Smicksburg Tales 1,2 & 3 (Amish Knitting Circle, Amish Friends Knitting Circle & Amish Knit Lit Cirlce ~ Complete Series: 888 pages for Granny Weaver Lovers and 30+ Amish Recipes

by Karen Anna Vogel

  “Opa, danki,” Jenny said, one eyebrow cocked. “Are they for school?”

  Jeb waved his hand. “Nee, you can’t fit all your food in those little things. It’s for having picnics with Oma and me. “

  The girls clapped their hands, and Millie stood up. “When can we go?”

  “Today,” Roman said, with a grin. “We’re all going for a picnic to your favorite spot.”

  “The pumpkin patch!” the girls shouted in unison.

  Joe put a hand up. “Marge and I can’t go, but we brought a surprise.” He looked sheepishly at Roman. “Sorry, I just can’t wait any longer.”

  Roman laughed and told him to go ahead and bring his present in the house. The girls looked at each other, confused. “Why couldn’t he wrap it and put it on the table?” Jenny asked.

  “You can’t wrap it,” Marge blurted, eyes wide with anticipation. She winked at Tillie. “You’ll love her.” She clasped her mouth with both hands. “Oops”.

  “Her? So it’s alive?” Jenny asked slowly, deep in thought.

  Marge let out nervous laughter. “Oh, you know me. I named my car! Her name is Red. It’s a lame name, but it’s what I call my girl.” Marge shot up when Joe entered the room with something large and square with a white cloth covering it.

  “Can you guess what it is?” Joe asked, as he placed it on the floor.

  Jenny sprung up and went over to Joe. “I think I know.”

  “Now how can you know?” he said, jabbing Jenny in the side. “It’s covered.”

  “I can smell it.”

  “You’re bluffing,” Joe said. “Now guess.”

  Jenny put a finger to her cheek. “Well, I smell woodchips. Wet woodchips. But they’re clean, and don’t smell funny. So it just tipped its’ water, or something.”

  “A guinea pig!” Millie put her hands on her heart. “I’ve always wanted a guinea pig.”

  Joe beamed. “Something better.”

  “We have three,” Marge hinted. “Can you guess now?”

  Jenny leaned forward and hugged Joe around the neck, and then ran to Marge. “A rabbit.”

  “You’re right, Preacher Girl,” Joe teased. “When I first met you, you ran away to our place to find the rabbits, remember? Trying to find the dwarfs?”

  Marge chuckled. “After you read Snow White?”

  Jenny pursed her lips to compose herself. “I remember, but I’m eight now, and don’t believe that story anymore.”

  Tillie and Millie ran over to see the rabbit. “She’s so small. Is she a boppli?” Tillie asked.

  “She’s a dwarf rabbit,” Joe said, laughing. “They don’t get big. Your mamm insisted.”

  Lizzie nodded. “Jah, that’s for sure. Some rabbits are too big to keep in the house.”

  “In the house?” Jeb asked. “Keep a rabbit in the house? Why not the barn where animals belong?”

  Jonas cleared his throat. “Lizzie had a little rabbit when she was a kinner. She didn’t pay for hers, though, but found it, abandoned, so she raised it.”

  Roman looked at Lizzie with star-struck eyes. “I remember that rabbit. And our girls will be just like their mamm, and have a big heart to care for not only all of us, but animals too.”

  The girls ran to embrace Lizzie. “Danki, Mamm,” they all said.

  Lizzie kissed the tops of their heads. How she loved these girls. Though she wasn’t the natural mamm, she had a heart like one, she supposed. Fearing she may cry tears of joy, Lizzie quickly told everyone to go out on the porch and she’d soon have everything ready for their picnic.

  They all obeyed, except Roman, still staring at her. He drew her close with his good arm, the other still in a cast, and leaned down to kiss her. Not a short peck, but a sweet kiss that lingered. “Danki, my love.”

  Breathless, Lizzie didn’t hurry to get all the cold-cuts out of the refrigerator to make sandwiches. No, she soon found herself lost in another kiss and didn’t care if anyone walked into the room. When she leaned back for air, her eyes met Roman’s. She knew he had something to say. “What is it?”

  He leaned his forehead against hers. “I’ll take my medicine. I want to be here to see many more birthdays…and grow old with you…”

  Lizzie closed her eyes and thanked God. She hadn’t nagged, only prayed, and it worked. Yes, she’d spoken her mind, and then cast her care on God, not nagging. Tension left the home and peace filled it once again. Danki, God.

  ~*~

  Tillie slipped her hand into Lavina’s, and the sweetness of this girl helped the sour feeling in her heart. She was to ignore Nathan, as Jeb had instructed, but she had overheard their conversation. He said he loved her, but she didn’t dare tell Jeb when they had another long talk at the noon meal.

  Lavina took in the scent of dried cornstalks as they approached them, halfway down to the pumpkin patch. How she loved autumn and the scooping out of pumpkins seeds and roasting them, as Lizzie had planned, carving stenciled designs on the skin, and using them as lanterns. She’d try the flower stencil, since it looked simple. The girls would be delighted at yet another surprise. What a goot mamm Lizzie was to the girls, and seeing Ella with her twins, gave her a deep joy.

  She felt a tap on her shoulder and turned to see Nathan, eyes sheepish. “Lavina, want to take a walk through the corn maze?”

  She stopped so abruptly that is jerked Tillie back. “Sorry, Tillie.”

  Tillie looked at her, then Nathan, and then smiled and skipped ahead to meet the others. As Lavina faced Nathan’s anxious eyes, she saw Jeb out of her peripheral vision. She needed to listen to her bishop, but to her shock, Jeb came closer, a grin on his face.

  “Why don’t yinz young’uns go take a walk in the corn maze?” He winked at Lavina.

  “But you said that I should…” She looked at Jeb, shaking her head. “We talked at the noon meal, jah?”

  “Jah, we did. Never said you young’uns couldn’t play in the cornfield.”

  Lavina reached her hand out to Jeb and grabbed him. “Jeb, what’s wrong? You’ve never called us ‘young’uns’ before. We’re not kinner. Are you alright?”

  “Right as rain. You forget about me, and go have some fun for a change. Us old folk can get awfully cantankerous.”

  Lavina gasped. “What?”

  “Cantankerous. Crabby. Well, at least me. Deborah’s still like a young lamb, skipping along life’s roads. She sees things I just can’t.”

  Nathan took her hand and pulled her toward one of the entrances to the maze of corn. What was going on? Only an hour ago, Jeb had forbidden her to be alone with Nathan! Digging in her barefooted heels to stop, Lavina’s foot caught a jagged rock and she cried out in pain. Reaching for her foot, she sat down, right there in the dirt.

  “Are you alright? Lavina, I’m sorry.”

  Lavina, realizing the stone hadn’t even broke the skin, felt heat rise, making her ruddy skin much redder. She didn’t look up for a few seconds, hoping to compose herself. “I’m fine.”

  Nathan helped pull her up, but withdrew his hand quickly as soon as she was on her feet. Was he listening to Jeb? Going back to Sarah? Is that why Jeb was so happy? Lavina set her face like flint, looking ahead as they walked through the tall, stiff cornstalks. The path getting narrow at times, Nathan always let her go through first, holding back any stalks in her way.

  Nathan was the first to attempt to break the tall wall between them. “How are Maryann and Michael?”

  “Busy, as usual. Maryann likes my help with the kinner.”

  “So, you’ll be staying with them for goot?”

  Lavina paused. “I found a relative in Ohio. One I never knew of. We write…I want to visit.”

  “Only visit, right?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “Won’t you miss Smicksburg?” he prodded. “You couldn’t leave permanently.”

  “I can always visit. And you have two uncles out there, jah? People move all the time.” She heard a loud rustling sound not far off. A grunt. Lavina s
pun around. “Nathan, the pig’s in these cornstalks.”

  “Jah, I know. He won’t go far. Only digging up roots, having a goot meal.”

  Lavina clenched her fists. “But I’m afraid of pigs because…” before she could finish, a black pig headed toward them. Lavina screamed and clung on to Nathan. “Pick me up!”

  Nathan scooped her into his arms, but let out laughter so loud, the crows on the stalks all took flight. “Never known an Amish girl to be afraid of pigs.”

  As the pig circled them, more excited now than ever, Nathan called to the pig. “Christmas, get out of here.” He ripped off a piece of stalk with one hand, and smacked the pig’s behind. “Now shoo. Away with you.” Soon, the pig darted off down the path.

  Lavina wiggled out of his arms. “He could hurt someone. One of the girls.”

  Nathan adjusted his straw hat, and more laughter followed. “A pig won’t hurt you. And he’s not a seven-hundred pound sow, but, well, Christmas.”

  Lavina tried to calm down and count to ten slowly to herself. Colleen had taught her this. She let out a deep breath. “What is Christmas?”

  “What we call the pig. That or Thanksgiving or Wedding…”

  “My daed named the animals we had.”

  “But you get too attached if you name them, and then it’s like losing a pet.”

  Lavina’s mouth grew dry when Nathan looked up, sensitivity in his eyes. He’d just said…losing…was she losing him forever? He’d laughed up to this point, but now, the more she searched his eyes, she saw fear. “So, Nathan, when are you leaving for Montana?” she forced herself to ask.

  “Do you still want me to go?”

  Why were his blue eyes darkening? And when his shaggy brown hair tried to cover them, he didn’t brush it away as usual. He was hiding something. But he asked her if she wanted him to go, like she’d said before, when angry. You love the girl you’re with Nathan. Go back to Montana. She’d spit out these words like venom, feeling ashamed afterwards. But trying to guard her heart, she got defensive, and shot quite an arrow into his heart. Ach, the painful look he’d given her.

  “Nathan, I’ve been so mean to you. I’m sorry.”

  He rushed to her and took her hand. “No, I should be apologizing. I hurt you. Can you forgive me?”

  The image of another woman in Montana, waiting for him, overpowered her, and she pulled her hands away. “What about Sarah?”

  He readjusted his straw hat. “Can we talk about that?”

  “Jah. I think I can. Jeb seemed to encourage it.”

  Nathan took her hand, and she didn’t pull away for some reason. It almost seemed like Nathan needed her support, to be able to share what weighed on his heart.

  “My mamm and Sarah’s mamm are best friends. They’ve been upset about Sarah since she was a kinner, her being mighty head-strong. When we were in our teens, looking back, they encouraged me to court Sarah a little too much. They’d always say she’d stray from the Amish, and I was the strong one who could keep her in the fold. So we planned to wed when we were eighteen, but she disappeared.”

  “Disappeared?”

  “Jah, she ran off with some English friends. My mamm and Sarah’s have been sick with worry for over two years, until she came back a few months ago. That’s why the sudden call to go back home. They figured the sooner the two of us go hitched, their problem with Sarah would be solved.” He squeezed her hand tighter. “I felt forced, Lavina, understand? And I didn’t want to see my mamm and her friend, the whole extended family, hurt again.”

  “But, didn’t you love Sarah?” Lavina asked slowly, preparing herself for the blow.

  “I thought I did…until I met you.”

  Lavina felt her heart leap like a deer. The tone in Nathan’s voice was sincere, she was sure. She looked up through the cornstalks to a blue sky. “Danki.”

  “What?”

  “I said ‘danki’.”

  “For what?”

  “I was talking to God, not you.” She squeezed his hand. “Nathan, I feel like you’re my equal for the first time.”

  Nathan rubbed the back of her hand with his thumb. “Go on. I want to hear it.”

  “I was young, only fourteen when I felt forced into a relationship, and gave in. I just wanted to make my mamm not worry so and feared my daed. And you did the same thing. You were being forced into marrying Sarah.”

  “Forced is too strong a word. My parents weren’t abusive like yours.”

  “But you were manipulated, jah? Like I was, and you gave in?”

  Canada Geese flew overhead, and the sound was deafening. Nathan took her by the chin and said something, but she couldn’t hear. She shrugged her shoulders and pointed to the birds ahead. He pulled her close, and she heard, I love you, Lavina. Will you be my bride?

  Tears sprung from her eyes as she nodded yes, and Nathan threw his hat up and yelled a yippy! But no one heard, only Lavina’s heart.

  ~*~

  Fannie balanced the pumpkin on the top of her ever-expanding stomach. “Mamm, I’ll be having a little pumpkin come winter. And you’ll have two grandkinner.” Trying to make her mamm smile was a task. The woman had a permanent frown, like the scarecrows the English had in their fields. “Aren’t you excited?”

  She slowly bent down to pick up the baskets of miniature gourds at her feet. “Jah, I suppose so.”

  Suppose so? Didn’t she want the precious life inside of her daughter? Old feelings, buried deep, that she was never wanted threatened to surface. But Granny had taught her well. Self-pity was the first step she always took in her spiral down into her inferiority complex. Fannie gave thanks to God for Granny and her knitting friends….and the circle tomorrow night. “Mamm, are you still going to knitting circle tomorrow?”

  “I suppose so.”

  I suppose so. She was like one of Melvin’s clocks that chimed, always the same song. I supposed so, usually meant, if I’m not sleeping, sick again without any medical explanation. But some of the women at the circle said they thought she was depressed. Could depression make a soul so lifeless, tired…uncaring? Surely God would give her strength if she tried harder.

  Resentment tried to grip her, but Fannie quickly thought of one of her Bible verses on forgiveness: Let he who is without sin, cast the first stone. But it seemed like her whole life her mamm had been throwing mental stones at her, and she never flung any back. She didn’t cast stones, so why was she feeling guilty of unforgiveness? Fannie found herself counting the minutes until knitting circle so she could chat with Granny. And thankful she had her to really be there for her. Granny had her struggles, too, but fought the good fight of faith, as the Bible instructed. Her mamm cowered under every dark cloud that blew her way. Why?

  ~*~

  Ruth placed pumpkin pie on two plates, and set them before Luke and little Micah. How her boy was growing, almost three, and would soon want more. She stared down at the pie as she cut herself a slice. She was eating for two, so she cut a quarter of the pie, and slid it on a plate.

  When she met her family at the table, Luke stared at her growing middle. “You sure you’re carrying one boppli?”

  “I don’t know. Ravished all the time.” She met Luke’s merry blue eyes, and they savored this moment. The first pumpkin pie from their patch. They’d planted this pumpkin patch together, for the first time, and she couldn’t help but keep her eyes locked on Luke’s. What a wunderbar husband he had become. So good that she didn’t fear moving away from her parents…

  “Luke, have you thought more on Marge and Joe’s place? Still want to buy it?”

  He nodded. “I’d like to. No land here.”

  Ruth felt debt was a noose around the neck, and just talking about it made her throat constrict. “I don’t like debt.”

  “Me neither. And I like working with your daed. Never thought I’d take to woodworking, but I’m keen on it.” He sighed, and put another piece of pie in his mouth.

  “How much does farming mean to you?”


  Luke pulled at his blond beard. “I think it’s the animals I like best. They calm me.”

  “Me too. I’d love to have alpacas and learn to spin their fur. Sheep too.” Ruth blurted this out without thinking. She really didn’t want the debt, and knew Luke weighed what she said very seriously.

  “Is there money in raising alpacas?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. I was just thinking out loud.”

  Luke reached across the table for her hand. “I think I’m leaning toward buying it…and some sheep. I think knitting has been goot for you. Remember how I called your knitting circle a bunch of knit-picks, always picking out faults in others? I was so wrong.”

  “Jah, you were. We pick each other up.” The thoughts of having sheep made her heart skip. And all the land for birding. The idea of this farm took root in her mind’s eye, as she imagined sheering sheep, carding the wool and going to Granny’s and spinning together. Was it worth it to be in debt, though? And the shell for the addition was already attached to the house. Were they being foolish?

  “What’s wrong? Luke asked. “You’re miles away.”

  “Like I said. I don’t like debt…and moving. We’ve only been here for nine months.”

  A glow washed over Luke’s face. “It takes nine months for God to create a new life, jah?”

  She knew what he meant. God had given them a whole new marriage in nine months. Neither of them were the same people. Her knit-pickin’ friends had been a part of this, and so was the Gmay leadership. How Ruth treasured her Amish life. And that life could be lived where they were, or where they moved to. She smiled at Luke and prayed that the Lord would direct their path. Surely the unity they now shared would lead them down the same path.

  ~*~

  That night, Joe thought of the events of the day. The birthday party for the girls would have been a disappointment to most other kids, but Amish children weren’t spoiled, he’d come to see. Although, they made a fuss about the rabbit, which cost a pretty penny compared to the other gifts, they didn’t show any contempt for Clark’s meager present: crayons and a cheap coloring book.