Crystal Madrilejos

So I haven’t had a minute to try to figure out the “Read More” thing. BUT yesterday, in my Blogger frenzy I forgot to mention that I changed some comment setting so now anyone can comment and also you can link back to any posts you want with the little “Links to this post” link (too many “links” in this sentence) at the bottom of every post. If you’re confused by what I just said, just look below this post and you’ll figure it out.

Since I haven’t figured out how to do the “Read More” thing, I’m going to have to post many Amish Country photos in a row. So here goes:

I’m going to work backwards in our trip, because I think it makes for a better starting point and ending.

These are some kids hanging out next to the country store. There was one little girl, who was probably about 7 or 8 years old, shopping for groceries with another little girl (about 2 years old) on her hip. She looked like an adult! I don’t have a good picture of them so this will do instead.

Ashery Country Store was our last stop on the trip and it, as you can see, has bulk foods. I’m not sure if they make all these goods, but the hot cocoa mix looked suspiciously like Swiss Miss. Guess we’ll never know. I got a bag of chocolate covered almonds and some raw sugar. Andrew stocked up on “special” flour and such.

This is the parking lot of the Ashery Country Store. Special parking for the horse drawn carriages. I don’t know a whole lot about the Amish other than what I’ve observed, and that isn’t much. So if I’m misrepresenting anything in anyway, please feel free to set me right. But I swear I saw more than a few buggies driven by Amish men drinking Mountain Dew or Canada Dry or coffee out of a styrofoam cup. Is this allowed? I don’t know why it wouldn’t be, but it sort of makes you do a double-take.

Speaking of carriages, we rode in this one. (In this photo it looks like the horse is about to take a mad dash and the carriage is teetering on two wheels!) Andy is the horse’s name and the driver is Lester. Seems like it should be the other way around (no offense to anyone named Lester!). I felt a little weird riding in the carriage because I wasn’t sure how the horse was treated. The driver seemed nice enough and there are horses EVERYWHERE in Amish Country pulling carriages. But the fact that we were tourists of sorts felt like maybe it was more carnival ride and less necessity for transportation.

Last but not least is Lehman’s. This is a huge Amish Department store. Even though I did see a few Amish people browsing and probably buying, I have a feeling it’s not where they would go to get a bargain. Lots of cool stuff, for sure. I mean, it’s famous! People come from all over the place to shop at Lehman’s.

Abigail weighing herself at Lehman’s and below is a really neato display of yard sticks.