There are those people who believe you have to give up your dreams to make a living. Kathi Fillmore is definitely not one of those people! Following her dreams of a life working with horses has worked out just fine!

You’ll find Kathi, these days, at her new farm, Cinnamon Ridge, right here in Amissville. It’s the latest home for the business of horses, her passion. Kathi was in love with horses from the time she was three years old and got her first cowgirl outfit. Back in those days a horse of her own was out of the question. As part of a military family she moved around the country and a horse was not part of the allowed household items! But when she was about 11 the family settled in Virginia and it didn’t take long before she had her first horse, a blind pony that was given to her.

Kathi soon learned to ride and stayed involved with horses all through high school. But her practical family and friends advised her that she couldn’t possibly make a living in the horse business and that she needed a more sensible major. So she got a degree in business management and accounting. Three years in the business world and she knew that for her at least, it was no way to live.

She bought her first farm when she was 24 years old. And horses have been an essential part of both her business and personal life ever since. She’s downsized a couple of times as she fought her way through health concerns including a benign tumor on her spine as well as a bout with Lyme Disease. At one time she had 100 acres and 100 horses. Her 12 acres here on South Poes Road and her 7 horses now seem just right!

Cinnamon Ridge is home to a series of VHSA and BHSA horse shows. And, while the shows are fun, Kathi’s real love is teaching. She gives lessons in hunters and hunter equitation. “I make it fun!” she says as she tells me about the games mixed in with the classes. And she must be doing something right as many of her students have gone on to become horse professionals themselves.

But teaching and the horse shows is only part of what Kathi’s doing these days. She boards horses, although only a few at a time. She breeds Welsh ponies. She still judges horse shows. Believe it or not, from Kathi’s perspective this is semi-retirement! Clearly none of those earlier health challenges was going to keep her down for long!

Kathi took some time to show me around Cinnamon Ridge including the show ring, the 4 stall horse barn that includes a wash stall and an office. And, of course, no visit to the farm would be complete without the chance to meet some of the four legged residents. Joey is her 4 year old Welsh Pony stallion. And she expects the first foals from him next year to be something very special. Katie is her personal horse and a real sweetheart! Actually, I enjoyed meeting everyone on the farm down to the smallest residents, the cat and dog!

Kathi is a confessed workaholic who says she’s mended her ways. Having seen everything going on at Cinnamon Ridge, I’m not so sure about that. But I do know it’s going to be a lot of fun having her in the neighborhood!

Tis the season for family and friends to come visiting! While there’s none of that to report at our house, there seems to be plenty of company coming elsewhere in the neighborhood!

Don and Valerie Jones of Amissville welcomed their daughter Camilla Anne Jones Corn and her husband, John Wing Corn from San Diego. Camilla and John are newlyweds and were back to celebrate an early Christmas on the 21^st here in Amissville. They were joined by the Jones’ daughter, Courtney, who currently lives in Midland and her husband Patrick and their children. They all enjoyed a sumptuous buffet and 8 kinds of cookies baked by Valerie. Camilla and John then headed by car down to Murfreesboro, TN to celebrate Christmas again with more family there.

Roy & Myrtle Jenkins were glad to have their son Jeff, his wife, Pat and their two boys home for Christmas. Jeff and his family live in Ohio and make it back here for most major holidays. The Jenkins two other children, Bev and Terry, and their families live nearby and were also on hand to celebrate the holidays. Myrtle even baked her special chocolate cake for the occasion! Rumor has it she may be saving me a piece!

With Christmas already behind us, most of us are already thinking ahead to 2007 and what the next year will bring. I’d love to predict here that it will bring peace on earth, but I don’t see much evidence to support that. So, I thought I’d focus on what the New Year will bring closer to home. I’ve been asking people what changes 2007 will bring in their lives.

Mike Suess initially told me his life was “awfully good just the way it is.” But upon further reflection he decided 2007 will be the year that he’s able to get two cars in his garage. I’m guessing Mike’s not the only one with that on his agenda this year!

Hazel Zinn-Day was excited to tell me that 2007 will make her a great aunt twice! Hazel is the niece of Dorothy Hackley and the cousin of Brad Nicholas who runs Hackley’s store. It’s nice to see their family continue to grow. Maybe one of these babies will be the next generation of those keeping Hackley’s alive and thriving here in Amissville!

Kit Johnston from Madison went out of her way to tell me that 2007 will bring more time for her and her border collie at Mountain View Training Center in Amissville. She raved about the work that Averil and Ken Ring do there. I hope to feature more on this local business in a future column so stay tuned!

There were a few people who were happy to tell me about plans for 2007 anonymously! Here are some of their contributions:

“I’ll be joining the new Weight Watchers group in Rappahannock County.”

“Christmas in 2007 will definitely be less crazy at our house! Enough already!”

“I’m going to get more involved in my community.”

“My kids will do their homework immediately after school if I have to tie them to their chairs!”

As for us here, our 2007 will hopefully bring no snakebites, a great garden, more time for family and friends and a continuing column about Amissville! Happy New Year!

I’m not a person who dislikes change. In fact, I seem genetically predisposed to shaking up my life in some fashion about every five years. (Watch out this year everybody!)

But I’ll admit that, like most people, I’m always more comfortable with change I choose than with change forced upon me from the outside. And lately it seems like there is a lot of that going on.

Sometimes it’s the little things. I don’t how it looks from the front porch of your house, but at ours there is a definite shortage of hummingbirds! It seems that every year like clockwork they show up, looking for food. And we had our first couple, right on schedule. But within about a month, we have dozens of the tiny beauties sucking up that nectar about as fast as we can make it! This year we’ve got our two, but no more. Is this true around Amissville? Is this the case around Rappahannock County? If so, what could be causing this? And, most importantly, how do we fix this? I like it just fine the way it worked in the past!

Sometimes it’s more personal. It seems every so often I am inundated with news of friends divorcing. And it once again seems to be that season. I’m not self-centered enough to think any of this is really about me. Change is being thrust upon the family involved, not me. But the truth is there is a ripple of change that goes out from a family that’s breaking apart. It affects many of the people who love them. And there’s a great sadness for a lot of us as we watch and try as best we can to help them through this change.

And then there’s the change in our communities. If you look at surrounding counties you can’t really say that Rappahannock County is experiencing unprecedented growth! And thank goodness for that! And, yet, in my little corner of Amissville it feels like new houses are going up right and left. I’m not saying that they won’t be perfectly nice houses. I’m not saying that the people who eventually move into them won’t be wonderful neighbors. But the truth is that change is being forced upon me again and I’m not pleased about that!

Of course, the biggest change of all, for many of us is the prospect of Dominion’s expanded power lines. As I drive through this gorgeous countryside I begin to imagine what it will look like if Dominion wins this fight. And I’m saddened by what seems like more awful change being forced on a lot of people in these parts.

But there’s plenty of good change around as well! There are new babies, new marriages, new jobs and new homes. There are new neighbors in our communities. And nature is constantly forcing change on all of us. But I never seem to mind when spring gives way to summer. While the storms this year have taken down some old pine trees, I see new seedlings everywhere I look. Some of them will eventually be huge trees. I think this week I’ll look to nature for some lessons on gratefully accepting the changes around me!

I still like the serenity prayer that Al-Anon uses. God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. Here’s to a wise week for all of us!

I love watching the faces of the three-year-olds at the carnival. They’re on the slowest ride in the place and you’d think it was the most thrilling thing on earth. They grin from ear to ear! I saw plenty of them this week at the Amissville Fireman’s Carnival. Watching them was entertainment in and of itself!

I still grin like an idiot riding on the Octopus. I’ve loved carnival rides all my life! The more spinning the better! You’d think a grown person would have gotten beyond that. Not me.

Part of that three-year-old grin is the still innate belief that you’re indestructible. Typically that lasts through your teenage years and maybe into your 20s. For me, it lasted a lot longer. I think I still only half believe that the “no one gets out of this alive” quote includes me. Blame it on my parents. Heaven knows they knew plenty of economic fear. But there never seemed to be a fear of trying new things, of embarking on adventures or throwing yourself wholeheartedly into any endeavor. I hope the same is true for the next generation!

So carnival rides were always a thrill. But there came a day when something changed. And while part of it may have been a realization of my own mortality; a bigger part was a realization that I was riding on a machine and they break all the time! It was probably after I bought my first, very old, car, and was responsible for maintaining something mechanical. Now that I’ve also owned houses and, heaven help me, lawnmowers, it’s a wonder I’m not terrified of all mechanical things!

This was really brought home to me about ten years ago when I was on that ride that’s basically a roller coaster in the form of a loop. And at some point they leave you at the top of the loop, suspended upside down. They leave you up there for a really, really long time! This is when you start to notice the rust on the bolts and the creaking of aging machinery. And have I mentioned that the seat belt in my car holds me in more firmly than that single bar across my middle?  Why is it that you need two straps across your body, horizontally and diagonally, in a car that’s meant to stay right side up on the ground, but suspended hundreds of feet above the ground, upside down I only needed that dinky little bar?! And where’s my airbag? Suddenly I was sure I was going to die an untimely and terrifying death!

Obviously, I made it down off that ride. And it didn’t cure me of rides, although it did cure me of that particular ride! And as I get a little older and I realize I am here on earth for a finite amount of time, carnival rides once again seem like a good thing. After all, I might as well have fun in the time I’ve got!

If you missed all the fun at this week’s fireman’s carnival, there are more coming up, around Rappahannock county and the larger area. You can live dangerously by eating the cotton candy and rotting your teeth out. You can lose your retirement money at the carnival games. Or you can get on that upside down roller coaster thing! If you’re looking for me I’ll be the grinning idiot on the Octopus!

Where do you go for a good time in Amissville on Monday night? You go to the Amissville Volunteer Fire Department, of course, to play some bingo!

The regular Monday night bingo games have been on our “to do” list here for almost as long as we’ve lived here. We finally took the plunge this past Monday night. We definitely waited too long!

Bingo has been going on at the fire department here for about 25 years. Amissville’s fire department was among the first to try this as a fund raiser. It’s spread far and wide now and some localities have enormous crowds, although it’s hard to imagine a friendlier crowd than the one here!

On an average night there are probably around 3 dozen players. This Monday proved to be pretty average. Prizes range from a few dollars to potentially as much as $1,000.

Bingo starts promptly at 6:45 and it definitely pays to be on time. We arrived almost exactly at 6:45. But we didn’t know we needed to allow time to buy the bingo cards and, of course, get instructions.

Now, I know you’re all thinking that we must be idiots! How much do you need to know to play bingo? Well, you’d be surprised! They had about 28 games Monday night and there was quite a variety. I had no idea there were that many ways to play bingo. And after seeing this I’m guessing we didn’t even scratch the surface!

The evening included games such as “Crazy Ts” and “2 Postage Stamps” that I’d certainly never heard of. I thought of bingo as being about getting a row across, down or diagonally. Apparently I’m way behind the times when it comes to bingo innovation!

Fortunately, we were directed to sit next to a very helpful group. These six women live in Wildwood Forest in Amissville and have been playing bingo together on Monday nights for two years. They were very generous with their time and expertise and were happy to share their secrets to managing all those cards efficiently.

It was not only our ignorance of the variety of games that gave away our inexperience. Clearly there are some bingo pros here. They bring special stands to hold their myriad cards. They bring big bags of bingo supplies. And, fortunately for us, they bring food to share! The Fire Department sells hot dogs and other assorted items. But there’s also plenty of friendly sharing going on and we were offered chocolates and mints. And on other tables I saw cake and cookies and other treats being shared.

We found six cards at a time enough to manage. But some of the bingo regulars are watching anywhere from 18 to 24 cards. I think I’d need some additional practice to pull that off!

By the end of the evening we were starting to feel comfortable with all the varieties of games, happy about the new friends we’d made and even happier about our bingo winnings!

If you haven’t checked out the bingo games for yourself, set aside a Monday night and bring some friends! Or better yet, plan to meet your neighbors and make some new friends!

GET YOUR UMBRELLAS BEFORE SPRING SHOWERS COME

The Rappahannock County Sophomore Class, class of 2009, are selling Panther Golf Umbrellas.The wet weather will soon be upon the folks of Rappahannock and now is the season to purchase one or two (perhaps a gift for a friend in need). These durable, large, blue and gold golf umbrellas are currently on sale for $20 each at several locations that include Rappahannock Elementary School (987-8259), Rappahannock High School (987-8575) or Farmers' Co-op. Please assist the Class of 2009 by purchasing a sturdy umbrella. Stop by or call one of the mentioned locations.

GRAY GHOST WINS ANOTHER AWARD           

Adieu, a dessert wine from Gray Ghost Vineyards here in Amissville, has won another award. It was the only Virginia wine to win Gold in California’s prestigious Grand Harvest Awards held at the end of February. Adieu had also won a bronze at the Florida State Fair international Wine Competition. If you’d like to taste this fine wine for yourself, stop by Gray Ghost during the month of March for free samplings. They’re located at 14706 Lee Highway, Amissville and can be reached at 937-4869.

At my house we’re ignoring the weather and pretending it’s spring! “Faith is evidence of things hoped for…” and we are definitely, eternally hopeful!

So, in one act of faith this week I put up the first hummingbird feeder. I haven’t seen any of them yet, but a web site that tracks sightings of the birds says they are in our neck of the woods already. In looking for information on when to expect them I also learned that the nectar we give them isn’t their main source of food. They’re actually carnivores and just use the nectar as fuel to help them catch and eat flies. Now that I know they eat flies they’re doubly welcome here! I wonder if it’s possible to get them to expand their diet to include mosquitoes? These little things fly about 20 miles a day on their way back up here. And the small amount of research that’s been done so far leads them to believe that the same birds return to the same place to eat every year. That may explain why my neighbor who’s lived here 30 years always has more birds than I do!

Like most of you we’re outside more with the longer days and so we’re noticing more of the natural world around us. The wild onion crop seemed larger than usual this year and I got curious about this plant. When we first moved here my mother gave dire warnings about what would happen if we even thought of eating the wild onions. And, so we haven’t. But I like to use what’s around me and fresh for cooking and it’s always bothered me that there seemed to be this possible food source there that I wasn’t making use of. So I finally started doing some research. It turns out that these aren’t wild onions, but wild garlic. They look much the same, but the stems on the garlic are hollow and the onions are solid. That definitely makes ours garlic. And, both plants are edible. Although most references I looked at did warn that the taste is definitely more intense and perhaps less pleasant than our domesticated variety. But I’m definitely going to try some for flavoring in some of my cooking this week.

And as long as we’re talking onions, I learned from the extension service this year why I never got the results from my garden onions I was hoping for. Apparently Virginia is not a great place to grow onions. There are onions designed for a very short growing season like the one I grew up with in Minnesota. There are onions designed for very long growing seasons. Think of Vidalia Onions from Georgia. But apparently there are almost no onions designed for a middle of the road kind of growing season like the one we have here in Virginia. While we get great spring onions from our garden, I could never seem to grow big keeper onions for the winter. It is nice to know it’s not my lack of gardening expertise!

The wild strawberries here also intrigue me. I don’t remember ever seeing them at home in Minnesota. But that may be because we grew so many of the domesticated variety I never noticed them. They are also edible and are supposed to have a stronger flavor than the humongous ones you see in the grocery store. Of course, they’re so tiny they’d need to have a pretty intense flavor. And did you know that during the American Revolution, the Minutemen were saved from scurvy by drinking tea made from the green leaves of the wild strawberry? And Indians ate wild strawberries to help them get over colds. Seems like a handy plant to have around!

And last but not least are the beautiful wild violets that grow in profusion in our ditches out front. Every resource I looked at referred to these as a noxious weed. That seems very harsh to me considering how pretty they are! But I will have to admit they seem to be spreading. Since I did find a note that the leaves can be boiled to make a tea and that the leaves can be used in salads maybe I can turn them into a useful crop! By the way, did you know that the leaves and flowers of the wild violet have three times the vitamin C of an orange.

What are you waiting for? Get out there and start foraging?

Nancy Delaney doesn’t live in our world of automatic this and instant that. She lives in a place where electricity isn’t needed. It’s a world where craftsmanship is one person with great skill and training working meticulously on one item at a time. And I was fortunate enough to visit Nancy’s world this week!

Nancy is the force behind Delaney Restorations, LLC located right here in Amissville. And you’d never guess that inside this modern home was an operation that is much like one you would have seen a couple of hundred years ago.

Delaney Restorations does hand bookbinding and restorations. She restores books such as generations-old family bibles. But she’ll also hand bind new materials. Say you’ve stumbled upon letters your great grandparents wrote each other over a 20 year period. Bring them to Nancy and have them bound in something special that treats them like the heirloom they are.

The work Nancy does is not easily learned. While Nancy knew she wanted to do this when she was still in high school, she found it impossible to find a school that taught these techniques. So, she went to college and tried to take the courses that she thought would be most useful. She majored in art history and had enough course work in English literature to get a minor. She’s since added general and organic chemistry courses. After college, still unable to find a school to train her in these techniques, she elected to apprentice with a woman in Winchester who was the sole practitioner of this craft in the commonwealth of Virginia.  She spent five years as an apprentice and another five years there gaining additional experience before she decided she was ready to go out on her own.

Nancy was gracious enough to show me around her workshop and explain the process to me. It was fascinating to see that most of the tools she uses are from another century! I loved looking at the loom used for hand sewing the pages together. And the backer used to make the rounded spine on the books is an amazing tool that looks every bit of it’s 200 years!

Some of the people who find their way to Nancy with their books don’t fully understand that this is a very manual process. “They ask if they can pick up the book the next day,” she says laughing! “They think there’s a machine and I put the book in one end and the finished product comes out the other end!” But we’re talking hand-sewn pages, hand-glued leather and cloth and even a hand-operated titler. This is a tool that imprints the title on the cover of the book. It’s done with old fashioned type and is imprinted in the book one letter at a time! It really is amazing that anyone devotes this kind of time and attention to anything these days!

The finished product is a work of art to be cherished and each one is unique. I was lucky enough to get to see a family Bible from a local Amissville client. She showed me the before picture and it’s truly amazing that it’s been put back together! She also has a photo album showing the process of restoring a family Bible that had been almost destroyed in Hurricane Katrina. The before process definitely looks like something unsalvageable! But Nancy was able to bring it back and the final pictures are of a family treasure restored.

Nancy’s business comes from book dealers, antique dealers, her web site and word of mouth. Right now she does about 10 books per month, but could handle slightly higher volumes. I think once word gets out about what she does she’ll have more work than she can handle! This is a dying craft with only two people in all of Virginia who do this work.

If you’d like to find more about Nancy and her work you can go to her web site at http://www.delaneyrestorations.com or give her a call at 937-2980. I off to have a look at my family’s stash of old books!

You meet the most interesting people in Amissville! I had the pleasure last week of sitting down with Ruth Zeh over a cup of coffee. Ruth has lived here in Amissville for four years. She’s a lifelong resident of the area and she and her husband were thrilled when they had the opportunity to move to Rappahannock county.

But the most interesting part of my conversation with Ruth was about her job. Ruth works for Air Serv International at their world headquarters in Warrenton. For those of you who aren’t familiar with the company, they are a nonprofit organization providing air services for humanitarian work around the world. They say that they fly where others can’t or won’t. They operate in places like Chad and Afghanistan. They were a big part of tsunami relief; where they ended up using mostly helicopters.

Ruth is the Information Technology Administrator at the company, making sure the communications infrastructure allows them to communicate with these far flung locations. She didn’t start out in the technology field. She started by answering an ad in the paper for a receptionist. But over the years her responsibilities have grown. And, it turned out, she had a knack for working with computers. So now she’s taking care of computer networks and e-mail. There are unique problems in this area because of the places Air Serv goes. She’s had company personnel calling back to the office from the top of a tree in Chad because it was the only place they could get a signal. Keeping e-mail flowing back and forth between Warrenton and the locations in the Middle East and Africa where they work most frequently is a huge challenge.

With exciting opportunities like that it’s not wonder that Ruth says she loves her job. “What’s best about it is that it’s exciting, interesting and humanitarian”, she said. She’s happiest when she’s been able to help someone out in the field to do their job by helping them through computer problems.

The company got started out in California and moved to Warrenton about eight years ago. Since much of their work is coordinated with NGOs and government agencies, being close to Washington, DC made a lot of sense. The story goes that when they were trying to decide exactly where to put the headquarters they flew into Dulles, started driving around the area and fell in love with the Warrenton area.

The company is a non-profit and like all non-profits, obtaining funding can be a challenge. Fed Ex is a big supporter but they’re just one organization. Air Serv depends on both organizations and individuals for their support. According to their web site http://www.airserv.org donations can be made to the General Fund, the Disaster Response Fund for specific emergencies, the Equipment Fund which allows them to buy, replace and repair equipment or the New Initiatives Fund.

Ruth is working to improve her skills and better help the organization. She’s hard at work on her Microsoft certification. I asked her if she ever had any desire to go out in the field. She laughed and said there are days she’d love to have that experience and others she’s happy to be safe and secure in Rappahannock! We’re glad she’s here too!

If romance is on your mind as we get closer to Valentine’s Day, think about heading over to Gray Ghost Vineyards for their Annual Irresistible Chocolates and Cabernet event on February 16^th and 17^th. There will be decadent desserts such as passion truffles and chocolate dipped apricots and, of course, tastings from Gray Ghost’s own gold-medal winning red wines. Tickets are $15 and include a collectible Valentines glass.

And we wanted to mention that Elizabeth Streagle is home following surgical replacement of both knees.  She appreciated and enjoyed the many visits from friends and neighbors while she was hospitalized and in rehab. Welcome home, Elizabeth!