Lampeter Fair Baby Parade

This evening was the Lampeter Fair Baby Parade and since Awstin was in it, of course I went to watch. It was amazing. I had no idea that parents put so much time and energy into creating show pieces for their children to ride in or wear. I'm pretty sure it should be called a "parent creation parade" instead of baby parade.

Melissa got the idea to make a manure truck for Awstin to ride in at the parade. She thought she would just get a barrel and put it on top of a wagon, paint it and pull Awstin in it. She told Shawn her idea and in her words, "Shawn kind of took it from there." Shawn and Josh spent a good many hours getting this truck just right, even down to the wide fenders and same lettering that they put on their big trucks. In the end, I think they were a little worried that they had overdone it. However, when they saw what other parents had put together, they realized they should not have worried. It ended up being a really cute event and even though it rained and Awstin was tired, everyone had fun. They came in third in their category and I think they were satisfied and just happy to get a prize for all their efforts.

Here are a few pictures and two videos from the evening.

Awstin's shirt also had "Lehman Ag" on it and Melissa was wearing a "Lehman Ag" sweatshirt.



 

 

Glorious Fall

I've been neglecting this blog a little bit.  It's not that we haven't been doing anything in this month of September. On the contrary, we have actually been pretty busy so here is a little bit of a catch up from the past couple weeks. Some of the things we did included a wonderful weekend with our church family at a retreat center in Denver and playing the Friendship Community Benefit Golf Tournament with Gene and Rhoda. As far as the golfing, we came in dead last which was a little humiliating, but we had fun and hopefully we can do better next year! I also enjoyed the Solanco Parade with all my grandchildren and am looking forward to this week's Lampeter Fair. There is going to be a special little someone in the baby parade so look for pictures on a later blog!

Yesterday was the first day of fall and how I love this season of the year! I just read a quote on a Facebook wall this morning that is so true: Even if something is left undone, everyone must take time to sit still and watch the leaves turn ~ E. Lawrence. There is just something about a crisp, autumn morning that is unlike anything else.

 

On Sunday, Steve and I had a great time with Jay and Kristen's children. We spent a few hours with them at Muddy Run Park and it brought back such good memories of when we took our children there when they were little. Alexis looked a little doubtful when I told her that her daddy came to this same place when he was her age! As we left at sunset we were treated to the sight of many deer. They were so close to the car, that all the children could plainly see them and they watched them wide-eyed. I couldn't get any pictures of them, because it was too dark but it is certainly a treasured memory. Here are a few pictures of the day:

As we headed for the park our precious cargo in the backseat got a little goofy :)

A real "picnic" lunch - Burger King Delight

 

I love that I got all three children on the same picture each doing a different thing on the playground.

 

Super Mark!





Lydia has no fear of heights!

 

So happy!



 Big smile!

Alexis and Lydia and I walked to a larger playground, while Steve and Mark stayed at the smaller one. There was a sand pit and the girls loved it. As you can see, they were soon covered in it.  

 

They also liked the big slide. Most playgrounds don't have these old big slides anymore. 

Mark was happy to see us when we returned. It was almost dark and we soon left and enjoyed watching the deer as we drove past them.

Here is a picture of Awstin that I took last Wednesday. We were in the playhouse and he kept peeking out over the half door. It was so cute and I can't believe that I was able to get this sequence of pictures. Every once in a while, you just get lucky!

One other picture that I took this month was of Megan and Jeremy at our church retreat. They never like their picture taken, but amazingly cooperated for this one. Young love :)

I think that is it for now. Bring on this wonderful, magical time of the year. Glorious Fall!

Vacation in the Big Apple

Last August I wrote about the trip that my friend Becky and I took to watch the U.S. Open Tennis Tournament in New York City. You can read that story here. Having gone with Becky last year and surviving (although not without adventure), Steve and I decided to attempt the same journey this year by ourselves. Of course, a vacation without some type of drama usually doesn't happen to us and this one didn't disappoint.

 

We started out on a Thursday morning and drove to the Lancaster Train Station. We left our car there and took the train into Penn Station in New York City. From there we walked to the Subway, bought two Metro Cards (one for each of us), found and boarded the E Train, transferred to the 7 Train, disembarked in Flushing, walked to our motel and checked in. We did all this without incident. We were feeling pretty accomplished and proud.

We settled into our motel and then prepared to go to the Tennis Center for the evening session of tennis. We would need to take the Subway just one stop back to Met-Willets Point which was within walking distance of the U.S. Open.  A Subway ride cost $2.50 per person. We had purchased two $10.00 Metro Cards and used each one time. We decided to leave one of them in the room and just take the other as we thought we would only need $5.00 to get back and forth. (Really, we would need $10.00 because we would need to pay $5.00 for the return trip but we didn't think that far.)

 

We walked to the Subway and approached the turn style. Steve swiped the Metro Card and I walked through. He then swiped the card again for himself but the turn style remained locked and he got a message that said "swipe again." He tried two more times and got the same message. When he tried again, the message said, "insufficient funds." After being denied repeatedly, he decided his only option was to buy another card. He went over to the Metro machine (kind of like an ATM) and bought a $20.00 card. This new card worked and he joined me (I had been waiting and watching the fiasco from the other side of the turn style) and together we went to watch some tennis.

 

After the tennis was over for the evening, we walked back to the Subway. The majority of the crowd was boarding the trains that were headed into Manhattan, so the corridor to the Flushing train was practically empty. Three teenage boys ran down the hall and simply jumped over the turn style without using a Metro Card. Interesting. Didn't anyone watch and monitor the turn styles? Surely there were security cameras that caught everything. Steve swiped the card and I walked through. He swiped it for himself but was denied entrance again. By this time, we were both disgusted. Steve decided if those young guys could jump over, so could he. There was no one else around, so he tried to leap over the turn style. That was a bad decision. As I watched with horror, he got one leg over but the other one did not follow. I was certain he was going to fall headfirst to the floor and I would be calling 911. He managed to catch himself on the sides and prevent himself from falling. After failing with that, he resorted to crawling through. Well, Steve is a big man and the space was pretty small. I will just say that if it was caught on camera, I'm sure the viewer was highly entertained. However, he made it and no one stopped us so we boarded the Subway and rode it back to Flushing and our motel.

 

To make a long story short, I will just say that whenever we used the Metro Card(s) we had problems. The story was always the same. Steve would  swipe the card for me and I would go through but when he swiped the card for himself he would be denied. We figured we were wasting a lot of money because it seemed like although it was denying Steve entrance, it was deducting money off the card. Needless to say, he got pretty good at crawling through the turn style!

 

Finally, on Saturday evening when we came back from the tennis center and exited the Subway in Flushing, we decided to go to the booth and ask a live person for help. We showed the man our three cards and asked him to tell us how much was on each card. It turned out that if he combined the three cards and put the money on one card, we would have a total of $6.85. We only needed $5.00 for one final Subway ride the next morning since we were heading home, so we told him to go ahead. We went back to the hotel thinking that our problem was solved and we would be able to use the card in the morning for the last time and leave the frustration behind. We should have known it wouldn't be that easy.

 

When we got to the Subway station in the morning, Steve took the Metro card from his wallet, swiped it and I went through. He swiped it again and was denied. We were so angry. I told him to hand his carry-on luggage over to me and I would go over to my usual spot and wait for him with our bags while he went for help. The lady was helpful enough and after trying it again several times, she deducted the $2.50 from the card and opened the wheelchair access door for Steve to walk through. We were so happy to leave that place behind. We boarded the train and sank into the seats. As the subway pulled away from the station, I said to Steve, "Do you have everything? Your phone? Your glasses? Your wallet?" His face got pale and he said, "I don't have my wallet." With sinking hearts, we got off at the next station and went back, but to no avail. The wallet was gone. We think he either dropped it when he handed his luggage over to me, or else when he went for help he left it on the ledge of the booth. Fortunately, the lady was kind enough to open the wheelchair access gate again, so we didn't have to purchase another Metro Card. I think we both would have sat down and cried if they had required us to do that.

 

In the end, we survived and besides the Metro Card debacle, we had a great vacation. Once we got over the shock, and looked at everything clearly, we realized it could have been a lot worse. Steve only had $21.00 in cash in the wallet and two credit cards and his license. We stopped the credit cards immediately and last Thursday he went to the Driver's License Center and replaced his license. The loss he felt most deeply was that of the actual wallet. It was my dad's old wallet and he said he had never had a wallet that felt so good in his pocket and that didn't wear down the cards causing him to have to replace them often. In the end, he found a new one at K-Mart that was very similar to the lost one so hopefully it will serve him well.

So ends another trip to the big city. I'm not sure why we had such a difficult time with the Metro Cards. We will have to ask some experienced New Yorkers what the problem might have been. Maybe country folks like us just aren't cut out to maneuver around the city. In any event, we will see if we will return next year for Round Three.