Pennsylvania

I thought I'd begin my letters from every state today. :) 

Fun Fact: Pennsylvania is the first state of the fifty United States to list their web site URL on a license plate.

More Stuff That's Good To Know: 

Pennsylvania was the 2^nd state in the USA; it became a state on December 12, 1787. 

State Abbreviation - PA

State Capital - Harrisburg
Largest City - Philadelphia
Area - 46,058 square miles [Pennsylvania is the 33rd biggest state in the USA]
Population - 12,281,054 (as of 2000) [Pennsylvania is the sixth most populous state in the USA, after California, New York, Texas, Florida and Illinois]

Anyway, my high school pen pal went to Creation Fest in 2005 & sent me this postcard:

I just went to the website & found out that one of this year's Creation Fests started this week & the other will be in the coming month.

Share Your Love of Writing

A journal entry from my sister:

I love looking back at old journal entries! This one is particularly appropriate for this blog, I think, because it is an example of how other people have encouraged me to write. I'd like to thank my sister for, on numerous occasions, reminding me to write in my journal and for always replying to my letters, my mom for telling me to "write it down" when I shared with her a cute story about one of my five children, and my grandma for starting my letter-writing obsession early. To those reading this blog, I encourage you to share your love of writing with others and inspire a young person in your life to write by sending them letters and always replying to theirs!

-Kristi Kritter

Germany

Mrs. Barbara has once again provided me with a delightful surprise to support one of my dreams for the blog...to have a letter from every country. :) I never would've expected a letter from Germany to be the first one I got, & I definitely wouldn't have expected to have one written in this beautiful German! Fun Fact: You would have to try one kind of German bread per day for almost a whole year in order to be able to taste them all! There are over 300 different kinds of bread in Germany.

I couldn't tell you what the letter says.  At the time I got it, I had a german neighbor who translated it for me.

A little background: 

In 1965, Frank was stationed in Germany.  I went there to be with him.  He had to have living quarters for us before we could go there and there were none available in the government housing area, so he rented an upstairs apt from a lady in Kandel, Germany.  Her name was Luise Metz.  We called her Frau Metz.  We already had two boys one 4 and one 2 and I was seven months pregnant with our 3rd child when I went to Germany.  Our daughter was born a month after I got there.  She had a lot of problems at birth and when she was about 2 days old they dismissed me from the hospital, but she had to stay there for a couple of more weeks.  I went back to our apt in Kandel with the boys.  I was in quite a lot of pain (breast pain due to milk) and Frau Metz saw the pain and discomfort I was in.  I tried to communicate to her that I wanted a breast pump to releieve some of the pressure, but instead she brought a German Midwife in to minister to me. I had no idea of what they were saying or what she was going to do; but it worked.  We moved from her place before our daughter was dismissed from the hospital, but when she was six months old, we went back to visit Frau Metz.  She was so glad to see us and to see the baby.  She had bought a cute little German outfit for her.  Over the years,I kept in touch with her and sent her letters and Christmas cards until one year we got a letter from one of her friends saying that she had passed away. 

-Barbara

1868

So far, this is the oldest letter I have. It's written in an old volume of Shakespeare that a professor at my college owns.