Tourist Activity 2a & Fall Colors 3

We had another great day in Amish country yesterday. We spent our morning in and around Charm, OH visiting quilt and fabric shops, a boot and harness shop, and Keim Lumber. After working up an appetite with all that walking (with a limited amount of shopping), we chose to eat lunch at the Carpenter's Cafe inside Keim. The "Carpenter" referred to is Jesus Christ.

Keim Lumber is staffed primarily by Amish and Mennonite employees and has a worldwide clientele/customer base. They do it right at Keim and provide an open witness for Jesus Christ as a foundation for their business. Keim Lumber is a massive venture in the middle of nowhere that ships everywhere. As you would imagine, customer service is #1 at Keim. What a refreshing experience compared to other lumber yards and home improvement super stores.

And by the way, the meals at Carpenter's Cafe taste great and are a good value, too.

From Charm we headed out Highway 70 for a few miles and returned to The Farm at Walnut Creek. You can enjoy our previous posts about that here and here. The weather was perfect and we had a small group on our wagon ride through the exotic animal enclosure. The ostriches were totally rude, the Highland cow was still a vacuum cleaner for animal feed, the llamas would run along side the wagon, and all the other animals were glad to see us. Feeding and petting the giraffes is usually everyone's favorite activity. As usual I may split the photos into two different posts. I think I'll focus on some Amish scenes and fall colors shots in this post.

Amish corn shock, Coshocton County, OH

Amish farm, Holmes County, OH

Some trees along the wagon path at The Farm

Another wagon scene with Gus and Pearl doing the pulling

Then on the way home I snapped this picture from the car at Chestnut and 3rd Street in Coshocton. Whether out in the country or back in "the city" the colors are vibrant this year.

Courthouse Square, Coshocton, Ohio

Today we're off to tour Annin Flag, Pearl Valley Cheese, make a stop at MMS Aviation and then this evening travel to an Amish home where we'll be guests at their dinner table. Perfect weather predicted today as well. Wish you were here...

Fall Colors 2 and Beyond

The past week has been rather...crazy. Mon-Wednesday I was focused on writing/assembling/organizing the December GroundCrew newsletter to send off to our graphic designer and then Thursday-Friday Karen and I administered the pre-service orientation to two new families ready to start hangar service: the Beckwiths and Newmans. Normal ministry routines filled the evenings and all of a sudden it's October 20th.

Karen and I totally took Saturday off. We built a fire, laid on the couches, read books, napped under fleece blankets, let the dogs climb on top...it was wonderful. I only went outside to grab more wood. Yesterday (Monday) we started a week of vacation. We ran errands, accomplished some minor household chores, handled some ministry, and took a few minutes to snap some pictures of some more fall colors.

What's special about this week vacation is that my dad and my step-mom are in for a visit. It's been three years since dad and Jane have been here. We're actually heading out on our first day of tourist activity in another hour or so.

So, here are the latest snapshot of some local fall color. These were taken in a cemetery that Karen likes to ride her bike to when she needs a special place to sit and relax, to think and to pray.




And along with that, we also stumbled across one of the top-secret ICBT (Inter-Continental Ballistic Truck) sites readying for a launch!

As far as I know this is the FIRST photograph of this secret site used to rapidly deliver trucks and their cargo around the world avoiding all road blocks, traffic congestion, weigh stations, oceans and other geographic and political hindrances. Thankfully, we were able to evade the security cordon and get this photograph out to you.

We'll see what else we can discover on today's journey north into Amish country and beyond...

Fall Colors 1

The fall colors are really starting to come into their peak time. The next week should be amazing as all the red, gold, and orange explode all over the county. Unfortunately we're under rather consistent overcast with rain predicted for the next few days so the colors are a bit more subdued than if in direct sunlight, but I hope these snapshots can give you a clue of what we're blessed to enjoy right now. These are just a small sampling of the trees around the airport.

This is a snapshot of just one small section of the tree line across the runway.

These trees are just outside our main gate and line both sides of Airport Road.

The colors are breath-taking this year.

If the wet weather passes, the leaves hang-on, and the sun comes out...I'll try to get some more snapshots.