Family Traditions

Twice a year we have the opportunity to listen to our church leaders from Salt Lake City in what is called General Conference. It's such an amazing two days. We typically stay home and watch all four two-hour sessions online (Two sessions on Saturday and two on Sunday. Men also attend one session Saturday evening, but they have to go to the church and watch it). When you're a little kid eight hours of meetings can seem like a long time; however, as an adult the time goes by so fast I never want it to end. But at least we get to study the talks/sermons throughout the next six months before the next conference. It's one of the best weekends of the whole year.

On the Saturday morning of the October conference one of our favorite family traditions is to drive out to Millheim where we visit some Amish markets (bakery as well as a fruit/vegetable stand), a country store (they have some bulk food items as well as a great bulk candy and cookie/cake decorating section), and a meat market. One of our primary motivations for making the drive is to get some amazing barbecue chicken (roasted on an open fire pit) from the Dutch Valley Bakery (an Amish family's bakery/home) for lunch. Amos cooks some of the best chicken I've ever had in my life. During the last couple years there has been a Dutch Fall Festival in Aarronsburg (literally a hop, skip and jump from Millheim). This year we left early so that we could stop at the festival. Unfortunately it was rainy and cold, so there weren't many people out. But I enjoyed walking around the little booths that lined the streets. Richard and I really like little town fairs. He enjoys sampling the food and I like checking out the crafts and home decor items. We have a lot of fun going to things like this together. This year we took some new friends (the Nichols) with us. It was fun sharing our little family tradition with them. We typically make the drive to Millheim and go to these shops when people from out of town come visit us. So, if you're not from Pennsylvania and you want a true Pennsylvania experience, this is a glimpse of where we will go if you come visit. It's a great country drive. We enjoy it more than Lancaster.

On another note, it's been cold and rainy all weekend. Actually, it looks pretty bleak outside.We just read a news report indicating this area saw it's first snowflakes early this morning. It's not allowed to get cold yet. I think it's supposed to warm up later this week. I sure hope so, I still haven't taken our "final" fall pictures for Christmas.