My City in 10 Photos (not likely): Part 3

It is 3:30 am. I am awake and spending my time looking at some of the articles written by a few people I know when I came across this image in an article written by @ozenozge, "Let's tour the Ortamahalle together". Aside from my appreciation for a walking tour of the highlights this neighborhood, and my appreciation of these young ladies (@ozenozge and her cousin @busraca), I noticed something. They are sitting in wagons that won't roll. Shaking my head a little (it is 3:30 am and I only went to sleep at 1:00 am) I realized that they are sitting in an interesting design of outdoor furniture. This reminded me that perhaps I should write my next installment of "My City in 10 Photos (not likely)." This time I thought about showing where I buy outdoor furniture.

Country Charm Mennonite Furniture

During COVID, I wanted to provide my parents with a gift. It was impossible for them to meet with friends as they would normally do, so I thought I would create an outdoor space that would allow them to gather yet still maintain a distance from each other. I spent a day visiting different stores to see what was available. Most of the stores had plastic chairs that sold for about $40-50. One store had wooden furniture from the US that was priced at $3,000 each. My last stop was only a few miles south of our place - Country Charm Mennonite Furniture.

Website

To save looking it up in the dictionary, the word "Mennonite" refers to a group of people whose religious practices set them apart from other people.

Sometimes mistaken for Amish, Mennonites are a group of Christians that formed during the Protestant Reformation. The Mennonite denomination is named after Menno Simons.
Simons (1492-1561) became a Catholic priest at about 24, but had doubts about some Catholic teachings. He started to “rely on Scripture alone for answers,” and eventually left the Catholic Church to become an Anabaptist, or “rebaptizer.”

He said he did not believe infant baptism was in the bible and studied the works of theologians Martin Luther and Heinrich Bullinger. After his brother, an Anabaptist, was killed in 1535, Simons left the Catholic Church. He became an influential man among Anabaptists in the Netherlands and northwestern Germany. Considered a heretic, Simons was constantly persecuted and those who helped him were often executed. However, by 1544, the term “Mennonite” was used to describe Dutch Anabaptists. Mennonites became a new movement known for adult baptisms.In 1693, Swiss Anabaptist leader Jacob Ammann did not believe that banning and shunning was being practiced well enough. He felt the current church was not strict enough and he separated to create the Amish.
10 Things Everyone Should Know about Mennonites and Their Beliefs

The most important thing to know about Mennonites is encapsulated in the following:

Mennonites say violence is “not the will of God” and violence includes war, hostility among races and classes, child abuse, abuse of women, any violence between man and woman, abortion and capital punishment.

Clearly it is a sentiment shared by most people, so they are really set apart from the rest of a community because of the house of worship they enter.

The first piece I bought was an angled settee for my parents to sit in together. In the background, you can see another piece that I bought, a picnic table.

I also bought six additional Muskoka Chairs with side tables to sit between them.

The end result was that the furniture was laid out in a circular pattern where the couples could sit a distance from each other outside and still picnic together.

There is one extra piece that I might consider buying - a rocker.

It appeals to me.