A Great Feeling
When Dennis and I have had a great road trip as we had yesterday, Today is a great feeling to be home safe and sound. We had wished for the weather to have been good for yesterday and it was. I knew I would be wore out when we got home before dark yesterday. Sleep hit me right after the head hit the pillow.
We got to the Penn Church early yesterday, just in time to help Aunt Janet. My cousin Kelly had picked Janet up from her home in Brownton. Kelly also had a car load of items that she needed to get into the kitchen of the church where her sister Connie was already hard at it. The 90th birthday party for Janet was about to begin. The look on Janet’s face when we opened the door at the foot of the stairs going into the church’s basement was one that a camera should not have missed . . . but it did.
The entire basement was decorated complete with a fairly large decorated Christmas tree. Cousin Dan went on to say, all the decorations had been boxed up and came with the church when he had bought it. That must have been in around 2005. It was right after the purchase, a wagon of soybeans, that the fuel oil furnace had backed up and soot was everywhere. Dan had had insurance and the entire church, Sunday school addition and all within, was professionally cleaned and painted where it needed it. Wow.
2016, Dan had contacted me to have a family get together at the church. It was a great turn out. There have been several more get togethers. There is always open-house church services for Easter and Christmas. I am not sure how the word spreads in the community as to when and what time. A pastor from Winthrop officiates at the services. Just last week, a lifetime member of St. Matthews, Penn Township had passed away and the family had asked Dan if the funeral service could be held at the church. Dan agreed. Dan has turned down weddings as the cleanup after a wedding could be quite a different story than a funeral. Aunt Janet takes charge of the alter cloths, so you know they are pristine.
As in yesterday, my dad’s family of which there were eight children in total, do appreciate being able to get together at a location that has family history decades old. Those eight children of Christ and Laura Wendlandt were baptized, confirmed and some even married in St. Matthew Lutheran Church of Penn Township, as well as family funerals.
Janet had a whirlwind of family and community to share in the birthday party yesterday. Dan, Kelly and Connie did a wonderful job of putting on the afternoon. People kept coming and the smile never left Janet’s face. I am quite sure, today, Janet never got out of her bathrobe. Sweet.
With that I take my leave. ♥