New Year's Eve

Enjoyed spending New Year's Eve in Grantsville, Maryland, with family.  In the final hours of 2013 we gathered in the Casselman dining room.  One family of four children makes music as a string quartet.  I stopped in the center of town to look at this antique store in blue lights.

birthday meal

There was salmon grilled on a cedar plank and cake with raspberry syrup. Mostly, there was a happy young woman. (pics by Joel)

Easter dinner

Here's the kitchen of my sister's church in Akron. The five in their twenties had already gone when we thought of taking a photo.

more family

Several moments in our family story converged and brought us together, 14 of us, Nov. 10 in Harrisburg. I won't try to prioritize.

Nov. 10 was the 27th anniversary of Dad's passing. Photo 4. It was the return from Syria of Mel, one week after Gary's death for Evie, and the first evening out for Loretta after back surgery.

Photo 3. Another moment was the visit of Oregonians Bonnie and Chris. And, photo 2, it was the one-year anniversary of Joel and Stephanie. We anchored them at the end of the Chinese restaurant table. All in all it looked like this, photo 1.

brother-in-law dies

Nearly everyday my newspaper reading includes the obituary page. Here's the sad news of Gary's sudden passing--sudden as in instantaneous. My sister, Evelyn, had dropped him off at the house after a doctor's visit. While she drove on to the pharmacy he walked into the house and died.

He often said at family gatherings, I never saw a U-haul trailer behind a hearse, meaning one can't take anything from this world to the next. After a Thanksgiving feast he would say, I wonder how the rich live, meaning the rich could eat no better than we just did.

I'll miss him. I doubt if he would have voted for Obama, but his obit (first three paragraphs here) was published in the same paper that announced Obama's election.

more cherries

These are North Star Cherries--just plain ol' sour cherries, chosen to be tough and disease resistant, needing no pesticide.

Here's some of the Lehman gang picking. L to R--Anna Lois, Helen, Milton, Evie, and Lois. Loretta's in there somewhere, too. In the 1950s we picked cherries at the Lehman farm close to Lancaster. In the 1970s we picked seconds at a Beiler neighbor's orchard.

cherry picking

Here's my brother Milton holding his granddaughter Helen. And here's grandma, Lois, after the cherry picking today.

The crop this year is small but deep red. Both trees were swarmed by my sisters Loretta, Anna Lois, and Evelyn and husband Gary, besides the three in the pic and Dorcas and me.

The trees came from the nursery 20 years ago and one is sorely diseased. But, what a family time!

third and fourth generations

Eighteen family members crowded into the Monterey house Sunday, December 23. Of the family of Lester and Elva, that's the whole bunch, except Mel and Patrick.

Late in the afternoon, the entire and third and fourth generations were there and the shop light gave this image of them. Standing: Bonnie, Chris, Joel, Stephanie, Sarah, Ryan; front, Helen, Manny, Angela, and lights girl Emily.

Wow. Great bunch! If Lester and Elva could see them now!

lights, action, Emily

You get the family together for Christmas. You got three generations from three states. Plenty of action. But, lights, please, for the historic pic.

Emily knows what to do. A picture of taking a picture. This so good maybe we'd do best just to imagine what the light's pointed at.