at Georgia's to drop something off and had told her the night before to expect me. She lives next door!
It was absolutely pouring rain so I decided that rather than run across the yards like normal I would just pull in as we left.
Anyway...about a half hour before we needed to leave, Chelsea came to me and said that she couldn't find her bag of Scrapbooking supplies for her class. She was very upset because the teacher had said at one point, "If you don't bring your supplies, don't bother coming to class." Sounds harsh? I know this teacher, she wouldn't hurt a flea...but the kids got the message loud and strong and Chelsea was terribly upset. We began the search for her scrapbooking supplies and I expected to go to the piano and pick up my music book.
Not There! Not in the living room bookcase! Not in the Family Room! Not in the office by the computer! Not anywhere!
So, the scrapbooking supplies were missing and my music, including background track!, were gone! GONE! My wheels start turning. Hmmm...what did we do last week after co-op. We waited for some friends and then went bowling. We checked the car and van....a couple of times. Nope, not there.
By now it was too late to stop at Georgia's and I had to call pastor Mike and tell him I would meet him ten minutes late and call Georgia and tell her I don't have time to "run next door"!
We were forced to leave without our supplies.
I was thinking and thinking about what we could have done with it. My best hope was that when we were waiting at the Church the week before that we had set it all down and left without it.
With my mind churning hard enough to make butter, we pulled out of the driveway and turned the wrong way! Being strong willed as I am, we kept going the wrong way even though it took us longer to go that way. I wonder why I didn't just turn around? Is it admission of defeat to turn around? What was that?!? Well, I'll have to analyze that another day.
We pulled in to meet Mike about 10 minutes late and it was still pouring. Folks down south, I do not mean to complain about the rain. I know how much you need it but it does seriously factor into this story. Long story short, this building was too small and the owner had a crew there putting walls up to make each space even smaller. No go. So...we stood in the rain a couple of minutes, Mike talked and said that while he was out the evening before his glass shower door had exploded into a million pieces and that was how he found it when returning home. Had he started talking about the weather or even this building I would have felt very comfortable pointing out that it was raining and I am a girl and don't want to go to Co-op looking like a drowned rat...but his shower door "Blew up!" Now this is something that just doesn't happen every day and how was he going to explain to his landlord..."I was out for the evening at friends, watching a show about ghosts, and when I returned my shower door was in pieces." So, I stood in the rain and empathized, really I do...it is terrible!, and got really wet. After the appropriate amount of empathy I hopped into the car and headed...the wrong way! Not my choice. This is another reason not to want this building. It is on a divided highway with no access in the front of the building to the other side of the road.
Feel my blood pressure rising? We have no scrapbooking supplies and I have no music for my two classes. I decide that even though we will be an hour early we will go to the church and see if it is there.
We arrive. It is still pouring so I get a fabulous parking spot near the door. This lot is usually reserved for the gym classes...but they won't be using them on this day. We run into the building and with trepidation I check the lost and found area. Nothing. I go down the stairs to the Moms' Room. Nope, not lying around in there. Our wonderful Moms' Room Coordinator shows up. I ask, with much hope in my voice if she has found a bag of Scrapbooking supplies....YES! She has. They are in the closet. I look to see if they are ours? YES! There is Chelsea's bag. Now to see if I placed my music in the bag... NOPE! Not there.
Up to the music room, no music...well there is lots of music in there, but none of it was mine...down the hall to find the kids...no kids. Back down the stairs. Oh, here are the kids. I tell them that we are going to run home and look again for my music...one half hour each way! They plead with me to be allowed to stay so they won't be late for class. I agree to do this if I can find a mom willing to oversee them. One agrees and off I go.
The rain and wind are now at an all time high. It was unbelievable. I am slipping an sliding because of the water on the road.
Meanwhile...back at Co-op. The fire alarm goes off and all of the people in the building are forced out into the downpour. Wouldn't you know, the ONE time I leave my children there this happens! The fire trucks came...it was chaos. I am oblivious to this, however, and am hurtling myself through major water lying on the roadways and being blown around, thinking about the price of gas, and how upset Warren would be at me for making this extra trip. I am a grown up and should know where my things are! Isn't this what we tell our children..all the time????
I arrive at home and search all of the places already searched. Nothing. So, I did what all addicted bloggers would do. I came down to check my inbox. New comments to the blog! Yeah! So, I guess that calmed my head enough that I thought to check just one more place...the garage, in a bin, under another bin. There it was! Apparently, I had done a quick car clean out and then this bin got placed on top of the one ....oh you get the drift.
Back in the car I go and fly up to Co-op. Everything appears to be normal so I have no clue about the fire alarm and the near drowning of my children. At least that is how they saw it.
I pause at Chelsea's scrapbooking class and her teacher says, teasingly, "Chelsea pulled the fire alarm." I laugh with her and think that this is a weird thing to think of as a joke...right then. Then they tell me that the fire alarm did go off and they were all outside for more than a half hour! Thankfully some friends pulled in and allowed my kids into their car while they waited at some point during the evacuation.
It turns out that the rain leaked through the roof of the church and shorted the fire alarm causing it to go off. Now, this cause was a major relief to us on the co-op committee because one year a student pulled the alarm and it caused us some grief with our host church.
My classes went on, with interruption. The Yearbook editor came and took pictures of the girls in the ensemble. They had to fix hair and makeup...time lost...they sang "flat", the room was HOT! It just was not a good day.
The 4-6th graders were not at their best, either. Here we are with 2 more practices and everyone is falling apart! Oh well, it must have been the day. Lets just hope that on concert day it is not raining and I know where my music is.
Might as well laugh! No sense in raising the blood pressure!

Today's Youth

Disclaimer: This post could be construed to sound like we have it all together and have perfect kids...oh no! We are struggling through issues just like anyone else. These are simply observations of one mother of teenagers.

Sometimes I am caught by surprise at the openness of today's teens. If you know their cues you can know whether they are hurting , angry, contented or any other various emotional tag most teens wear today. I do mean wear. As we are out at the mall or local shopping center, I get an education from my boys, who have been paying attention to these trends through kids at youth group and a teen radio show that our Christian radio station plays.

Emo: Tight pants, long sleeves(to cover the cutting) and white makeup. Reflecting emotional pain. It has its roots in music that is extremely emotional. Click on the word emo to link to an article on the subject.
Punk: The angry side of emo. Will dress for impact, pink or some other noticable hair color, in general a funky look. Just making a statement of "look at me".
Goth: All about black, death, trip pants, a statement of individuality and morbidity.

I am sure there are others but I remember my shock the first time I heard about the Emo way of presenting one's self. I thought, my goodness, they are screaming for love! They are allowing us to see their pain! I have attempted to reach out to a girl who visits our youth group sometimes. We ran into her at the mall and she was with other scary looking kids, like herself.
In other days, I likely would have been scared and put off by her but on this day she ran up to us and was so happy to see us and all I saw was a sweet, lost and confused little girl with too much time on her hands.
Where are the parents of these kids? My son, Jonathan, has a real interest in counseling one day and has been observing that many of these kids, not all, but many are crying out for attention because it is missing at home. We happen to know that in this specific girl's case she is very unhappy at home.
Teens, in general, used to scare me. Even in High School I was half afraid of my own generation and preferred adults. But now, being drawn in through having teens of my own, I can see these young people as they are. Scared, wanting their independence but being given too much to deal with, wanting a moral compass but being afraid to show it, hormones rushing and not understanding the many emotions that this causes, the highs and the lows. I see the public schools wanting to treat these children as adults. Since we came from State College, very heavy with influence from Penn State, we observed through being extremely involved, the constant desire on the part of the system to want to treat the High School students as if they were already in college. They are not ready for this. We have to look behind the words and attitudes to the real needs of these young people. We have to be the adults. They need guidelines and to have the pressure taken off of them. The pressure to be an adult before they are adults.

We must not be led astray by the growing bodies and big attitudes. What these kids need most is security and guidance with love....lots and lots of love.

Our middle son (15) is stretching into young adulthood. He pulls against us and declares that he is grown and should make his own decisions. Yet, he follows us around and talks our ears off. He spends a fair amount of time being angry and frustrated. I see the connection between his hormones spiking and whether he is getting enough sleep. I see him also feeling angry when he is not getting enough healthy food to eat. His sugar levels fluctuate and make him out of sorts. These are parent issues. It is up to us as parents to understand and spend enough time with our children to see the causes of some of these behaviors and help our children find solutions rather than just blame it on being a teenager and writing them off for a few years.
I tell my son, every day when I drop him off for work that I love him. He gives a little snort but, you know, I see the little grin as he turns away from the car. He would not want me to know that he likes being reminded of that but it is so important.
Often, lately, he wants to stay at home with his video games when the family is having an outing. For a while, I fell into the trap of allowing this and then realized that he is missing out on family memories and would quickly become disconnected if this continued. His attitudes have improved as we have made the extra effort to make sure that he knows his presence with us is desired and often required. For Mikey, at least, he needed to know that we like being with him and really miss him if he is not with us.
For the most part, because we homeschool the kids we spend the most time with do not reflect this world's clothing or attitudes. I appreciate that as a Mom, but as a Christian woman, I feel a calling to reach out and love the hurting and wounded young people around me. I don't know where this will lead but, I am willing Lord.

Failure and Success

This picture shows an actual event. In 2005 we were at Potter County for our usual Labor Day vacation and were shooting rockets. As you know by now this is popular at our house. The boys put together a styrofoam plane and a rocket engine just to see what would happen. It was crazy to watch this thing go up into the air and then zoom in a crazy pattern, nearly taking out our dog, Sally, the husky we had then. She later died...wonder if the fear took years off her life, poor thing. Anyway, back to the story...the plane crashed to the ground and burned!!!
My brother, the artist, had his camera on the whole thing and for Christmas that year we received this poster. I love it! Really, these are the actual pictures from that exciting event and I think that the caption says it all!

Advice please!!

I have these two really cute chairs. I know that they are not being used to their maximum capacity sitting in the back of my family room waiting to be needed. I would like to use them in a special way but cannot figure out how to yet. I have not touched them to recover or anything. They came into the house and down the stairs and there they sit. Would you recover the seat on the one? The other is caned and is in pretty good shape. Be creative! What would you do with these chairs?
Do you have stray chairs and if so what have you done with them?

Mom is home!

A tired but happy Grandma and her ecstatic Chelsea. We are so happy to have Mom back safe and sound. (Thanks for taking excellent care of her Aunt Naomi and Uncle Cliff. We saw her pictures from your new house before we were allowed to go to the salad bar! Beautiful!!!! That view is amazing!) What is up with letting her borrow a whole 'nother suitcase?!? Guess the shopping was good, too. Giggle! It's a good thing we took the boys along to carry the loot!
I hear that when she unpacks I get some bulbs to plant - awesome!

We left the Harrisburg Airport and headed off to Hoss's for dinner. I had to take a picture because the sign wasn't working and it really put us in the holiday spirit. Ho! Ho! Ho!