Grandpa Martin's Funeral

Last Thursday night, Ricky's Grandpa Martin passed away. He was 83 years old and his health had been deteriorating the past couple years. He was a very interesting man, I remember laughing at all his stories that he used to tell and funny things he would say. I always thought it was neat how much he loved his little Jack Russel Terrier, every time we would visit he would sit in his chair with his dog on his lap and talk dutch to him. Ricky has some great memories of his grandpa, from going on hunting trips or having him "drive" him to school in the buggy. It's nice that he is at peace and rest right now but we will miss him. I love the lyrics of this one song that we sang today:

Asleep in Jesus!

Asleep in Jesus! Blessed sleep!

From which no one ever wake to weep;

A calm and undisturbed repose,

Unbroken by the last of foes.

Asleep in Jesus! oh, how sweet

To be for such a slumber meet!

With holy confidence to sing

That death hath lost its venomed sting!

Asleep in Jesus! peaceful rest!

Whose waking is supremely blest;

No fear-no woe shall dim the hour

That manifests the savior's power.

Asleep in Jesus! oh, for me

May such a blissful refuge be;

Securely shall my ashes lie.

And wait the summons from on high.

Last evening we went over to the viewing at Grandma and Grandpa's house a little before 6:00pm and stayed till around 9:00pm. Grandpa Martin was Old Order Mennonite and the whole viewing and funeral process that they have was very different than anything I had ever seen. The viewing was in the home and the coffin was just a simple box with no frills or even handles. Chase thought that grandpa was sleeping and that he might be hiding toys in the box with him, I guess it looked a little like a toy box, but I wouldn't let him go look for toys. Many of Ricky's cousins came that we had not seen for several years so it was nice to connect with them again
Early this morning around 8:30am we went over to the house again for a mini service for the family and then the processional to the church. The hearse was a horse drawn carriage and the processional must have looked pretty weird with a mix of vehicles and buggies. If you know much about Mennonites, you know that they do not like their picture taken. I did sneak some pictures but I was wishing I could take a hundred more.

all the buggies waiting at Grandpa's

The horse drawn hearse.
When we got to the church everyone was just waiting outside, men on one side and women on the other, not talking or anything.


The pallbearers (Ricky was one) put the coffin in the middle and they had one last viewing and then went immediately to the graveyard.
As soon as we walked down to the graveyard, Chase said he had to pee, so we had to walk back up to the bathrooms and I missed most of the graveside ceremony. The bathrooms are outhouses and so that caused a huge issue with Chase and he was pitching a fit and not wanting to go so finally I held him while he stood over the hole and he peed like that, but then Jojo was trying to look in between his legs down the hole and almost got peed on since I was holding Chase and couldn't' keep her away! Yikes! It worked out though. After a short graveside sermon they started filling in the grave by hand with shovels. We all went into the church then for a short service, haha- that was a joke, it was a looooong service with 4 preachers! I actually had it pretty good and was able to sit in a pretty comfortable chair in a side room and nurse Joanna. Patty sat back with me to keep me company:)

In the church the men and women sit on opposite sides of the church facing each other, usually the preaching is in German but they preached in English today because there were a lot of "English" people there, you could tell that they were not comfortable preaching in English though.

(I love this picture of the bonnets)
The service was over at noon and we went home really quick so Ricky could change and then went back over to Grandma's house for lunch.
This is a view of the front of the church.

Leaving the Church

Some of the women from the church had provided lunch for the family and we were all so hungry by the time we ate. We stayed and talked for a while and finally got home around 3:00pm. The kids did so well for that long time but we had issues this afternoon because of missing nap time, yikes. So now it's back to work tomorrow.