All the children are home and busy doing the chores

There is a lot more activity going around here this morning since six of our children are home from school on spring break. Makes it a little harder for me to concentrate to sit down and write this column. I should have written this before everyone was awake, but the extra sleep sure gave me a better start.

We had a delicious meal of homemade breakfast burritos before starting our day. It is now 10 a.m. and everyone is busy doing something. Elizabeth, 17, and Susan, 16, are gathering laundry that needs to be washed. Verena, 14, and Loretta, 11, and Lovina, 7, are washing dishes and sweeping the floors. Benjamin, 12, Joseph, 9, and Kevin, 6, headed out to the barn to clean out the chicken coop. Elizabeth found out the twins that she baby-sits for are sick so she does not have to go to work today. After she is done with laundry she wants to work on getting her dress, cape and apron cut out and start sewing on it. Her friend Timothy’s brother is getting married in a few weeks. Timothy and Elizabeth will each have a part in the wedding and she needs a certain color of dress.

I am enjoying sewing on my sewing machine again since our friend stopped by to give my machine a tune-up. It was the first time in 9 years that it has had one. It is really working well again. Sewing is so much more fun and easier if your sewing machine works okay. I started to make Kevin a few more pants and it looks like Joseph needs a few more.

It doesn’t take long for the boys to have holes in their pants. I need to put patches on them for the ones they wear here at home and make new ones for school.

Easter will be Sunday already so the children want to color eggs this week. I will probably not let them color as many dozens as we usually did. Our chickens are laying around 16 eggs a day so it is getting hard to keep up outside. We want to get another batch of little chicks started this spring. We plan to order some broilers to butcher so we have our own chicken in the freezer.

The local grocery store where we bought meat if we needed it has now closed. We miss it because it was only five miles from here and a quick, easy run with the horse and buggy. It was on the outside edge of town and we didn’t have to battle traffic on the busy highway. Now we’ll have to drive the horse and buggy farther and onto more crowded roads to go to a grocery store.

Also on our list to do this week is to make some horseradish to use with the hard-boiled eggs for Easter. We will have church services at our neighbors for Easter Sunday. Joe will be off from work this Good Friday. We will hide eggs for the children since on Friday we won’t be home Sunday. The children like to find candy-filled eggs out in the yard. All of these activities are fun but we always make the children understsand what the true meaning of Easter is, though.

Lovina’s eye had a bad scratch on the cornea last week. She was home from school for three days with a very painful eye. One day last week she asked me if she could have carrots for lunch. She said I heard eating carrots are good for your eyes. It made me smile that she thought of that. The eye doctor prescribed some eye drops and it seemed to help heal the eye. Now she doesn’t act like she has any side effects from it.

Jacob, Emma and family had dinner here yesterday. Joe grilled T-bone steaks and we also had mashed potatoes, gravy, tea, macaroni and cheese, carrot sticks, and ranch dip, sliced cheese, white cake, rhubarb coffeecake, cherry delight and peaches. Lovina mixed the white cake so she was proud to see it all ate up.

I will share the recipe for the white cake.

HOMEMADE

WHITE CAKE

1 cup water

1 cup butter or margerine

2 cups sugar

pinch of salt

2 2/3 cup flour

2 eggs

2 teaspoons vanilla

1 1/2 teaspoons soda

2/3 cup buttermilk

In a saucepan boil the water and add the butter. Mix the sugar, salt, and flour and add to the hot butter water mixture and beat. Add the rest of the ingredients and beat. Pour into a greased 15 by 10 inch jelly roll pan. Bake at 325 for 15 to 20 minutes. Add frosting if desired.

Editor’s note: Visit amishcookonline and register for the e-mail list for twice weekly Eicher updates, recipes, Amish information, stories, and videos.

Readers with culinary or cultural questions or to share recipes write Lovina at: Lovina Eicher, c/o Oasis Newsfeatures, P.O. Box 157, Middletown, OH 45042. To learn more about Amish culture and the Amish Cook column, visit www.amishcookonline.com or “The Amish Cook Fan Page” on Facebook.