Sandi's Country Fried News/Kudos to the Apache Marching Band

The great Apache Marching Band got all One's in UIL competition in Giddings last Saturday. Yes they did. We are very proud of them. They will be going to Waco for competition this Saturday. However, we are more than proud of a young man, Sean Allen, who is a member of the Belmont Community and a member of the Monthalia United Methodist Church. I have seen first hand just how much work Sean has put into practicing for this band before school started and after school started. He slept when Will and I or just Will or some of his other friends, or his mother picked him up to cart him back and forth for practice. He learned to eat while he was walking. You have to realize that it is a whole different matter to belong to an extracurricular activity if you live in the country. Sean Allen was one determined young man. There was many a time Kathleen and I discussed whether this band business was ever going to work, but with his determination and everyone helping it has. We covet your prayers and support for the Gonzales Apache Marching Band. We wish you all the luck. Get out there and win. Go all the way-go to state.

I have to make one important correction. You need to contact Jackie Gandre at 830-437-5730 or 830-203-1655 if you would like to tour of the Pumpkin Patch at Monthalia United Methodist Church. I think that Betty Fink has gone into retirement. I will tell you a little secret. Betty Fink is celebrating a birthday on October 19th. Wouldn't it be nice if she got a mail box full of cards, along with an email box full of cards, along with a Facebook full of greetings. Oh Heavens to Betsy, I am wandering all over the place------Will wears himself out at this pumpkin patch. He catches the bean bags instead of letting the kids catch them. The Presbyterians brought their little ones out and Dane Needhams's little boy was in this group. Will does not remember this young man's name but since he used to work with Dane, I hope all is forgiven. I swear that Will got more laughs out of him. Will said he wandered around everywhere but where he was supposed to be. He got one of the little pumpkins and then he held it by the stem and proceeded to beat it against everything solid that was in his pathway. I bet that was one pulverized pumpkin by the time he got home. He asked Dane how he and Leah ever kept up with him at home. Dane said that it kept them busy and alert. I would like to thank the Inquirer for printing such a lovely picture of our pumpkin patch. If you need to send out some fall cards, go out and take some pictures to put on the front. And they did not feed the driver in the Parish Hall. They fed the driver wherever everyone else ate---ta dah! Gotcha!

The Belmont Ladies Club will have their regular meeting on the fourth Tuesday of October. There is much to be discussed. There will definitely be a Thanksgiving Dinner held in the Belmont Community Center in November. We need further discussion as to who is going to bring some essential items. I think the turkey and dressing is about settled but we need a few more committed items. Funds for paying bills for the community center are setting on zero. So I think all the money from the supper will go toward that cause. Oh there was much confusion about these goodie jars but on Wednesday they did get together and made soup jars.

Please get your calendars our and mark the second Saturday, November 13th as the time for the annual fundraiser Thanksgiving supper at the Belmont Community Center. This is a joint effort between the Belmont Church and the Belmont Ladies Club. Everyone attending will need to bring to bring two side dishes (one dessert or vegetable or two vegetables) The price per family is $8.00 or $4.00 per singles. This year the Ladies Club will have a bake sale. Anyone wanting to donate an item for the bake sale can contact a Ladies Club member. The supper has been a great success in the past and we encourage everyone to attend this year. Proceeds from the supper and bake sale will be used for the maintenance of the Community Center.

There will be a fifth Sunday Celebration Song Service on October 31st at the Belmont United Methodist Church. Breakfast is served at 8:15 and then you get to choose the hymn to sing. You get a little extra time to talk about where you have that big buck staked out in the pasture

Also for the 9AM service the children are encouraged to wear their Halloween costumes to church.

Please pray for the following people:

Joe Kotwig, Clay, Betsy Achilles grandson, is over in Afghanistan, Britt Hindmann is in Afghan, and Scott Hindmann is just finished with basic training; Paw Paw Allen and Frances Allen; Theresa Wilke, Anna Lindemann, Glenna, Buster Richter, Kathy, Tony, and Daniel Black; Joyce and Jack Black; Kathy and Danny Collins, Jean Best, Pete Kallies, Frances Buchholtz, We Praise God for the rescue of the copper miners in Chili: Royce Towns, Georgie Gandre, the family of Ray Clemons; we pray for all of our troops everywhere and their families;

We praise God for four months of happiness and wonderful health on this earth. I am talking about Jake Hobbs. He is such photogenic a baby. He passed his four month checkup with flying colors weighing in at 17.2 lbs. and is 25.25 inches long. Congrats Mom and Dad, Shelley and Richard Hobbs, and Big Daddy Joe Kotwig, and someone is going to have to clue me in as to what Jake is calling the Great Grandma Kotwig. Happy Four Months Jake Hobbs!!

Somewhere deep down in my heart of hearts I just can't resist this. I am going to have to send out some advice to Jose Hernandez. They pulled out the words to entitle his column "Getting into college isn't hard-but staying there is". I am going to have to tell you that college is something to concern yourself about, but a job and money to put food on the table comes first. There are so many people out there getting degrees and there are no jobs to match them. Many of them are in the teaching field. If you had that teaching certificate that would almost guarantee you a job, but it doesn't any more. Now you may want to change that to something in the medical field or law enforcement. Accounting-just what are the statistics on that???

The Belmont Volunteer Fire Department would like to thank everyone who helped in making their annual fundraiser a success. They sold over five hundred plates. They raised over $17,000.00 in the auction and donations. It takes a lot of money to keep and maintain the building, and trucks and the costs of fuel etc. When you look at this Belmont VFD, it is a top notch department in training and the best equipment that it can afford. We are all very proud of their new fire truck.

Pete Kallies is around six weeks post op from quadruple bypass surgery. He had had stints put in before but they were not doing the job. So they took arteries from his groin and from somewhere there in his intestinal area and did four bypasses on his heart. He is doing well at home. I know that his family is happy that he is doing okay. Nothing is ever taken for granted these days. Just keep on praying.

My big old Samson gave me a real scare. That big black cat started coughing so loud it sounded like he had the whooping cough. So I looked down his throat and in between his teeth. Then I felt on the outside of his throat. He didn't act sick. He didn't have mucous coming out of his nose or mattering in his eyes. He didn't act sick You could go on and on listing the things that Samson could have put in his mouth and chewed or ate. Samson picks up pieces of paper and pretends it is a rat He will pack off the pop off top to a can of Mighty Dog and make you do a double take when he comes by you with the hand towel from the bath room. Yesterday I caught Samson with something unusual. It was weird looking stuffing from a cushion for some outdoor furniture. We had put it up in the open loft to store it. I don't know whether Samson chewed it open or whether it was already open, but he thought taking that stuffing out of there was just magical. So far at least, we think that is what was doing it. Samson still coughs a little. He got a treat of some chicken thigh meat yesterday with a little grease on it maybe just to make things a little smoother. Samson smacked his lips, twitched his whiskers, swung out his right paw for a taste test, and decided that chicken treat was some mighty fine grub. It took him a couple hours to get each one of those sleek black hair resting back in their proper spot. If I spent as much time as that blasted cat does on my hair, I'd be so worn out that I would just have to stay at home.

Now I don't know what Aunt Georgie Gandre is doing to us. This woman is not allowed to get sick. She runs around to Shirley Goss's on Tuesday night with the Wesleyan Circle. Then she ends up having a stroke and is in Memorial Hospital on Sunday. Then she is demanding Sean Allen o bring her chicken to eat when he and Kathleen come to visit her the next time. She told her son Guy that she was so small in comparison to Sean that she could fit right up underneath his arm. Guy Gandre convinced her to wait at least until Tuesday. Guy is a man of few words. I think we need a few extra prayers for Aunt Georgie. And I don't know what we need for Guy. His brother George is coming in on a flight late Monday night. Maybe George will figure out what, if anything, needs to be done for Guy. By the time I get done with this, Guy will be ready to knock my glasses to China. He doesn't take to humor too well.

I think that we need to give these two people a great big Thank You. I will let them remain mostly anonymous. Every year they make a case of delicious fig preserves and share them with their friends and their Sunday School class. We each need to send them a Thank You card for their love and generosity that they show by doing this. If you like fig preserves, you have not lived until you have eaten some of these.

I cannot believe that Shari Lee is sixty years old. Her family threw her a big birthday party last Saturday night. She had her family and friends. The weather was just right. There was room for every one out on the deck or in the yard and in the house, and down at the tank. Poncho, the twins Chihuahua, mostly gave his approval to everyone and everything. I tell you that Shari does not look a day over thirty. I can see how that was a shock to my husband. We had all kinds of food and drinks. Since I am into real food these days, I liked the stuffed chicken rolls, the sausage, the cheese, and the cold cuts had salami. I can see how the little Missy got a little perturbed because she had to wear a dress and that dress just kept getting in her way. However I can see how Shari could go hog wild buying those twins all kinds of things. We enjoyed our evening and we wish you many more Happy Birthdays. Have a great week, and God Bless.