“For Thanksgiving my extended Kuhns family came to town and for entertainment the 2 year olds were playing church,” writes Karleen Kuhns. After viewing Karleen’s videos, I realized they were too cute to not share with you. In the first of three videos, one of the boys sings the opening to the Loblied (“Hymn of Praise”, sung as the second hymn in every Amish church…
Thanks to everyone for another great year. It’s been over 11 years now since I fired up this site in November 2006, really having no idea at the time where posting my observations on the Amish might lead. Thousands of posts and nearly 50,000 blog comments later, it’s been one of the most enriching things I’ve ever been a part of. I hope that you…
It seems like every year around this time we get a video of Amish out having some winter fun. We’ve previously seen Amish people skiing in Knox County, Ohio, and in Lowville, New York. There was also a clip of a buggy doing parking lot snow donuts. This short video, shot by Tara Hayward after Christmas dinner, shows an Amishman in Morley, Michigan, getting ski-towed down…
Ruth Streicher lives in an Amish community on Manitoulin Island in Ontario. Ruth recently shared thoughts on how Amish celebrate Christmas for the Manitoulin Expositor. First, as with most things Amish, Christmas traditions vary: “We celebrate the birth of Christ,” Ruth Streicher of Tehkummah smiled gently when asked about the Amish Christmas traditions. “But there are differences in how families observe Christmas. Some are more conservative…
Should Amish be required to install seat belts and other safety features common to motor vehicles? That’s the idea behind a new ordinance up for consideration tomorrow in Wood County, Wisconsin: Horse-drawn vehicles would need windshields, seat belts, child car seats and rear-view mirrors if officials in Wisconsin’s Wood County pass an ordinance that will be considered Tuesday. Amish and other religious groups that rely…
Diane Bell’s story sounds like something from a novel or a Hallmark holiday film. Diane was left on an Amish porch as a 3-month-old, over 40 years ago. Her story was told in an article featured in Lancaster Online which we looked at here last year. From the original article: Forty years ago, a widowed Amish woman and her daughter watched from their window late one night as…
Interesting column this week from Gloria Yoder. Gloria, an Amish mother from southern Illinois, writes the Amish Cook column. It’s not unusual to find Amish serving as foster families for non-Amish children. When I sold books in Amish communities, I would bump into these situations from time to time. This week Gloria answers several questions on fostering among the Amish. The Yoders are foster parents in addition to…
We’ve previously seen video footage from within a Lancaster Amish home, as well as photos from inside homes of the very plain Swartzentruber Amish. But this is the first video I’ve come across showing the interior of a Swartzentruber home. In the video below, LaVonne DeBois of Heartland Tours gives us a look inside the home of a family she is obviously well-acquainted with. It’s not common…
How many social media friends do you have? And how many would you also consider “real-life” friends? I have some who fit both categories. But with hundreds of online connections, it’s literally impossible to keep up, in a meaningful way, with everyone. Jeff Smith, who wrote Becoming Amish on the conversion journey of Bill and Tricia Moser (see posts on the 6 richest aspects and 5 challenges of…
Lancaster Online reports that a new Amish settlement has been founded in Lancaster County’s next-door neighbor, York County. Why is this news? It’s notable because it’s the first example of a new, more deliberate strategy of creating Amish settlements. Amish have actually lived in York County for quite some time. But these Amish have been considered a part of the greater Lancaster County settlement (which also…