wedding

This past Friday afternoon, Daryl (who works in the Community Center with the after-school program and the recreation program) came into the library and said, "I'm getting married in about an hour over by the crosses--you should come over!" I had known he was going to get married this weekend, but I didn't expect it to be then! So, of course, I ran down and got the camera from our apartment.

It was a beautiful day (although chilly!) and it's a beautiful place that they decided to have their wedding. This is an area on the campus set up mainly for work camp groups to have their morning devotions. It overlooks the valley that serves as one of the pastures for the cows.

Daryl and Diane (who works at the Settlement's day care) decided to have a very simple ceremony to exchange rings. Wendell, who works in Mission Resources and is a retired pastor, officiated at the wedding. About ten or twelve people who work/volunteer at the Settlement were there to witness the ceremony.

I guess it just goes to show that you never know for sure what's going to happen on any given day! It was great to be part of this special time for Daryl and Diane. It was fun to wear jeans to a wedding, and it's good to know that the thing that was important to them was to get married--not necessarily to have a big to-do. I wish them the best as they start out on this new adventure together.

come and see

We have sent letters to some of you that have said you were interested in coming for a work team or we thought me might pester you to see if you would come. If we have overlooked you(our apologies) and you would like some information and or a DVD about Henderson Settlement, let us know and we can send that out to you asap. For those of you that may be planning a trip, we would love to have you any time but keep in mind that we will be away from here the weeks of May 25th, July 14th, and two weeks from April 21st to May 4th. Two weeks in June are already booked full so don’t wait too long to reserve your lodging. If you do plan on coming down let us know when it would be.

America

As we were driving over the mountain toward Middlesboro the other evening, a good song came up on the iPod: "America" by Simon and Garfunkel. It seemed so appropriate to be driving over a curvy road through the woods, looking out on the fall beauty of the Appalachian Mountains, hearing the lyrics, "I've gone to look for America."

During another instance driving on this (or a similar) road, the iPod brought up "This Land is Your Land" by Woodie Guthrie, and I felt like this, too, was exactly right.

Right now, Eric's watching a documentary on baseball that was made by PBS, and it started out with playing (appropriately) a big, impressive version of our national anthem. It reminded me of what I thought while listening to those other two songs--"The Star-Spangled Banner" doesn't really represent how I feel about America.

I tried to explain this to Eric last night, and it didn't really work, so I'm not sure if it will make sense to y'all, either.

I think part of why we came to Kentucky was that we came "to look for America," like Paul Simon wrote. We came to see what it's like to live in the mountains. We came to hear bluegrass music. We came to hear stories. We came to find out how God is experienced here.

I don't see America with all of the pride and pomp of "The Star-Spangled Banner"--I see it with the grittiness of "This Land is Your Land." I'm not so hung up on the flag as I am on the natural beauty. I prefer simple strings to big brass in telling the story of our country. I don't love big business America--I love tree-covered America. I don't appreciate suits as much as I appreciate dirty overalls in making a living. It makes more sense to me to build your body up with hard work instead of with fancy exercise machines.

While we've been here, I've seen lots of things that I came to find when I look for America: a restaurant where they have open mike night every Friday and where the owner showed us to our table; coal miners who stand at the picket line to show solidarity with striking nurses; a national park that's trying to restore a cave to some of its natural state after it had been a money-making tourist stop; women who sing hymns a capella with such beauty that you wish the piano had never been invented.

Maybe I just have a romanticized view of it all. I'm not sure. But I'm definitely glad that we "walked off to look for America."

pictures

Ok. Those of you who have been begging for pictures (ahem, Mom.) should now be satisfied. All of the Kentucky pictures that have been put on the computer are now on our picture website. Enjoy!

Amazing Find from the Opportunity Store - Part 2

Here are a couple of awesome glasses that we found at the Opportunity Store.

blank walls

This is a request for pictures of you, our family and friends so we can put something up on our walls to remind us of you. We also appreciate original artwork by you and/or your children. Our address is to your right (I can't wait to see what we may get).

Thanks

birthday weekend in Kentucky

Well, I told Eric that he should write a blog about his birthday in Kentucky, but he said that I should do it, so here we go! (I've decided to do this in photo essay form again.)

Eric's birthday was on Sunday, so we decided to take the whole weekend to do things he wanted to do. On Saturday we slept in, but not too long (it wasn't MY birthday), and then we headed to Middlesboro. We went to the Middlesboro Public Library to restock on DVDs and CDs....and on books, and then we headed to the Goodwill store, where we found this shirt with Eric's birthday on it!

Then we headed down Highway 25E toward Pineville to scout out the flea markets. We found a couple of sketchy ones with lots of.....interesting stuff for sale, but we found no amazing things that we needed to have. It's incredible what people can get away with selling.


We went to Pineville State Resort Park, stopping first at Lookout Point to look at Pineville from way up high!


Then we went to Chained Rock, which is so named because it's got a rock chained to another rock to prevent it from crashing down onto Pineville. (In reality, though, neither rock is going anywhere, with or without the chain.)

Here's Pineville from the Chained Rock site. (The Pineville Library and the Bookmobile are both visible in this picture...but so are a lot of things.)
Here are a couple of views of the rocks that are chained together.
Eric peeked down to check things out. Yep, it's a long way down!

After leaving Chained Rock, we went to Pine Mountain's dining room, where we had a buffet dinner--hooray! The buffet was interesting--it contained food from mashed potatoes to fish to what we think were frog legs.

Then we headed to Corbin to see Steve Carell's new movie, Dan in Real Life. It was cute, and we both liked it (proof that Eric likes chick flicks......if they've got Steve Carell).

When we got home, we watched Saturday Night Live, which featured Brian Williams and Feist. Brian Williams was fantastic, especially considering he's not an actor at all. I guess the Nightly News can prepare you to say anything on live television.

On Sunday morning, we went to Covenant UMC in Middlesboro, where several of the staff members attend church. (We usually go to the Hope UMC here in Frakes--sometime we'll have to blog about it!)

Then we headed to the town of Cumberland Gap, Tennessee, for lunch at Webb's Country Kitchen. Needless to say, it was great. And they have live music on Saturday nights, so we may be returning!

After lunch, we headed toward Cumberland Gap National Historical Park for a tour of the Gap Cave. When the group gathered together, we strapped on our giant yellow flashlights and hiked half a mile to the cave entrance. The guy in the park ranger outfit in this photo below is, in fact, a park ranger--our tour guide Scott.


It was pretty incredible inside. As you can see from this photo, Eric was pretty amazed.

Below are some photos of various cave scenes--stalagmites and stalactites and such.

This is called "Cleopatra's Pool."

And there was wildlife in the cave, too! Here are a bat and a salamander.

After coming out of the cave, we headed back to Cumberland Gap for some ice cream and a little antique store browsing.

We finished the day by heading back home so Eric could watch the football game between the Patriots and Colts. This didn't have the outcome we hoped, but it didn't spoil our day.

There are a couple of other things that need to be mentioned. Because Eric's birthday fell on daylight savings time, he managed to have 25 hours of birthday, instead of the standard 24--pretty cool. Also, he got several cards and packages during the week leading up to his birthday, which made for a lot of fun! (Grandma Yetter, if you're reading this, Eric did NOT wait until his birthday to open your package.)