Wisconsin welcomes the Schrocks

Last weekend was the annual Leroy and Esther Schrock - Ramont's paternal grandparents - reunion, held this time at their homeplace near Jump River, Wisconsin. I don't yet have the photo with everyone on it, but above is Ramont's family with (Great) Grandma Schrock; his dad, Elwood, is the eldest in the family. We were around 30 people altogether.

Most of us stayed in the house or yard of (Great) Grandma Schrock, while the rest stayed just down the road at daughter Rita and Alvin's home. Rita and her daughter, Maria, did ALL the cooking, hosting, and general logistics - truly extraordinary hosts! Ravonn's family and ours stayed in two campers on the yard. The one we stayed in is in the background above, beside the barn and beyond the trampoline. Since we knew this ahead of time, our kids were soooo excited before and during (and after) the event to sleep in a CAMPER!! It was pretty cold the first few days, so we enjoyed having our mate around the campfire each morning, waiting for the others to stumble out of their beds. Here are Ranene, Joseph and Josiah with Ramont and Anna. Ranene's family is on its way from Alberta to Harrisonburg, VA where they are moving onto a farmstead and beginning their new life this weekend!

We also spent the days in various activities. My favorite was just sitting and visiting, while the kids played around the yard on Jonathan's dream machines - here a real, live four-wheeler, with cousin Noelle. Also in this photo are Ramont's cousin Verlyn, his wife Lisa and their baby, Claire.

Ramont gave some of the rides, here with Josiah running behind.

Grandma Schrock plays cards with Greta and Noelle.

The trampoline was a gigantic hit with the kids (the "rules" of only one kid jumping at a time, not so much). Jonathan and Anna were the youngest cousins (except baby Claire), so they mainly got bounced around. Thankfully they have some extremely solicitous bigger girl cousin that took great care of them.

We ate three super square meals a day in this garage, and also had morning and evening singing and sharing times in here. Let me tell you, the Schrocks can SING. And tell long stories :)

The food was amazing and (too) plentiful!

Here are the hosts, Rita and Maria. I've seriously never (with the exception of Ramont's mom and his sister, Ravonn) seen such relaxed hosts as they were.

Rita made this amazing cake with the names of everyone who attended the reunion. If you know the family, you can see it follows family tree lines in the leaves.

Cousin Greta high-fives Anna before pictures.

Jonathan enjoys some watermelon.

There was even an organized kickball game. No, Anna was not a participating member.

The first and second cousins line up for family pictures.

This is as good as the family photo-ing goes at this stage in life. [Yikes.]

Entertainment while family pics happen in the background.

Esther Schrock with three of her children: Betty, Elwood, and Rita; Arlan lives in Virginia and wasn't at the reunion.

(Great) Grandma Schrock, age 93, pioneer, pastor's wife, handiworker, and much, much more.

Summertime, and the living is...

...pretty good. Ramont's folks came to visit last week. Somehow I never seem to get photos of them, especially not with the kids (doesn't happen with my folks either, and I'm not sure why; probably I spend the hands-free time out-of-sight rather than hanging around taking pictures). We loved, loved, loved having them here. This time Jonathan and Anna were old(er) enough to really start enjoying the time with them. They then headed to Wisconsin and we joined them over the weekend for the Schrock family reunion (more in a later post). Today is our first day back to normal, and it was a bit too much for Anna. She cried and cried and cried after morning quiet time, and then finally collapsed into a sleep coma around 10.30. Too much excitement in the last few days!

Back to the farm, pre-Wisconsin: our new hammock hasn't seen many naps in it yet. Lots of roughhousing, yes.

Here Jonathan gives it a test spin.

I found Anna like this one afternoon, working away under the couch with her pliers.

And another morning I came outside to this lovely scene. This farm life certainly does suit all of us.

Don't be fooled by the hat: this was taken during the only 90+ degree week of the summer.

Grandpa Schrock made this amazing marble roller for Jonathan and Anna (he's made them for all the grandkids), which is a biiig and loud hit.

Anna models her new hat from Grandma Schrock. Jonathan models the hat he doesn't leave the house without.

[Sprayer zooms by on the road.]

Grandma and Grandpa picking raspberries in our garden,

while Jonathan supervises. What a great summer this has been and continues to be!

More MCCer goodness

The summer of amazing visitors continues: last weekend the happy Heppners came from Manitoba for a few nights. We first met them on the plane to MCC orientation in Akron in fall of 2008, when I plopped down in my seat hoping to read through the brand new Economist. Well, my seatmate was none other than Kathy Heppner (with an actively crawling Asha), sooo...no reading on that flight :)

We overlapped with the Heppners in Bolivia for three years. They were one of the best reasons to come into the city when we lived in Charagua, and then later when we lived in Santa Cruz, I looked forward to (almost) daily hausfrau sessions with Kathy under the communal clothes line, as we put up/took down diapers. I can't even begin to explain in how many ways this family is amazing, and I'm tempted to write here all the ways we think they are doing a stellar job raising their kids (but I'll save that for another venue). Suffice it to say that the few days with them were pretty great (and too few) for us and for our kids.

Here is Sunday afternoon terere (with popcorn, of course) and our ginormous pool.

 A common scene: lots of kids, in the backyard, with the wagon, etc.

 One of the funniest games ever: Kezia and Joel bringing their very obliging piglet to market over some rather bumpy terrain...

 ...with bound feet and everything.

 Also a common scene: Anna first on the table scene, and also last.

 Jonathan rescuing his little sister from the mayhem.

Have I mentioned that there is a little slice of raspberry heaven in our garden? Our freezer is filling up nicely with frozen little nuggets of gold.

For Sunday faspa we were also together with Nathan and Loida, fellow Bolivia MCCers, as well as my mom and dad (also a fellow Bolivia MCCer!).

 The kid's table.

 Jonathan has caught the climbing (and jumping) bug.

 Anna has had the "let's try on everyone else's shoes" bug for quite awhile now.

 First little ears of field corn.

 Anna hangs out with the chickens.

And that was that.

Rainy morning

Just to be clear, by morning I mean those hours when most (normal) kids are still inside sleeping, maaaybe eating breakfast. Ours were having a ball digging around in the driveway gravel in the drizzle. This was taken right before all the clothes got peeled off and into the (mini)pool they went...and Anna deposited all her, well, non-digestibles in a neat pile right beside the pool while I went inside to pull some cookies out of the oven.

So, into the bath we went. Having one in the morning - and in the downstairs tub - was something out of the ordinary, and thus even more fun than usual.

It never ceases to amaze me that one inch of water can provide so much entertainment.

A few bubbles add even more fun (i.e. longer diversion for mama to blog about it).