Reformation Day is finally here, and the Lord pushed the rain through a day early so we could have a beautiful day for all our outside activities. The purpose of the day-and-a-half event is to remember the providence of God in the work of the reformers, but many of our activities were simply inspired by our idea of 16th century life. Since the focus this year was John Knox's activities in Scotland, the event had a decidedly Scottish flavor.
The sign outside the church building sets the tone for the day. Fortunately there is no date on it so we can use it again next year!
The Bradshaw family came all the way from Tennessee to be subjected to staring into the sun to satisfy a pesky photographer. The monogrammed tartan looks fantastic on all of them, and the guys wore the kilts and plaids well.
The always-adorable Sanford girls busy imitating stained glass.
Karen and Lily keeping the troops busy at Bag End. The participants hand-sewed their own drawstring pouches in which to store their valuables. Except for the bit of tartan on the small cape Karen has on her shoulders, our family returned to our German costumes from last year. It was funny how many people recognized us as the "poster family." Hmmm, I never thought we'd be a poster family for anything...
Over at the battlefield, the crowd assembles to see the Scots advance on the Brits, while a mysterious piper wanders the field with his instrument of war.
The Scots assemble complete with spiked shields and broadswords.
The warriors charge with gusto!
The English are engaged and proceed to hold off the Scots with their spears and arrows.
The second wave of Scots is sent in. Is that a cowboy hat I see?
Whoa, this field is long... are we there yet?
The onlookers: always hungry for bloodshed via duct tape covered plastic...
Meanwhile, the piper abandons the troops to play requests from the crowd for tips. Hey, isn't your kilt too short?
I don't know if little John Creath was the cutest kid in a kilt that day, but he was definitely in the running.
Back at the Town Square, Scott Price sketches all that subject themselves to the torture of posing. Actually, the 16th century went high tech this year as Scott's son David would capture the subject with his camera and print an image that Scott would draw from. That way the torture only lasted 1/90th of a second.
On to the Highland Games and the caber toss. Here David Price shows less-than-remarkable form. Evidently he's never seen a caber thrown.
Even though this one is blurry, I include it because I think Joshua Peiffer should get the award for best form. He truly looks like a professional, even if his throw didn't look very professional. I'm guessing he's seen a caber tossed before.
Keith Bradshaw giving it his best shot. At least he looks Scottish.
Back inside for a
Nathan Clark George mini concert before the chapel lecture. Nathan commented that this was the first time he's ever performed in tights and a kilt. Go figure.
Not the only one exhausted after the day's activities, but one of the lucky few who had a soft place to lay his head.
Little David was in the running for the "cutest kid in a kilt" contest, but he was disqualified when he resorted to head-butting. Like always, he was a trooper until he fell asleep.
Scottish Country Dancing for those that still had energy at the end of the day.
Even all those swirling gowns can't hide the fact that Daniel Ryken has reverted to his military "take-charge" mode as he barks orders in the background.
Anna using Sierra as a guinea pig to demonstrate a "Swedish swing." Wait, isn't this supposed to be Scotland?
Mr. and Mrs. George do the "gypsy."
Tiffany demonstrating her dancing prowess with a partner that was also very talented (and wearing a nice tartan too).
The most obvious change that I worked on was the cupola. On November 1 I spent most of the day on the roof flashing and cladding the cupola curb and then assembling the cupola on the curb. The picture above is kinda dark because the daylight was fading fast as I was completing the cupola construction.
This photo was taken two days later when I finally was able to climb to the roof of the house when there was enough sunlight to take a photo. If I do say so myself, I think the cupola is pretty cute (and much cheaper than all the others we looked at, but that's a story for another day).
In conjunction with the garage construction we are moving the electric meter from a pole in the yard to the side of the house. My friend Bud happens to be an electrician so I was happy to ask for his help in dealing with the relocation of the main service to the house. In the process our wires from the utility will now run underground instead of through the middle of one of our trees, and the service will be upgraded from inadequately sized to appropriately sized. In the photo you can see the new meter base and two disconnect switches mounted to the side of the house. The one on the left will serve the new garage, and the one on the right will serve the house. Bud has the house temporarily wired with the big black wires looped across the hole while we wait for Corn Belt Energy to fit us into their schedule.
Here's a look down into the hole I dug under where our sidewalk used to be. The square box is a junction Bud had to add to connect the old conduit underground to the new conduit running to the disconnect. The grounding rod next to the box is something the house has never had, but something we are now grateful for.
It's a little hard to see all the flags in this shot since we have quite a collection of corn husks in the yard, but the tall wooden markers designate the route Corn Belt intends to take through the yard, while the small white flags mark the route of the septic tank outlet tube running perpendicular to the electrical wire route.
Meanwhile, back at the garage, Gene installed the windows on the first floor, and poured some footings for the stairway and landing on the west side of the building.
Finally a shot taken at the end of the day on November 5th. You can see the side door has been added although we don't yet have the lockset installed. Thanks for visiting (and patiently waiting).
One of the girls stuck their head out the back door far enough to get this picture showing the ladder/platform set-up the guys put together to do the steep portion of the roof.
