I am so glad to write this and hope people will understand more about the Old Order Mennonite. In our family is my husband David, my son David (age 6 months) and our daughter Susan (age 6). We own a Dairy Farm in Gorham New York. We are third generation on our farm. My husband's grandfather built the house and original barn. When David's grandfather passed away, David's parents bought the farm and lived there for many years. As they were getting older and wanted a smaller farm they put the farm up for sale. David and I were planning on getting married so we were looking for a farm. After much talking and praying David bought the farm from his parents. His parents, grandmother and us lived together until his parents found the farm they wanted and moved. Our present barn went up when David's parents owned it after the first one was struck by lightening and burned down. David's parents and my parents live very close by and so do most of my brothers and sisters. David is his parents only living child. We hope that when we get older,we can pass it down to our son David.
We have 25 cows right now, but that increases and decreases. Most of our cows we have for milking and we keep most of the calves we have every year. Some of our cows are sold or slaughtered for out meat as well as our selling some of the meat. We also have chickens and pigs. Our farm also has about 800 acres which we use for farming potatoes, corn, squash, etc. I also have a garden that I grow for our home foods and which I sell at the food stand.
My husband and I were both born in New York State. I was born in Romulous New York which is about 20 miles for here. David's parents lived in Gorham where he was born, but he was born in the Canandaigua hospital. Canandaigua is the a small city next to Gorham. My parents moved from Romulous to Gorham while I was still in school.
As I said, I am glad to write this so people will know and understand Old Order Mennonite. It's funny, little children will walk right up to us and ask "why do we dress the way we do". If our buggy is there, they will ask if they can pet our horse. Some have even asked for a ride in our buggy. Some children even think we are dressed for a movie . We explain that this is the way we live. Some adults are very nice, but some are rude. Because of the way we live we are from a different place(planet). People think we don't know how to do business or are out to get them. They feel we don't know what's going on in the world,and we do. Sometimes we wish we didn't.
Our lives are very much like everyone else's. We have good times and the bad times and all the times in between. People also have ideas about us because we don't have electric and we drive a buggy instead of a car. So We are different In that way, I guess we are. We would like people to understand us alittle more. To know even though we dress different, attend a different religion and drive buggies, etc. we are all the same.
Jean
