Favorite Photos of 2020

I’ve enjoyed the year overviews I’ve seen on some other blogs. Although I don’t plan to share a rundown of my year, I did go through my photos from this past year and pick out my favorites. I thought you might enjoy seeing them. *Disclaimer: Although I took most of the photos here, at least a few were taken by friends or family members.

Although Christmas 2019 is not technically part of the past year, I love these photos so much I thought I’d include them. Photo 1: The nieces playing at a Wisconsin family gathering. Christmas with my family was an early part of Ivan’s and my first year of marriage. Photo 2: Mother and daughter–my sister Jennie with Madison. Photo 3: I loved how the drops on my car window shimmered in the light of a local church where Ivan and I attended a Christmas play.

The lights of home. I took this photo early in our marriage. It felt so magical to stand in the darkness and capture the lights of our own home.

Ivan screws together a bookshelf. I brought more than 30 boxes of books with me from Wisconsin, and the wall to ceiling bookshelves he built in my office nicely holds both my collection and his. And no, I haven’t stopped buying books. Any of you locals are welcome to come over anytime and borrow.

The first few months of getting to know Oakland. Photo 1: Zackrey mixes his slime. I had the local Kinsinger children over one day. We made slime and I read them a few stories from my children’s collection. Photo 2: I love having my great grandma Miller’s rocking chair. My dad says she probably spent many hours praying in that chair. Photo 3: In January 2020, I attended the Amish ladies’ sewing circle for the first time. The sewing circle has become one of my favorite community gatherings. Those in charge always invite ladies from around the community, whether they are Amish, Baptist, Lutheran, or Mennonite, so attending is a great way to get to know the local women.

In early spring, just before COVID hit in full force, these people flew out from Wisconsin and surprised me. That’s my niece Madison standing in front of the waterfall, good friend Deqo with me in the center, and my sister Jennie at the far right.

Photo 1: Cutting up on the round bales. Photo 2: A couple of Kinsinger great nieces with their “bloomies.” Photo 3: Our barn in the moonlight.

Ivan and I have never been very good at taking selfies, although we love taking them. We joke that we need to improve our selfie skills. In the photo on the left, Ivan took the photo, and I laughed and laughed when I looked at the camera and saw the face he’d made. Straw hat selfie on the right. Farmer girl coming up!

A visit home to my Wisconsin family. I love having a photo where I actually have all my ducks in a row! The last photo is of the sanctuary at the church I attended for most of my life. It will always hold a special place in my heart.

We brought a bear back with us from Wisconsin. My dad has taken up chainsaw carving since he sold the milk cows, and he gave Ivan and me this bear holding a small welcome sign. The photo on the right shows the stump and enormous fallen pine tree we had to cut down due to age and disease. It had been growing just to the right of the front door for as long as Ivan can remember.

Photo 1: Gortner Garment Charities, the local clothes sorting center which donates used clothing to Christian Aid Ministries, receives a donation. Photo 2: Pure happiness, in miniature.

Photo 1: Ivan likes to use this ancient planting device to plant sweet corn for our own eating. Here, he checks the furrow’s depth. Photo 2: Cutting up potatoes for cheeseburger soup. We both like soup for supper, so I tried canning some. Photo 3: Ivan snapped this photo of me trying on his hat.

Photo 1: I visited my good friend Lois in Harrisonburg this summer. Photo 2: Dad and Mom gave me a tour of their apple orchard on a visit home to Wisconsin.

Farm life. I especially love having our own blueberries.

And more farm life. The squash is ever so delicious fried. In the last photo, my mother-in-law (who I call “Grandma”) displays her giant tomatoes.

I’ve greatly enjoyed getting to know my Kinsinger great nieces and nephews, including this energetic little guy.

My parents and several siblings came to visit, and the Kinsinger clan escorted them up the mountain on Gators and four wheelers. Ivan’s brothers own a section of this particular mountain, and it’s a fun place to take visitors, providing a lovely overlook of Pleasant Valley.

Photo 1: I love our expressions. Photo 2: One of our visitors left tracks in the driveway. Photo 3: My sister Elizabeth with her boyfriend, Brett.

Triumph! In September, we scaled Chimney Top in the Smokies.

Ivan told me I could post this silly photo of him only if I posted an equally silly one of myself. So here they both are.

Photo 1: In November, Ivan and I took a final trip for the year to visit my Wisconsin family. My parents had harvested bushels and bushels of crisp apples from their young trees. Ivan helped Dad get their new apple cider press set up, and we came home with jugs of cider. Photo 2: Louise (who is my niece-by-marriage and exactly my age) garnishes the turkey for the Kinsingers’ Thanksgiving gathering. Photo 3: I was surprised to drive in our lane to an Amish buggy one day. It made me remember that, yes, many of my Kinsinger relatives are Amish and do drive buggies on occasion. I forget that sometimes, because I almost always see them on tractors and Gators. I used to joke to Ivan, when I first moved into this community, that those two pretty Amish girls driving by on a tractor were probably headed to a tea party. At that time, using a piece of farm machinery to drive to a tea party seemed to me the height of humorous irony. Now I don’t give a second thought to tractors and Gators, but buggies still hold a little bit of the exoticness they did for me as a young girl, when we’d visit my dad’s parents in Indiana and hear them clop-clop-clopping down the road.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this glimpse of my 2020 in photos. The photos bring back happy memories, but cannot begin to capture the depth of growth, loss, and love I’ve experienced this year. It’s been an unusual year for all of us, and I know that some of you have been far more profoundly affected by the difficult circumstances of this year than I have been. Praying for God’s guidance and growth for all of us in 2021.