Lithuania 2014 || The Camp & What We Did (P.S. We're back!)

Hello all you long lost friends!

It is so amazing that we are already safely back home! Our time in beautiful Lietuva (Lithuania) was just wonderful! We are sure to bore you with endless details in days to come. It seems that finding a happy medium on what to tell and when is our dilemma. Which is the reasoning behind our downtime most of this week, since settling back in has been easier than you would imagine after such a journey! I suppose "home sweet home" is more than the thought of a pleasant embroidery piece to hang on a wall, it is coming back to what you expect to be waiting for you once you return and embracing the people you hold dear who stayed behind. And that is just what it is, sweet to be home.

We're Off!

Hello!

We are finally heading out friends! We are off to take the voyage of a lifetime!

We will be heading out today around 10:30 a.m., meeting at our Church building to regroup, then driving to O'Hare airport in Chicago. Once there, our next feat will be a 9 hour flight to Warsaw and then a 6-8 hour layover! Our next flight arrives for a short jaunt of just over an hour to Vilnius (Lithuania's capital) where we will load up for our 2 hour drive to the campsite. That's where we will be spending our next 6 days.

Our time will not be consumed in only construction work. We have planned a day and a half of touring and shopping in the nearby towns! We pray we will be open to and ready for whatever may come our way, and ultimately be a blessing to the people there! This will be a growing time for our little group to say the least!

June || Photo-a-Day || Week Twenty

Outfit // Summer's Dawn

Hello dear friends!
What a beautiful evening here in Michigan we are enjoying this day! So much abundant greenery beckons us to open the windows and smell the fresh air. On this new and blessed day, let us not forget what most do, our fallen heroes of this beloved land- wherever this finds you, joy or tragedy.

Funk+Fab || in Ol' 50's Skirt

Hello dearies! I am hoping that your weekend was fabulous! I am so happy that our Church services went as planned instead of being cancelled as I was dreading.Since our pastor is out of town, we were blessed to have a dear elder gentleman, who has past connections with our church, deliver the Word.It was wonderful! So wonderful I guess that I not only was so I intrigued  that my Bible note journal lay out on my lap the entire service instead of being used, but I also forgot to get a copy of the service on cd! I will have to make it a point to grab one next week so I can share it with you more fully than just as I remember.I think that it is about time that my sermon summary's have a comeback.How about you?


As I was pondering what exactly to write along with this little outfit post, it struck me that we have never done an Awk and Awe!So Bek and I made up our own name and are going to share some with you today! I love reading these posts on other blogs because they are fun to read while giving a testimony about what is going on in your life without having to get into personal detail.They can make you laugh and smile.Bring out the writer side of the blogger and can can reach out to a lot of readers in different areas of their lives.

                                                                                                 Funky:

• Having a friend, who never stops by, come over unannounced to drop off Mission Trip money while you are still in your nightgown because you slept in too late.
• Picking up a string because out of the corner of your eye it looks like a pin, while you are trying to set a rounded hem.
• Shoveling snow above my head...It is getting so deep on the sides of our drive that we have to heave it up and over our heads to make a 'road' for the van to be able to get out.
• Having my hose slowly fall down during a Mission Team meeting. :P
• Having a friend wear a (shall we say) very bold accessory to church- you having no clue whether to comment about it or not end up saying nothing and feeling bad about it the rest of the day because it probably took a lot of gumption to wear and I really could have said something.
• Being asked by your relatively city-ish relatives, if you need a rooster to get eggs.
• Sweating during church because you are used to having your house temp set at only 58* instead of 80*.
• Being asked if we are Amish, all. the. time!
• Having a new acquaintance  ask  'how is school?' before they find out that you 'don't go to school'.

• Bringing your clumsy Saint Bernard to a public setting and having him slobber on a ladies' leather purse while she's cooing to him, which is awkward enough in itself!
• The salesmen at Sam's Club trying to sell you 'Direct TV' every time you go there. And, every time, you have a long shpeel ready about how we do not watch TV and even if we did we can not get a signal in the woods.
• The salesmen trying to convince you that we could get a signal with their amazing service... 
•  People being afraid to drink raw milk...  [Don't even get us started on this!  ;-) ]  
• Having people ask me when I am graduating and having to explain everything- I have been half way finished since last summer, but still working on the advanced stuff. :)

                                
                                                                                             Fabulous:

• Winning the Serenity Runaway Fashion Show! If you voted for me thank you so much! :)
• Having my cousin ask me to watch her kiddos for the next few days! She, in return is giving me a substantial amount toward my ticket fair for the Mission Trip! I am so blessed by her and her husband for this opportunity! 
• Argan oil! It is every bit as fabulous as I have heard! Just wonderful on hair!
• Joining The Historical Sew Fortnightly challenge this year! I am so happy to have been directed to it! I will be sharing my projects with you all for sure!
• All that we have. As our Mission Trip draws closer, it becomes a reality how much we are blessed.
•  Music. Isn't it just wonderful?!
• 'Daisy' my sewing machine. It is so amazing to me how wonderful she deals with everything! I always want to have a treadle in my life! :)
•  Wondering what this year holds.
• All my blogger friends. Love you all so much!  :)
• Trying to finish up school!!
• Anticipating how close the Mission Trip is getting and pondering our 'last minute' fundraisers and seeing our amount rise faithfully.
• Putting together our passports! So exiting!
• Hearing from people how much they enjoy our blog and being amazed at their kind words and thoughtful prayers!

Shoes- gifted // Stockings- ? // Petticoat- made by me // Skirt- vintage- free! // Belt- recently thrifted $2 // Undershirt- goodwill $2 // Blouse- goodwill $4 // Headband- gifted

I have had this skirt for about four years and have wore it quite a bit since then.And since I know most of you love the stories that can come along with fabulous vintage clothes, let me take a moment to share with you mine.We found this skirt with at our first Estate Sale among the owner's nursing uniforms from the early 50's.She said her mother made it for her when she went away for schooling after WW2! With that bit of history she flipped it over to see that the head of the zipper was missing and with that she tossed it to us saying to either have at it or throw it out! Even though the zipper's head was no longer intact and the hem was coming loose, I of course brought it home to mend and love. It has been a favorite of mine ever since!

                                            With that my friends I will say farewell! I hope you have a great week!
                                                                      
                                                          Have you had anything especially wonderful lately?
                                             Have you ever been bestowed upon a vintage treasure just for the taking? 
                                                                         What do you think about 'Funk+Fab'?
                                                                                     
                                                                                                    TTFN!
                                                                                                    Cassie

~ We Made It ~

Thanks SO very much everyone for your thoughts and prayers for our busy day!
We had a great time working together! :) And we made over our goal of 100 dozen with not one complication! Thank you Jesus!
Everything went like clockwork.We started at nine and were completely finished cooking by 3:15 on the dot! :) It feels great to sit down!

         We tied our purity rings with cooking twine around our necks so we would not loose them amongst the flour and such.  :)

                                                                          Thanks again!
                                                     Your comments were so lovely yesterday!

                                      If anyone has any questions, you know how to comment! 
                                                                            Much love,
                                                                   
                                                                        Cassie & Rebekah

        "In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will give you the desires of your heart."
                                                                         Proverbs 3:6

Outfit + Life // Keep Me Warm

Oh ladies, (and gents:) It is so cold! It snowed all Wednesday night here, leaving us with about eight inches of snow now! Flurries and gusts of cold winds has kept us indoors must of the week.This kind of fierce weather reminds me how much we are blessed to have a cozy home we know is waiting for us! Sometimes it is hard to be grateful while trying to clean this under construction house, I mean, there are so many people who actually have cabinetry! :) But then I remember that there are also people who don't have what we do- more than one room to live in, insulated walls, wood floors, windows, trees, slow, 25 mile an hour traffic, pets, the list goes has really no end! If only I could catch myself every time before getting frustrated!   *sigh*

Part of my reluctance to be frustrated started yesterday while getting our kitchen ready for a fundraiser that we have planned for tomorrow.As we have said before in some past posts, Rebekah, our Dad, and I are going on a mission trip to Lithuania in the summer! I have been meaning to write up a temporary tab about the trip so that everyone (especially new readers) can know what is going on and so that we can link back to it! I should be working on that this weekend.

Any who, our fundraiser for tomorrow is the task of making 100 dozen pig in the blankets.Have you heard of them before ? We make tons of them! They are wonderful for selling! Not to mention they are delish! :) If you have not heard of them before check out this post that Rebekah typed up the last time we made them!

This outfit is what I have been living in all week, with an occasional change of the long sleeve. :) Just an 'around the house, I am freezing, keep me coordinated' outfit. :)
I found this super cozy, J-Jill, sweater vest as I was about to check out at Goodwill last week for $3! I love it! The color, the fit, the price! :)
The wonderful three tiered skirt (for around the house and horse-back riding:) I found at the same time I bought the sweater I wore in this post. It is so much fun to wear and was such a great find at just $2! Even though I usually wear dresses for house work and such, this has kept me super warm and been a nice change. :)

Boots, thrifted, $5 (I believe) // Stockings, gifted // Four layered petticoat, made by me, $7 in fabric // Undershirt, thrifted, $2 // Long sleeve, hand-me-down from a friend's mom :) // Sweater vest, J-Jill, goodwill, $3 // Scarf , made by me, yarn was gifted

We would greatly appreciate prayers for our endeavor tomorrow, especially since just about everyone in our family has now had some kind of the flu these past couple of weeks, despite our chugging of fruits and vitamins! Please pray for clear thinking, patience while working together, and good health!   :)

                                                                                       SO,
                                                           Have you heard of pig in the blankets ?
                                                  What have you been wearing to keep back the chills ?
                                                          Have you been doing any fundraising lately ?
                                                       Have you ever been on a mission trip-anywhere ?

                                                                                       love,
                                                                                      Cassie

P.S.  A few of you had questions in your comment in Monday's post. I finally got around to answering
        them. Thanks for your patience!

Pig in a Blanket Anyone?

For those of you who have NO idea what the title means: a 'pig in a blanket' is a dutch food. It basically consists of a seasoned pork/beef meat wrapped inside a pastry dough 'blanket'... So,this is another fundraising post! Two Thursdays ago,the 8th, members of our missions team gathered at (my aunt's) church to create 200 dozen of these scrumptious sausage favorites. First we picked Sara and Nate up, (And left Em and Mel *a.k.a. the Littles* with Mrs. Van Kampen)  and I took this photo to start the day off... (Sorry for Cassie's 'lazy eye', hahaha...)    Actually, FIRST, my Mom,Emma, and Mel went shopping at Gordon Foods Center a few days before....   :-]

                                                        Double the load,double the pushers!

                              Next we picked up 200 pounds of meat from Blue Star Meats....

                                        Mom and the "manpower" going in for the meat order...

                                                           Nathan with a bus-tub of pork.

                                       Here's Cassie the dough-girl,that's her official rank... ;-)

Me, Rebekah, rolling out the first batch of dough... I wore a black shirt, don't ask me why... It didn't even get a smidgen dirty until Pastor Myers and the boys started some mischief with floury hands... =~D    (More pics of that later...)

                       Some of the butter that goes into the dough. We started out with 50 pounds!

          The boys scooping meat- a cold and seemingly endless occupation- the least envied job in the kitchen!                                        That's why we told the boys to do it...   ;-}

                                          Melody 'squishing' as we pros of pig-making call it....

             First you plop a ball of meat of a square of dough, make it into a sausage shape,and,roll it up!

                                    The forever helpful Aunt Joey rolling out a batch of dough...

                           Plop,squish,roll,plop,squish,roll,plop,squish- okay, you probably get it....

                                          Auntie Jane, as we call her, packing up some pigs...

                                         Janet Cobb and Marietta Marsden, Mom and daughter....

                                                                         A foot shot.

                                  My Dad came to help after a half-day of roofing a house...

                              Sara making the egg and milk mixture which goes into the dough.

                                                             One egg out of hundreds...

                                                               The giant whisk and me.

                Nate and Pete. They 'finally' got a break from scooping meat. Notice their shirts? Cute.
                                          I like Chevy better, but I like Nathan's shirt better!!!

                                                            Mrs. V.K. , a.k.a., Miss Dana....

 Mom cutting the dough squares... (Yes, she was in a hippie mood that day.)  :-)    That is REAL tye-dye shirt, an original from the 80's!!! HA HA HA!  :-D

I tried to do a panorama but the camera would not cooperate, I got as wide a shot as I could by shoving myself into the corner! ;-)

                                                                Here's Em's long braid...

                                Cassie a victim of the aforementioned "friendly game of flour tag"....

                                                                          Ha. Ha. HA!
                                                                        (Gotcha 'back'!)

Sara, another 'tagged' sister. (We were less than amused and eventually the boys were banished to the gym- -and they had to clean off all of the cart wheels and trash cans!)



Nathan, a victim of revenge, he didn't even know I- I mean SOMEONE , did it.   ;~]    (Sorry for the weirdly angled photo, I took it on the run!)







 Here is the pastor of our church, Dennis Myers,he was being corrected on his pig-squishing by Miss Dana.
                                           (You've got to get it all the way to the edge!)   :-}

       Emma and Mel waiting patiently for their lunch, we bake all of the ugly or 'bad' pigs to taste test!

                                 Janet scooping meatballs- thanks for taking up the task Janet!!!

After we were 'done' (This was during our break time of in between done baking and not started with clean up...) we tried to do some clothes pictures,but... ;-(   We were tired and dirty so we just took some silhouettes in front of the stained glass windows...

 Thanks for taking the picture Peter, and thanks Nathan, for jumping in front of the camera at every possible interval. (We have several photos with Nate's feet in them.)  Brothers. 

Well, that's it. So far in the selling process it is going very well! SO WELL, we may be making more in the near future!    (Don't worry, I'm sure we've ALL had enough 'pig-pics' to last us a good long while...)

                                                        Any more fundraising ideas? 
                                              Any of you ever made pig-in-a-blankets before?

Thanks for reading!!! Have a great day!

                                                                                                   ~Rebekah S.