Random Musings

Back before our Christmas our church lost a few of our Sunday morning children's teachers. A few were having health problems and simply needed to take a break; others are in different seasons of their life and are ministering in other areas now. Regardless, our fourth-sixth grade class suddenly became first-sixth grade. If you've ever worked with children, you know that is a HUGE age range. I love the older kids, but I've also enjoyed seeing the wonder and excitement in the eyes of the younger group. At the end of one of our lessons, I threw out the idea to the class that they were now old enough to read the Bible for themselves. They were all reading well, and there was no reason why they couldn't take a Bible, whether in book or on their phones or tablets, and read a verse or two every day. My fifth grade teacher encouraged me greatly in that area, (thank you Diana Postelwaite, wherever you are!), and the idea had never crossed my mind until she mentioned it. It w...

While I was in college, one of my classmates grew up in a Catholic area. All the churches in her town, whether Catholic or Protestant, truly celebrated both Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday. I was amazed to hear some of her stories and her favorite memories, and could then easily understand how disappointed Easter was to her when she arrived and attended Baptist churches in the South. I think about her now every Palm Sunday, and wonder how people would respond if we started truly celebrating our most important Christian holiday. Palm Sunday - the triumphant entry. I always thought it stupid as a child when I read fairy tales and a man or knight would place his cape or coat on the ground for a queen or princess to walk over.  It seemed most of my childhood I was reprimanded for "getting dirty" (as in playing in the dirt and pine straw...NOT how today's society uses that phrase). And I was always a bit puzzled by this passage in Sunday school: 6  The disciples went and di...

Bobby and I have the blessing of teaching the 1st-6th graders at our church every other month.  This past month their lessons have been on the Christmas story, which surprised me.  But by the end of preparing for lesson one, I realized where the curriculum writers were heading, and it made me appreciate the story in a new way. The emphasis was on the deity of Christ...not his humanity. As each lesson progressed through a few highlights of Christ's life, all which emphasized his deity, both from his claims, actions, and the accusation of the Jewish leaders and people, it ended with the importance of the fabric ripping in the temple. It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness fell over the whole land until   the ninth hour,   45  because the sun was obscured; and  the veil of the temple was torn in two .   46  And Jesus,  crying out with a loud voice, said, “Father,  into Your hands I commit My spirit .”  Having s...

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I don't remember there being trenches at the previous reenactments, but they clearly had them here, and even had soldiers digging in them at various points. The Boy Scouts behind us were laughing at the soldiers doing the digging, because they all took their wool coats off. I don't blame them! It was warming up. The boys must have had binoculars, because I had to zoom with my camera several times before I found the soldiers they were talking about.  The flank move below seemed to excite everyone in the crowd.  The two "dead" federal soldiers (in the trenches) caused quite a bit of laughter among the Boy Scout troup behind us. Evidently one of them turned his head at some point, and they were making quite a few jokes about what the two dead soldiers were discussing.  Maybe because of the almost teenage boys behind me, maybe because it was movement, but I started noticing the soldiers who "died". One, it was sad, but at the same time it became a litt...

Federal Band performing for the crowd pre-reenactment. They even took a few requests from the crowd and played a few Rebel songs. Add caption One of my favorite shots. Most drummers were younger boys, though by this point in the war the South was decimated and most southern soldiers were Grandpas and young boys. Not totally sure, but I think one of the flutists was a female. And another female I don't think I posted yesterday.

About half of this Federal unit sported the red caps. We weren't sure if they were supposed to be of French or Italian descent. Either way, they spoke a striking pose and were one of the groups that had a chant or song while marching. Yeah, I know this guy doesn't have a hat decoration...but check out that quilt! Saw quite a few feathers, which made me wonder if they got the idea from "yankee doodle" A lot of this unit sported holly in their hats and had orangy-beards, making me wonder if it's an Irish thing (like shamrocks) Don't fret. There's only a few more days worth of Bentonville's 150th anniversary pictures, and then I'll move on to other topics and such.

If I were in my 20s, I think reenacting is something that would be fun. And while I'd like to reenact the roles of women, such as the ladies who cook in the tents and work as medic assistants in the field with the long dresses and bonnets, I think it's cool that these girls took on the role as soldiers and such. Granted, all the women who fought did so in disguise (and yes, there is documented proof this did happen), I think it's kind of cool that these women do this without cutting off their hair and disguising as men. I know it would disgruntle the purists (yeah, the people who think about reenactments the same why I think of movies made from books), but it would make many young girls like I was more willing to participate. No, this lady wasn't a reenactor, but was standing in front of the sitting lines talking to friends before it started, (during the preview time), in essence blocking the view of EVERYONE sitting in my section. And just because I'm a littl...

Every five years, the historical society puts on a re-enactment of the battle of Bentonville. It's awesome. They have lectures, shops in tents (all kinds of historical gift shops - flags, clothes, material, hats, toys...you name it! as well as books  and momentos), and displays of tent life from soliders and the people who followed the armies around. The Harper House, which was claimed by both sides at different points and used as a field hospital (the old wood floors still sport darkened spots which are claimed to be blood stains), and then the fields nearby also became small graveyards.  It's sad, but it's also a good reminder that nothing is free, and sometimes that price is quite high. There used to be a lot of "purists" (those who think things should be exact replicas), but that is changing more and more with each re-enactment. We saw people in period clothing using their cell phones, both for talking and taking pictures, and more and more reenactors mus...

Today: Washed clothes...and the washing machine quit working halfway through a load. Spent 3 hours with a seam ripper tearing out 2/3 of a row of quilting that is absolutely horrible. Not sure how much is user error and how much is a quilting machine that doesn't quilt like it is supposed to. Attempted not to focus on the remaining 5 rows that must also come out. One moment/stitch at a time. Pieced a little on a QOV quilt. Tried not to look at the wheel tracks in the floor...that I just cleaned Friday afternoon. I could fill up a planter. Rejoiced that the pond drain is FINALLY unstopped and water levels are almost where they need to be. Spent some extra time in prayer for Bobby's sister and niece as today was his oldest nephew's birthday. He would have been 38. Got the phone call that the father of same nephew died tonight. While he's not been a part of the Bryan family since I've been on the scene, he was one of the few friends that didn't treat Bobb...

Well, I've planted all but one of the items we ordered a LONG time ago from a nursery. They divided the order into three boxes. The first one to arrive, a kiwi VINE (silly me thought it would be a shrub/tree) is still sitting on the kitchen table. The other two boxes arrived this morning and all are now in the ground and watered. And I am EXHAUSTED. (Healthy eating doesn't help a whole lot when you're drastically out of shape.) While I was planting the English walnut trees, I saw this word I didn't remember seeing when I ordered: grafted. And that gave me pause. Several years ago we purchased an English walnut that died back the first year but then came back. I rejoiced. And then this year it produced its first fruit...three pods of BLACK (not English walnuts). Evidently the tree was grafted into a Black walnut root. Sometimes that happens. Whatever the root of a graft is, if the graft dies for any reason, the plant that grows next will be whatever the original root w...

I currently have a subscription to ancestry.com that expires in May. My goal is to research everything I can before that ends. And it is T I M E consuming. One of the things that continuously throws me for a loop is the discrepancies. I'm finding that many people who were illiterate or had limited reading/writing abilities (Bobby and I are still baffled how a person could read but not write), say 4th grade or under, do not keep up with dates. For example, I have on distant relative who only completed a few years of school. On every census (every 10 years) her age is different. We know it's her because of the location and other family members listed in the household. From marriage certificate to her death certificate to the census records, her date of birth spans an entire decade. I can understand a year or two...but seven or ten? I'm also amazed at how much our current society takes for granted. Illiteracy is a huge topic in public education today, but it is NOTHING com...