The Amish Envy Club

A friend of mine has come up with the best idea for a club that I've heard in a decade. I'm not much of a joiner, but I do enjoy my book club, and my husband's recently launched (ha) a model rocket club that is much more fun than it sounds. But the Amish Envy Club is tops.

Here's how it works: You gather together 3-4 families of fun people. Each family gets to utilize all club members for one day of the year. We all work on a home-improvement project for each family- plus watch the kids, and contribute to not one, but two feasts (dinner and supper). As in any good club, there are rules. The Amish hosts for the day need to have the project ready to go by 9 am- all trips to Menards completed, tools assembled, work space cleared for takeoff. Any subsequent trip to Menards will cost the host points in the 'Ammy' competition, and probably put them out of the running for the coveted year-end award. I don't know if it's true, but I hear this year's Ammy award is going to be a goat. To be passed on to next year's lucky winner...

Ammy points are awarded for anything you do during a project that will make you seem more Amish. I think we should get something for just having a son named Eli, but no dice, in this club we only go by middle names. New names are essential to any club worth its salt, really. But we plan to get ahead in the point system by introducing kid projects like carding wool, or perhaps biking to the next project with big orange triangles on our backs. The possibilities are endless.

We got the Amish club off to a start by having a potluck planning meeting. Not much planning got done, but the children got used to each other (ok, we definitely lost points by allowing our vast weapons arsenal to be opened- resulting in a few injuries of a minor sort. BUT LET IT BE NOTED THAT THE WEAPONS ARE ALL HAND-MADE WOODEN NUMBERS!!!! That should bring our point total right back to about even. Right?) and the adults had numerous laughs. At one point it got so raucous that I was forced to use my inhaler. Laughing has not caused an asthma attack since back in my camp counselor days. That's a crying shame, to be sure.

Our first project was this past Saturday. We all gathered at the Spencer’s in the Hamline-Midway neighborhood. The project was to move plumbing and begin the process of adding a basement bathroom. It involved a jack-hammer- we do go in for power tools. Predictably, the guys in the group gravitated to the basement for the first shift. Not because they thought they were better suited for the work, but because they were slyly trying to avoid the work shift when the sewer pipe was severed and noseplugs might become necessary. Nice try guys. Anyway- work got done, laughs were had, friends were made, and we ate and drank very well. Jon and I came home tired, but excited to make a plan to put 6 other adults to work for us some day soon.

I hope you all aren’t thinking that we are being disrespectful to another’s culture. Truly, everyone in the group is very thankful and appreciative of the Amish barn raising tradition. I admit that the Ammy’s might be going a bit too far, but we are doing it out of jealousy- not spite. An Amish Envy Club can not get too big for it’s britches- 8 adult workers is about as much as any project in our small, citified houses can stand. And four weekends a year is a great starting point. It took us a full month just to land on a date that would work for all four families for this first project. We have three more Saturdays to try to pin down. But if you are eager to start your own branch of an AEC, please contact me and I can send you the by-laws and other chapter start-up information!