Thar she blows! Â A nice photo of what looks like Lancaster folks* at the Old Faithful geyser in Yellowstone park. Â I’m pretty sure these guys are on vacation and not scouting settlement locations. Â Amish do take vacations, some more extravagant than others. Summer is upon us which means road trips. Â Though with gas up and the economy down maybe less than usual. This summer I…
How do Amish folks maintain such a calm demeanor? Â Well, while poking around my friend’s library, I think I came across the secret. Â Attitude Adjustors: This innocent box just happened to be lying there on the shelf (within easy reach of a work desk, a stack of bills and other scary-looking papers, I might add). It seems Attitude Adjustors come standard in Amish homes. Â The…
Yes, these are Amish fellas in the photos. Â And no, definitely not something you see every day: These were taken at the PA Dutch festival held each summer at Reading Terminal Market in downtown Philadelphia. Â The event features a petting zoo, buggy rides, parade, country and bluegrass bands, and of course food. The dunk tank is for a good cause. Â A Lancaster friend who knows…
A couple of heart-breaking stories this week. An 11-month-old Amish baby died (article removed) late Sunday night when it fell from a moving buggy in Missouri. The person holding it had fallen asleep. Yesterday morning, an Amish woman in Indiana County, Pennsylvania, succumbed to serious burns suffered in a home explosion. She had thrown kerosene on a fire to get it burning better. The regularity…
A picture in need of a caption. Â Taken outside of Shartlesville, Berks County, Pennsylvania. I’m still not sure–would meeting this pair make me smile…or give me nightmares? Either way, one more reason to love America. Photo credit: Colin Grey
2010 was the 4th full year of this blog. Â I thought it’d be nice to look back at the year’s “best” posts. Â If you’re new here, it might also be a good way to catch up on what we’ve been up to. Here, “best” means posts that got lots of responses from you, or lots of visitors, plus some personal favorites. Thanks to every one…
I just cracked into my mail (I often get my US mail at my parents’ address, and collect it when I visit), and found a Christmas card from ‘Jake’ and ‘Suvilla’, Amish friends in Ohio. Jake included a two-page letter to get me up to date with what’s been going on since my last visit. In true Amish-letter fashion, he starts out with a fairly…
Many Amish families like to keep goats. Goats make nice pets. Some Amish raise goats to sell the meat. A few I met in northern Indiana sell them to Mexican and Arabic clientele, for example. Apparently goat’s meat is big in traditional Mexican and Arabic cooking. The Amish around Kalona, Iowa, like to milk them. A goat can make a great grass trimmer. Chain to…
Chili (pronounced ‘CH-EYE-LIE’) is at the southern tip of the Holmes County settlement. The hamlet itself is actually located well inside Coshocton County. It’s not much more than a few ramshackle homes at the juncture of a couple of country byways. Leaving town, a partially-covered sign alerts drivers to the presence of horse-drawn traffic just ahead, marking the start of the world’s largest Amish community….
I’d actually planned to post this photo today anyway. As I drove to an appointment this morning I came upon a slowdown on Highway 39, the main thoroughfare through Holmes County. Turns out it was caused by a head-on car-buggy collision. The remnants were still in view by the roadside. As I arrived at my 9 am meeting at the home of an Amish business…