Today the church I work for had a Labor Day picnic in the evening, out in the countryside on a farm belonging to a couple in the congregation. The picnic was scheduled for 5pm, so I left my apartment around 4pm since Mapquest said it would take about an hour to get there. And sure enough, just after 5pm (and after momentarily being "lost" by not going far enough down the road) I pulled into the house's driveway.
And no one was there.
But, having just spoken to the woman who owned the house on the phone, I figured that she and her husband must just be inside the dome-shaped house, and that I must just be the first one there. So I got out of the car, and started wandering along the fence, looking for a gate. And I wandered...and wandered...and wandered. I wandered to the very end of the long fence, and found no gate, besides a cattle gate that was wired shut. So I turned around, and wandered back. Shortly, I happened upon a farmhand and asked him where the gate was. I was relieved to hear him mention the last name of the people I was looking for (at least I was in the right spot!), and he undid the wire around the cattle gate and let me inside the yard.
In a dramatic turn of weather-related events, the 105 degree stifling heat had given way to a day of temperatures in the mid- to upper-80s, which was lovely. Unfortunately, this change in weather came with WIND. And LOTS of it. I felt like the Wicked Witch of the West was going to come flying by at any moment. So, confused and windblown, I sat down in a chair and waited. It turns out that not only was I the first guest, but I'd even beaten the hosts. Eventually I fought the wind back to the car, both to search out a church bulletin and verify that I had the correct time (which I did) and also to sit out of the wind and away from the perplexed farmhand who was trying to figure out what to do with me. While sitting in the car, I did what I often do in awkward situations: called my friend Brandi and laughed about the awkwardness that I was experiencing.
Around 5:20, the hosts of the picnic pulled up, and after introducing myself as the enthusiastic and charming young seminary intern, I helped unload their truck of its picnic-esque fare. A little while later, another car pulled up, and a couple from the church got out. Then we were all invited into the house, to escape the wind and wait on everyone else, who apparently had gotten hung up on a baby shower at the church (which, for the record, had begun 3 hours prior).
The house was the most charming thing ever. It was one of those dome houses that you often see from the side of the road, but rarely get to go inside (if you're like me, anyway). The inside was truly lovely, with warm yellow walls and hardwood floors. The bulk of the place was taken up by a living room that opened up to the dome ceiling, complete with a spiral staircase in the corner leading up to a loft with cafe-style tables and chairs. It doesn't take much more than a spiral staircase in the living room to make me a fan of a house. Underneath the loft was the kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom - simple, but adorable. I told the family that if they ever got tired of the house, I'd take it off their hands. This comment was received with general amusement.
For the next 45 minutes, I sat in the living room with these four people from the church (one of whom was wearing a white cowboy hat with a rattlesnake ribbon complete with a rattlesnake head sticking ferociously off the front). We conversed politely, and I felt bad for being as tired as I was (keep in mind that I'd already been to work at the church and driven all the way out to the country by the time this event was happening). Finally, around 6:30pm, more people began to show up, and around 7:00 or so I ventured back outside the house, into the wind and general crowd of Filipino people who had gathered.
It was at this point that the picnic began to be truly enjoyable. I was introduced to a picnic table of ladies from the church and the hosts' next-door-neighbor, and sat and chatted with them for the remainder of the night. The food (when it was finally served around 8:00) was bountiful and delicious - sticky rice (cooked in that perfect way that these Filipino people seem to be able to accomplish with ease), Greek couscous, grilled chicken, hot dogs, noodle salad with vegetables, adobo, and other things of which I did not partake because I ran out of room on my plate. I did save room for dessert: a chocolate chip cookie and ginataang - a Filipino rice and bean dessert based on coconut milk and, in this case, containing giant blobs of tapioca. It was all really, really good! If there's one thing that can be said for this internship, it's that it's expanding my food knowledge and exciting my taste buds!
I left the picnic around 9pm, and got back to my apartment an hour later around 10pm. The drive back included an unexpected venture through downtown Dallas at night; even though my GPS hadn't taken me on that highway on the way to the picnic, it seemed to be its preferred route back home, and being tired and unfamiliar with my surroundings I didn't want to risk overriding the GPS mandates. Although this was naturally a more chaotic route, I always love driving by the city at night...it makes me feel like I'm living the quintessential exciting young-adult life. Which, I suppose, I actually am...with some Filipino flare, in the case of this year :)
Tomorrow will be another busy social day, as I have plans with my boyfriend in the afternoon and I am celebrating a friend's birthday in the evening. Hopefully I'll be able to squeeze in some homework time as well!!
"The only way of catching a train I have ever discovered is to miss the train before." - Gilbert K. Chesterton
Showing posts with label Picnic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Picnic. Show all posts
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Sunday, July 24, 2011
A Family Picnic of Reunion Proportions
The internet issue of yester-night has been solved...it turns out that my grandmother doesn't actually have wireless internet - which explains why we had so much trouble connecting to it. Anyway, I've located the broadband cord, so we're good to go (until my battery gives out. I managed to leave the laptop charger at home).
The events of today included all the quintessential trappings of a visit to the extended family. In the morning, my father and I attended church with my grandmother. My mom and sister went to church with my mother's family, but I preferred to go to Calvary UMC 1) for the nostalgia quotient, and 2) because the building is just gorgeous. It was built in the 1800s, and has one of those old-fashioned tin ceilings and stained glass windows and red carpet and all those good, classic church-type things. It's the church where my dad grew up, where my parents were married, where I was baptized, and where my grandfather's funeral was held. I always like to go back there when we come up for a visit, because it's just about as familiar to me as my grandparents' houses.
The service was your typical United Methodist church service, so I won't go into great detail about it (go find a liturgy book if you're super curious). The highlight of the service, for me, was actually the children's time. The speaker came to the front, and the pastor invited the children to come forward, and it quickly became apparent to everyone in the room that there were no children present. The speaker muttered "oh, come on..." good natured-ly, but it was still something of an awkward moment...until, from all corners of the room, the seven teenage members of the church youth group popped up out of their pews and came down to the front, along with the pastor himself, while the congregation laughed appreciatively. It was a small gesture, but it spoke of the solidarity of the youth with the church, and the lack of arrogance among them. None of those seven teenagers thought they were "too good" to sit in front of the church and listen to the speaker read from The Cat in the Hat - they saw a gap, and they filled it. I thought that was pretty awesome.
So that was the morning. Lunch included grilled cheese and tomato soup, which has an uncanny way of vibrantly reminding me of my childhood. Also, my grandma makes better grilled cheese than any other grilled cheese maker that I've come across. It must be a grandma trick.
BUT, the highlight of the day was undoubtedly the Great Family Picnic of 2011.
My parents both grew up here in this small West Virginia town, and so all of my grandparents live here. We usually stay with my father's mom, but my mom's family lives right across town so we bop back and forth throughout the week. The catch is that unlike my paternal relatives, who have scattered across the country, my mom's entire family still lives in this area - meaning that every time we Missouri relatives show up, it's family picnic time. Four generations-worth of family, mind you.
I'll admit, it was rather a daunting site walking up the hill to my aunt's house to the large group of people who had assembled. In total, the number grew to 30 (I counted), and included grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, cousins' children, friends, and neighbors. It was truly quite a lot of people to just "come over to dinner," as it were. But, my aunt lives right next door to my grandparents' house out in the country, so there is a lot of space to be had, and she has the gift of hospitality, so it was a very warm and inviting atmosphere.
And there was GOOD FOOD. We're talking hot dogs, barbecue, my MawMaw's macaroni and cheese (which is amazing), cole slaw, deviled eggs, watermelon, corn casserole - all your classic picnic fare. Dessert-wise, there were fudge brownies, carrot cake, and potato candy...all of which I ate more of than was probably a good idea. This is potato candy, if you don't know what I'm talking about...I'd never heard of it until today, but it is certainly something I will be attempting to create in the future, you can believe that.
I ate dinner with my sister, my grandmother (who we grandchildren all call MawMaw), my cousin Randy, and his son Logan. Logan doesn't have fantastic language skills, being a toddler, but he is still quite the talkative kid. Still, he didn't have much to contribute to the Bachelorette discussions (yes, my grandmother is a fan). Logan and the other kids (six in total, all under the age of 9) spent the majority of the picnic playing in a kiddie pool and splashing each other with water (and soaking diapers wet through, which resulted in the occasional naked child while parents performed an on-the-spot diaper change). These picnics are a lot more fun now that kids are around - it used to be that my sister and I were the youngest of the family, and we were always rather shy and reserved and therefore non-entertaining. The evening wrapped up with a group game of Guesstures, in which three of the kids (Jacob, Chasity, and Serenity) participated the most enthusiastically. We finally said our goodbyes stuffed and tired, and happy to have seen one entire side of the family in one fell swoop.
In fact, being around those kids tonight made me wish that we didn't live so far away that we only get to see them once a year or so. But better sometimes than never, right? I also snagged MawMaw's macaroni and cheese recipe, which makes the entire evening an even greater success.
Here are a couple pictures from the family festivities... :)
The events of today included all the quintessential trappings of a visit to the extended family. In the morning, my father and I attended church with my grandmother. My mom and sister went to church with my mother's family, but I preferred to go to Calvary UMC 1) for the nostalgia quotient, and 2) because the building is just gorgeous. It was built in the 1800s, and has one of those old-fashioned tin ceilings and stained glass windows and red carpet and all those good, classic church-type things. It's the church where my dad grew up, where my parents were married, where I was baptized, and where my grandfather's funeral was held. I always like to go back there when we come up for a visit, because it's just about as familiar to me as my grandparents' houses.
The service was your typical United Methodist church service, so I won't go into great detail about it (go find a liturgy book if you're super curious). The highlight of the service, for me, was actually the children's time. The speaker came to the front, and the pastor invited the children to come forward, and it quickly became apparent to everyone in the room that there were no children present. The speaker muttered "oh, come on..." good natured-ly, but it was still something of an awkward moment...until, from all corners of the room, the seven teenage members of the church youth group popped up out of their pews and came down to the front, along with the pastor himself, while the congregation laughed appreciatively. It was a small gesture, but it spoke of the solidarity of the youth with the church, and the lack of arrogance among them. None of those seven teenagers thought they were "too good" to sit in front of the church and listen to the speaker read from The Cat in the Hat - they saw a gap, and they filled it. I thought that was pretty awesome.
So that was the morning. Lunch included grilled cheese and tomato soup, which has an uncanny way of vibrantly reminding me of my childhood. Also, my grandma makes better grilled cheese than any other grilled cheese maker that I've come across. It must be a grandma trick.
BUT, the highlight of the day was undoubtedly the Great Family Picnic of 2011.
My parents both grew up here in this small West Virginia town, and so all of my grandparents live here. We usually stay with my father's mom, but my mom's family lives right across town so we bop back and forth throughout the week. The catch is that unlike my paternal relatives, who have scattered across the country, my mom's entire family still lives in this area - meaning that every time we Missouri relatives show up, it's family picnic time. Four generations-worth of family, mind you.
I'll admit, it was rather a daunting site walking up the hill to my aunt's house to the large group of people who had assembled. In total, the number grew to 30 (I counted), and included grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, cousins' children, friends, and neighbors. It was truly quite a lot of people to just "come over to dinner," as it were. But, my aunt lives right next door to my grandparents' house out in the country, so there is a lot of space to be had, and she has the gift of hospitality, so it was a very warm and inviting atmosphere.
And there was GOOD FOOD. We're talking hot dogs, barbecue, my MawMaw's macaroni and cheese (which is amazing), cole slaw, deviled eggs, watermelon, corn casserole - all your classic picnic fare. Dessert-wise, there were fudge brownies, carrot cake, and potato candy...all of which I ate more of than was probably a good idea. This is potato candy, if you don't know what I'm talking about...I'd never heard of it until today, but it is certainly something I will be attempting to create in the future, you can believe that.
I ate dinner with my sister, my grandmother (who we grandchildren all call MawMaw), my cousin Randy, and his son Logan. Logan doesn't have fantastic language skills, being a toddler, but he is still quite the talkative kid. Still, he didn't have much to contribute to the Bachelorette discussions (yes, my grandmother is a fan). Logan and the other kids (six in total, all under the age of 9) spent the majority of the picnic playing in a kiddie pool and splashing each other with water (and soaking diapers wet through, which resulted in the occasional naked child while parents performed an on-the-spot diaper change). These picnics are a lot more fun now that kids are around - it used to be that my sister and I were the youngest of the family, and we were always rather shy and reserved and therefore non-entertaining. The evening wrapped up with a group game of Guesstures, in which three of the kids (Jacob, Chasity, and Serenity) participated the most enthusiastically. We finally said our goodbyes stuffed and tired, and happy to have seen one entire side of the family in one fell swoop.
In fact, being around those kids tonight made me wish that we didn't live so far away that we only get to see them once a year or so. But better sometimes than never, right? I also snagged MawMaw's macaroni and cheese recipe, which makes the entire evening an even greater success.
Here are a couple pictures from the family festivities... :)
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| My mom's family - my grandparents, aunts, and uncles (and mom, of course) |
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| Cousins photo-op (plus one kid) |
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| Serenity and I |
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| Hannah and Jacob |
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| The neighbor's cat kept coming over and trying to get in the house. It was adorable. |
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