Highlights

My neglect of this blog forces me to list the highlights of our summer in a bullet format:

• Elysia's garden got bigger this summer with the highlight being a new patch of strawberries, and some additional rhubarb plants from some local farms. We really enjoyed eating the fresh peas, cucumbers, lettuce, etc. 

• Our cat ran away after only two months of making our home its habitat. We put out fliers, looked for hours and spent time chasing down leads to no avail.
• An active summer of driving around for appointments, weeks of Bible Camp, and airport runs kept Elysia in the driver's seat much of the time. The time driving aggravated her hip condition and back pain thus changing her mind and scheduling hip surgery for September 2.
• Ethan spent two weeks in May teaching in the beautiful African country of Uganda. two months later in July, he travelled again, this time to teach pastors in South Asia.
• Ethan spent Father's Day in bed with pneumonia.
• Gretchen and Peter John experienced ministry first-hand by loving the poor and serving on a mission trip to South Dakota in June.
• Amy and Elysia went to the Sherburne County Fair. She rode a Ferris Wheel for the first time!

• Peter John was our faithful keeper of our yard through weekly lawn mowing and trimming.
• Gretchen improved her culinary skills (and kept our kitchen hot) by her daily baking and cooking projects.
• An inch worm got into our A/C Heat Exchange wall unit thus burning out an off-brand Korean machine with an expired warranty and no options for replacement parts. Amazing what a little worm can do.
• Lizzy and Amy devoured the books on our shelves and at the Princeton Library. We visited the library every Monday on our way to violin lessons. The girls are learning so much from their teacher, Jill Musick Selin, who teaches out of her farm house in rural Princeton. Gretchen has excelled under her tutelage as well.
• Ethan's sister, Sharon, spent five days with us while her son was at Bible Camp. While she was here, she helped Elysia repaint our basement bathroom a light Aqua color to match the turquoise and pink decor. Yay!
• Peter John was invited by his Uncle David to spend a week in Utah and Montana with him and cousin Andy which included a backpacking trip to a lake for camping in Yellowstone Park. David put him in the front of the hike because he was a good pacesetter. PJ is almost six feet tall now at age 12.

• Ethan's nephew, Tim, from Dallas spent some time with us in August so that he could also attend Bible Camp at Inspiration Point. Sadly, Peter John missed camp because of a persistent fever virus. 
• Lizzy's grandparents flew her out to Arizona to visit them for a few days before our family reunion in August. Elysia gave up her sweet daughter as an "unaccompanied minor" on an airplane flight entrusting her into The Good Shepherd's hands. Lizzy was the first in our family to ever see the Grand Canyon! She took lots of pictures.
• After some major work on our cars at Integrity Automotive, we packed up Waldo, our little trailer, and took the minivan packed with camping gear for our family car trip to Montana and Eastern Idaho. The first weekend was spent in Billings to attend our nephew, Mark's confirmation and to hear his dad, Bill, preach at Yellowstone Lutheran Brethren Church. Elysia's parents and ancestors are from Montana, so we drove to Sunset Memorial Gardens to visit the graves of her grandparents and other relatives. 
• We saw Ethan's entire family for our family reunion at his brother's cabin in Eastern Idaho, and we enjoyed Bear and Moose country. What a feast for our eyes. The mountains were lovely, albeit covered in a smoky haze from the western forest fires. After the reunion, our little family rented a forest service log cabin with no electricity or water in the wilderness of the Gallatin Mountain range of Montana.  than was in his happy place. We cooked in cast iron over a fire and brought gear to protect us from the Grizzlies. We carried water from the natural spring in buckets for washing and filtering for drinking. The undistracted, quiet secluded life gave us time with each other, with God, and alone with ourselves. The girls especially enjoyed the natural springs near the cabin, and we all enjoyed mountaineering and playing in the creeks. Ethan, Gretchen, PJ, and Amy made it to the top of Pika Point on a seven-hour hike. Elysia's hips and back forced her to turn back. Lizzy went with her along with the bear spray. Ethan kept the wood stove burning at night, and we awoke to frost outside three mornings in a row. On our hikes each day we saw screeching hawks, squirrels, many small birds, mule deer, woodchucks, gophers, a pair of beavers at a mountain lake, ducks, and horses. The flowers up high on the mountain caught our attention, especially the Indian paintbrush and the lupine. Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!

  

  Pika Point, Montana

  
  
• Lizzy got braces!