The first of a long line of high school graduations

We have had a wonderful visit with the Beelis. Saturday was the home school graduation ceremony. Despite some technical glitches, it was a good service. It began with a slide show of the graduates when they were children or doing something they enjoyed. The speaker was a pastor and father of one of the girls graduating. Afterward there was a very nice reception hosted by some of the moms. We had gone in separate cars so Pieder brought us home while the others went to the home of a graduate for another party. We napped and began a game of hand and foot when they arrived. We only got through the first hand. We had 6 players, so the game progressed quite slowly. In addition some had some food although I don’t know how they could eat anything. We also did some outside work in their garden that was overgrown with weeds and grass. I also helped Noah and Andrew install the repaired gate that is to corral the goat. An interesting side is that the goat is bigger than the new Chesapeake Bay Retriever. The dog ran from the goat who had bitten some hair from one of its ears. We retired a bit earlier than usual.

Sunday was “home church” day, although it was really a time when Pieder set the stage for a Bible study that he will lead, directing people to his “Christians don’t sin” theory. They will discuss words that he thinks have been mistranslated. It was interesting to hear the 4 ways they will look at the Greek words in the future. The couple who had loaned the Beelis their Suburban came to the church. The boys had been house sitters for them and their 2 dogs. They stayed around after the lecture stopped and gave advice and insight to dog rearing before leaving. The active family members went to play Ultimate Frisbee again while Pieder stayed and saw the reminder of our Israel pictures. When the others returned we had some food while we played the rest of our hand and foot game for the rest of the evening. The kids did their regular milking chores as they do everyday. They get around 5 quarts each day and drink it all. Pieder mixes some with coffee grounds making a somewhat disgusting drink. He seems to be the only one who likes it and takes 2 quarts to work each day. I learned to like the milk too and drank too much while we were there. I am relatively certain I have gained some weight as a result. We took some time during the afternoon packing for our departure Monday. The kids did our laundry for us again and dried it enough to travel with it. We talked with Stacy and learned they will come to the Airport in Atlanta to get us and take us out for our anniversary dinner. We had planned to go to dinner in Asheville next week, but Stacy has to come back to work.

We were up at 6 and off to the SLC airport by 7:30. We had to drop Pieder at the AFB and go from there. Elizabeth, Stephen and Emily dropped us there for our flight. The SLC airport has a unique feature for pick up. They have a waiting area where the engines are to be shut down. We have not seen that anywhere else. The flight to Denver was smooth, and we have a layover in Denver of 4 hours. We don’t have to run anywhere to catch a flight. It was quite a change from the flight to Utah. Evelyn read much of the 4 hours we waited for our flight. I tried to get on line. I was able to do that but couldn’t get my Internet Explorer to work. We ate some of our lunch before we heard the call. We finally boarded and set off for Atlanta. The flight was smooth and a bit early. Stacy and Tom were right there after we retrieved our luggage. While on the plane, I knocked a cup of coffee into my lap. Praise God it was not hot—but it was wet and uncomfortable during the remainder of the flight. After getting the luggage, I went to the rest room and changed shorts. We drove to a nearby restaurant for a delicious dinner given to us as an anniversary gift. It had stormed in Atlanta nearly causing us to delay landing, so we drove in the rain to the restaurant and then to their home. We were happy to have a place to sleep.