~Amish Innovations~

My little Amish friend, Katie, spent last Thursday with me. I find myself constantly marveling at how she can walk into a situation, size it up, and begin re-prioritizing and re-organizing the most mundane tasks in order to work more efficiently. And the good Lord knows with upcoming shows on the horizon, I could use all the help I can get on that front! The studio had managed to explode into most rooms of the house!

With only 8 grades of formal education, I used to think that the Amish were not as bright as the ‘average’ schooled American. Boy was I wrong! I continue learning that not only do they think everything through before acting on it, they do it with passion. That’s a totally ‘win-win’ prescription for Life 101.

By the time I drove Katie back to Middlefield, my home and studio was in tip-top shape…..and so was my soul. We talked about everything: Caroline’s recent passing and her widowed husband's struggle to continue on, her group of “Travel Girls” who get together monthly for pot-luck dinners, how the canning and wood-chopping is coming along for the upcoming winter months, the differences between her and her siblings….just everything. No topic is off-limits, and emotions flow along with the unending chatter and laughter.

She was excited for me to see her newly-sided house. Her brothers got together and not only sided the home Katie bought recently with two of her sisters, but also built the girls a spacious back porch, complete with railings, rockers, and planters filled with colorful flowers.

When we arrived, I could see why she was excited. The ‘almost’ century house now looked brand new. Her sisters, Fannie and Emma, were sewing in the huge great room. Fannie, working on a quilt, Emma, on doll clothes for her neighbor’s little girls. No matter how intense the task at hand, when they talk about them, their faces ‘light up’. Chores to us, but acts of love to them.

After chatting about our recent loss of power, my upcoming shows, how many dolls I’ve completed, how my Mom is faring, etc, my escape from the world was over, and I was ready for the 30 minute ride back to ‘my’ life.

As the girls waved good-bye, I rolled down the window when I noticed three cows in the pasture behind their house. Hmmm. I knew about Socks, the horse they recently purchased along with an Amish buggy, but cows??

“Hey…..when did you get the cows?” I asked.

“They’re not ours. We ‘borrowed’ them from our brother”, was the reply…..grins of delight and mischief evident on each of their ‘plain’ little faces.

“Why?” I asked.

“Oh….we got tired of mowing the pasture. They’ll eat the grass so we don’t have to mow it!”. I must say that the giggles erupting from those three sweet girls tickled me to the core.

Can you just picture Brother Daniel, hooking up his team of horses to the flat-bed wagon loaded with his three cows, traveling the 2 miles down the dirt roads to deliver those human lawn mowers to his sisters? Priceless!

Have a gloriously innovative Monday, wherever you are in the world!

**This post was nominated as Post Of the Day over at David's authorblog. Take a peak at the other winners!** Thank you, David!