Fall Projects

This Fall was spent mostly by doing outdoor projects and activities. Such as... Squeezing apple cider, fixing up horse sheds, and building a brand new white fence for our horses.

Our family had the privilege of helping a friend out by squeeze all these apples.

Cranking up a storm!

Filling jugs with the delicious golden liquid.

It's so rewarding to have your golden hard work put into jars, ready to be stuck in the freezer.

It's been close to 10 years since we've done anything with our horse sheds. As you can imagine, the roofs and siding were getting pretty rotten! It was such a good feeling to have the rotten plywood replaced with steel siding.

Cutting the steal...

Laurissa, hard at work pounding nails.

After many hours of work, we now have a nearly completed fence.

Dad and Matthew cut down this dead tree.

Cutting up the logs...

Laurissa, our excellent deer slayer, managed to get two deer this year. A seven point buck and a small doe.

We canned most of the meat this year and got 41 quarts of delicious venison canned for the winter.

Unfortunately, I didn't get any other pictures of this "fun" job that we did. But I did manage to get this one of Miranda.

I'm sorry everyone, for not being faithful in posting these past couple of months. I will TRY to be more faithful updating our blog in the future. But yet...

"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.

Ecclesiastes 9:10

Posted with Blogsy

Introducing...

A new bundle of joy! Ethan Joel Maendel, our nephew/grandson came into this world October 30th.

Thank you Jesus for your hand of protection on this precious baby boy!

"Lo, children are an heritance of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.

As arrows are in a hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth."

Psalm 127:3-4

Posted with Blogsy

Homeschool Family Camp

Camp was again another awesome year! With around three hundred attenders from over eleven different states. We definetly had a very blessed five days!

There were lots of inspiring messages, good food and fellowship, games, sports and so much more!

Mr. Wissmann gave the evening messages.

Each night one of the families would get up and share some songs and testimonies.

Here is the Bontrager Family.

Lots of volleyball!

I'm not exactly sure what this game is called, but it's very simaler to 4 square.

Gaga ball.

Miranda and Allison with some of their friends.

The gun range.

Time to shoot some clay pigeons!

The mighty-mighty-scoop-noodle-challenge is ALWAYS a highlight!

We also enjoyed playing some card games.

This year we played some Family Feud. Homeschool style!

For the first time, Miranda and I (pictured in the middle) had the opportunity to participate in a skit during the mother/daughter time.

Another skit.

Story time with Grandma Maryann.

Chelsy and Allison Bontrager gave a little class on dress.

Our group memory session was 1 Corinthians 15:57-58

"But thanks be to God which give the us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord."

If you all enjoyed these pictures and would like to see more (because there were a lot of people that took pictures this year) you can click here... http://media.villagecreek.net/2015-Fall-Retreats/2015-Home-School-Family-Camp

  

Posted with Blogsy

September Flooding

On Wednesday, it rained 6 inches in about 6-8 hours. The pasture across from our house got super flooded!

Since that hardly ever happens around here we all thought it was the perfect time to do something crazy. Like... Canoeing in the cow pasture!!! We had a blast, plus made some great memories!

Our neighbors pasture across our house is now lake side property.

Allison and I in one canoe...

Miranda and Laurissa in the second.

Smiles!

Our neighbors poor cornfield.

The picture below has a little story behind it...

Since there was so much water in a once dry area, the mice and little critters had no where to go but to swim or cling to the weeds that were still above the surface. This gave us the perfect opportunity to extinguish some pests that would someday invade our house.

We figured between the four of us girls we got rid of around 40-50 mice.

And to tell you the truth, the whole time we were all screaming and laughing like girls. It made for some pretty awesome memories!

This is the bridge that is on the main highway.

On a usual day there is normally 4-5 feet of head space under the bridge. On this perticular day there were only a few inches.

We all made sure to stay clear of it. We surely didn't want to get swept under!

Later after the rain stopped, Dad and I did some investing around the area to see what damage was done.

On one perticular gravel road we found this...

There was another country road that was so flooded they had to close the road off.

Believe it or not, this was once a field!

"When he utters his voice there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he makes the mist rise from the ends of the earth. He makes lightning for the rain, and he brings forth the wind from his storehouses."

Jeremiah 51:16

Posted with Blogsy