Slip Sliding Away

I love snow.  Blizzards? Bring 'em on. I love to watch it fall, I love to see piles of it everywhere.  I have been known to throw a snow ball, build a fort or snowman, sled down a hill or go for a walk in the silence that snow brings.  However, I have to admit, I'm really a snow bunny.  I prefer the lodge or in my case the living room couch where I can cocoon in a blanket and sip hot cocoa.

One thing I don't like to do in the snow? Drive!  I'm native to Seattle.  The PNW city gets some snow but not a whole bunch.  I never really had to drive in it.  By the time I was driving my dad was retired and able to give me a ride if the roads looked bad.  Then he passed the honor on to my husband.  When we moved to Idaho we only had one car so I never drove in the snow there.  When we moved to Texas... ha.... it snowed once and was gone in a few hours.  But here in Michigan... it snows and this year it started early.  I have teens who have to go to the dentist and the doctor and church play practice and guitar lessons and any number of social events.  And since Dad is usually either at work or in bed for these lovely errands guess who gets to drive them.  Me!  It is so not good.

Tuesday I had to drop off and pick up my eldest at a babysitting gig.  Of course this family has a long, steep, curving driveway up to the house. (With tons of trees lining the drive.)  I generally choose to stop at the bottom and let my daughter walk up to the house and down also.  But Tuesday, oh Tuesday, I forgot my phone at home whilst going to pick her up.  I didn't want to walk up to get her so I drove to the top.  I am an adult after all. This backing down a long, curvy, steep, tree-lined drive shouldn't be a problem.  Never mind that it is covered in snow.

Half way down the drive and "thunk".  In avoiding a tree, I failed to see the utility pole and backed right into it.  No big deal.  I was going slow. No damage.  I just put the vehicle in 4 wheel drive and drove forward. Of course what I couldn't see because of snow was the slope away from the driveway towards the tree I had missed.  The car moved forward and promptly slid down the slope and met the tree most intimately.  Okay, I'll just back up and be on my way.  NOOOOO... I end up digging the wheels down, down, down.  Now I am stuck and parallel parked between the tree and the pole. (Apparently the only time I can successfully parallel park is when I'm not trying to.)

Long story short, it took the grandfather of the kids my daughter was sitting, and my husband about an hour to dig and pull the car out.  Sigh... why do these things always happen to me.  Now I have a nice little dent in the front passenger fender and a busted tail light. Perhaps a move to Key West might not be a bad idea.

Now for the praises!  No one was hurt, the damage is small, both my husband and the grandfather were available to help, it was still light out and there was a break in the weather, they got the car out.  Big picture time. Big picture. Thank you Heavenly Father.

Lessons learned: Remember the phone so I can text my arrival to my daughter and not have to drive up to the house and if the phone is forgotten, don't be lazy. Park the beast and walk up to the house!

Read and Write Friday: I just might be a Heirloom Girl!

I got the best early Christmas present today.  I got a response from Mrs. Emilee Gettle who runs Heirloomgirl.com. She is interested in having me guest blog!  I am super excited!  I really love her site and the other projects she and her husband Jere have their hands in.

The Gettles are the owners of Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds and have authored a cookbook and gardening book as well as publishing Heirloom Gardener magazine.  I gave my husband a collection of their seeds for Christmas last year and it was such fun to watch the bounty roll in this summer.

I hope this will be the first step in obtaining bylines/clips/credit that will give me some ummph to back up queries to other magazines.  But, more than anything, I'm just excited to be a part of this family based, agrarian minded business.

If you haven't ever gotten a copy of their seed catalog you are missing out. Flipping through it and planning my spring garden is one of my favorite winter activities!

Off To The Theatre!

Yesterday was City Girl's first Theatre Lesson at the Grand Rapids Civic Theatre And School Of Theatre Arts.

She has recently become interested in acting and wanted to try it on for size.  We covered the cost of a Christian homeschool summer day camp for the arts for her and she loved it.  She decided that she wanted to try out for the winter play this group puts on.

It costs $175 to participate in the production and Farmer John and I had to tell her we couldn't afford that.  But because she was passionate about it we found a fundraising site and she gathered a portion of the money from donations of family, friends and blog readers and then Farmer John found her a summer child care position for a couple of weeks. Between the two she was able to cover the cost.

Audition day for Peter Pan came and went.  Finally the cast list was posted and ache of all motherly aches, she didn't make the cut.  She didn't get a part, not even a small one. To keep total devastation at bay I quickly got online to find out if there was some other drama program she could take part in.

I found out that the local Grand Rapids Theater did indeed have classes available for her age group and the cost was $135- money she had from above.

So for 10 weeks she will learn the basics of acting.  I wish it was under the shelter of the homeschool group instead of the Civic Theater but it is only a couple of hours a week for ten-weeks.  I will be praying for discernment for her.  Worldly theater can be, well, wordly.

I'm a firm believer that modern "culture" is the way it is because we Christians have abandoned it.  We should be leaders of culture and that is the reason I am letting my daughter foray into this field of interest.  Should she feel led by God to continue on then we will discuss ways for her to study to the fullest glory of her Savior, The Lord Jesus Christ.

Thank goodness the Lord knows the plans he has for us! 

Homesteading Means Staying At Home

Just a couple of nights ago I was sighing and feeling extremely stressed out and unhappy because all I seem to be doing lately is running around.  An errand here, the library there, this child here, that child there... Frustrating! I just want to be at home doing the things that need to be done.

Well, today the Lord gave me a nudge to remind me that He is in control.  The brakes on my car are failing and Farmer John deemed the car unsafe to drive.  BOOM!  Just like that I don't have to run around anymore.  I get to stay home.  Now, it actually is kinda inconvenient (Had to put my son's guitar lessons on hold and when do I grocery shop?) but really it is a blessing in disguise.

My husband's work schedule is such that he will be home so that I can have the car for Wed. evening church services, and city girl's theater lessons  (for 10 weeks) and he will be off most Sunday's as well. Those are the important things. Everything else will work itself out.

We currently don't have the funds to get the car fixed so we are going to be living life as a one car family for a while but I really don't mind. The Lord never works in ways that I expect but he knows what is best for me.  The Homestead is where my heart is!  Thank you, Lord Jesus!

Sickness Is Finally Retreating!

I don't know about you but this was a hard week for me.  Not much got accomplished.  My brain felt like it was wrapped in a wool sweater for most of the time.  This week's word was BEFUDDLED.

I spent most of my time resting and reading.  I blew threw many a tissue and also Veronica Roth's Insurgent.  Great read and I can't wait for the third installment in the Divergent series to come out. (Due out Oct. 22nd of this year.)

Today my brain is finally full speed, my house is clean and jars for canning apples and tomatoes are washing. A time of rest is always welcome but I'm ready to get back moving! 

I drank half of Lake Michigan while I was down and consumed a lot of citrus in the form of orange juice and lemon water.  Herbal Teas w/ honey also are a favorite of mine when sick along with one comfort food that probably has no health benefit but it is tasty... Red Robin Clam Chowder.  When I'm sick I'm their best customer.  (I'm fairly certain it tastes so good because it is thoroughly laden with msg but when I'm sick there is nothing that I want more.)

What do you all do when you are sick?

The Cow Monolith across the street...

You can't really tell from these pictures but the dairy farmer across the street is building a gargantuan barn.  It will house 300+ head of cattle.  I'm getting a little intimidated by the shear size of this thing.  I really hope they keep on top of the manure situation because I can only imagine how much poo will accumulate in this monolith.  We were relieved at first that it wasn't a manure lagoon but how different will this be?  I wonder if they will leave it silver or neutral like most of their other structures or if they'll paint it red?  If they do paint it red I have already decided to call it, "Clifford, The Big Red Barn". Why can't it be Joel Salatin who lives across the street?  Then I wouldn't have a worry in the world.

 

 

 

On a happier note... while traversing the yard to take these photos I found my barred rocks digging in the shredded leaf mulch on the fence line.  They were having a dandy time.

 

Snowball

 

 Chicken butts all lined up!

Bad Surprises!

Yesterday I had good surprises.  Today... not so much.

Bad surprises:

1. All those lovely tomatoes I thought I might harvest?  1/2 of them have blossom rot.

2. My smallest daughter got stung by bees... 4 times.

3. A predatory bird (hawk, falcon, etc.) tried to sweep down and steal one of laying chickens this evening as we were putting them away.


Praises:

1. At least the chickens get to eat well.  Lots of tomatoes went their way.

2. Taylor seems not to have had an allergic reaction any more serious than some nausea and slight swelling around the stings. We are keeping an eye on her.

3.  The bird did not get my hen.  She ran for cover as I ran at the bird.  The bird aborted and landed in a tree on the property line.

Lessons learned:

1. Blossom rot can be caused by lack of calcium in the soil.  High amounts of nitrogen can also cause it. I don't know about the calcium levels but we did have the chickens in that bed before we tilled it and planted.  It is possible that the chicken manure was too "hot" for the plants.

2. Keeping baking soda, topical benedryl and ibuprofen handy is a good thing.  Also learned that nausea is part of an allergic action.

3. Must keep an eye out for predatory birds.  If anyone is gonna eat chicken it's me! Also apparently I will run toward a predator to save a chicken.  Maybe I should start carrying a sling and a stone.

Wow! What will tomorrow bring?! Tomatoes with noses?

Fighting The Curse!

In Genesis Chapter 3 God said to Adam, "Cursed is the ground because of you... It will produce thorns and thistles for you."

Yep!  Wonderful.

That is why we have this:

And this...

 

 And this...

 

But even in God's original plan we had work to do. In Genesis 2:15 it says, "The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

 

...And so that is what we did today.  We worked hard fighting the curse of weeds and taking care of our little piece of blessing.  Not all aspects of homesteading are glamorous- actually very few are- but the rewards are bountiful when you see the finished product of all your hard work.

 

 

Nothing left but the mailbox, the day lilies and dirt. 

 

The plan is to chip fallen branches (from the backwoods of our property) and cover the dirt with chip mulch and then next spring put in some more plants.  I think lavender would be good.  What do you think?

 

God's Plan For Us

Luke 12:27

Consider how the wildflowers grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.

And now we wait....

 

We had a busy day, yesterday.  My oldest had tryouts for the Grand Rapids Homeschool Performing Art's Production of Peter Pan. She said she did well.  Not perfect- I guess the dance portion could have gone better- but she is content with her audition.  Now we wait for the e-mail that tells her if she got the part or not.  She could know as soon as today or as late as the end of the month.  Many thanks to family and Mr. Herrick Kimball of the Deliberate Agrarian for their financial donations to make this happen for her and to the Weber family for hiring her for childcare.

 

She isn't after any specific part. In fact she'd prefer a smaller one since this would be her first production but I know she hopes to get A part.  Even just part of the pirate chorus.  I told her I know she tried her best and now all we can do is ask the Lord to guide decisions.

I also am playing the waiting game. I applied (via essay) for a scholarship to a local writer's conference this fall. Deadline for entries is 8/15/13 and then I might not hear till the end of the month also.  Don't you just love waiting?

Teen #3 (And A Future Farmer- I Hope!)

13 years ago, on a warm sultry early morning in Meridian, Idaho, I was awakened from a good sleep at 5:30am with a pop-pop sensation/sound.  Did I dream it?  I'd better check.  Off to the bathroom I scuffled and sure enough my water had broken.  I hurried back to the bed to tell my husband and before he had fully woken my contractions had started in full.  I called the hospital, went outside to the travel trailer my parents were staying in to let them know what was going on and off we went to the hospital in downtown Boise.  It took about thirty minutes from our house to the birthing floor.

During the drive I remember telling my husband that everything was okay.  He didn't need to speed because my contractions weren't very bad. (Our first child came in 2 hrs, the second was induced for various reasons.)  We parked and I waddled up to the birth floor and was just about to check in when this tremendous contraction hit.  I remember looking up at the clock.  It was 6:10am.

I was escorted to triage and the nurse proceeded to ask me to change and of course, pee in a cup. I went in and changed but was unable to oblige the nurse with the other.  I was in a lot of pain, there was a lot of blood and it just wasn't gonna happen.  When I returned and told her I couldn't go she got me up on the table to check my progress.  The next words I heard were, "I see a head!"  Then she turned to the other nurse behind her and said, "Get me the resident on duty, STAT! We are having a baby right here."

The resident got there pretty darn quick but that nurse almost delivered without him, all the time apologizing that I wasn't in a private birthing suite. (Uhmmm... I was not caring where I was.  I just wanted to finish the task at hand.) My son was born around 6:30am.  My own doctor hadn't even made it despite my persistent warnings to him that I birth fast.  "Don't worry," he said. "I live ten minutes from the hospital." Ha!  I got to tell him, "I told you so."

It is only fitting that we had chosen the name Remington for him because he shot out like a bullet! One hour- start to finish.

Today, thirteen years in the future, a wonderful young man stands before me and I am blessed.  He is a crazy silly kid but I see a godly man starting to form.  God is good!  Happy Birthday Remington Carlisle Lewis!!!

15 Years & A Movie In Production...

Yesterday was the birthday of my second eldest. Andi Rose Lewis has been blessed with 15 wonderful years of life and we have been blessed by her in return.

We spent the day celebrating as a family.  The other kids and I took care of her daily chores as well as our own and then, after lunch, she opened her gifts and then we partook in cake and ice cream. (Orange Soda Cake, Creamsicle Ice Cream, and Orange Soda). We then went to Barnes and Noble to pick her up two books that she wanted that were released on her birthday. We finished the day off by having her favorite dinner... Fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and watermelon.  I am so thankful for this wonderful, Godly, young lady.

 

Also... I found out from reading The Deliberate Agrarian about a new Christian, Agrarian movie being made called Beyond Off Grid.  It looks really good and I am looking forward to it's release.  My husband and I have been working on self-sustainable living (though we have a long way to go.) and I hope this film will inspire us and educate us. I really hope the grid doesn't go down but it seems to me to be prudent and know how to live without it if needed.  Let's face it, we've only had around 125 years (ish) of electricity in history.  Seems foolish to forsake all the knowledge of those who came before us as primitive and not needed.  Our normal is actually not normal when viewed through the scope of history. 

 

The novel I am working on touches on these subjects too.  The Follower is set in post-peak oil and though electricity is still around society is very much changed and agrarianism is once again the main way of life for most of society.  Anyone want to donate the use of a weekend cabin and babysitting for me to write more?  Haha... just kidding... sort of.

 

Have a super Fourth of July! 

 

Working With What God Gives Me

Just a quick morning post.  Gonna work with the bounty that the Lord has given me today.  I'll be picking strawberries from our two patches and hopefully will secure enough for a batch of strawberry jam or strawberry rhubarb jam.  I also will be infusing some plantain oil today for use in a healing salve in a couple of weeks as well as exploring what else is growing "wild" that I can harvest and use.  (My poor delusional husband calls these things weeds.) I love foraging on my property.  God has so richly blessed us with all we need if we just open our eyes to see it!

What has God given you?

Mosquitoes Part 2 (Friday Read & Write)

I am a little bit of a natural cosmetics freak and I had an entire long post written about natural mosquito repellants but wouldn't you know that my internet disconnected during the writing of it so nothing saved and when I went to add photos I lost most of the post. (I have a love/hate relationship with technology.)  So in keeping with Friday's theme of reading and writing.  Here are some of my go to books on the topic and tomorrow I will try again with the real post.

 

The Herbal Home Remedy Book by Joyce A. Wardwell

The Herbal Body Book by Stephanie Tourles

Organic Body Care Recipes by Stephanie Tourles

Making Aromatherapy creams and lotions by Donna Maria

Natural Beauty at Home by Janice Cox

God's plan for us

Leviticus 19:9-10

When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick the grapes that have fallen.  Leave them for the poor and alien.  I am the Lord your God.

What if all of us who grow food did this?  What would the impact be?

Slight Diversion

Today's post was supposed to be something "artisany" but like all best laid plans...

Remember my post last week about this...

Well, that ended up in my basement yesterday when the sump pump blew a fuse and quit working.  The ground from last week's rains was still so saturated that when the pump ceased to function the water just drained back in.  The entire 1,000 sq feet was two to three inches deep with water.  Very cold, ankle numbing water, I might add.

So today instead of doing something fun on the homestead, I get to dry out carpet and organize basement stuff that got brought upstairs.  Upside:  We hardly lost any material "stuff".  Most everything was either up on racks or stored in plastic boxes or dryable.  My biggest loss:  RIP to my 1985 Sophomore yearbook. Tragic, I know.

We are hoping with quick action (read sucking up water and drying things out with dehumidifiers) that we may avoid having to replace carpet and padding.  We shall see.  If we lose the carpet then my husband gets his basement woodworking shop he has wanted.

Currently we have the basement (one big room, one smaller room and two store rooms) set up as craft/sewing and exercise in the big room and a playroom in the smaller. But the play room is really just toy storage.  The kids rarely stay and play.  If my husband does his woodshop thing then I'll claim the second room for my "shop".  Pinterest has lots of cute ideas for painting concrete floors and creating clever craft spaces.  We shall see.

So I'm off to tackle water!  Have a blessed day!!

Spring Days

Oh, what a nice day we had today.  After colder than normal temps and lots of rain we finally had a nice warm and sunny day!  It is so much nicer to do chicken chores in warmer weather.  Of course I had to fill the chicken's water a couple of times.  Those ladies can drink!  But just being able to be outside.  Happy sigh.

The only shame to the day was the ground was still to wet to work in the garden much.  Last week we had torrential rain!  By Thursday morning everything in West Michigan was flooding.  I'm crossing my fingers that my recently planted spinach seeds didn't get washed away.  I guess time will tell.

So we spent this lovely day practicing archery, going to the park and perusing the local libraries for good spring reading material.  And as I write this, we have homemade ice-cream whirring around in the maker.  It is good that winter has disappeared at least for today.

Here are some pictures of the local flooding last week:

 The dairy farm across the street.  That's supposed to be a field, not a lake.

 The creek that passes through our property flooding by the road.  The owners of the house in the background were very worried.

 The other side of the road.  The creek didn't overflow quite as bad.

 The Cooke Family rescuing their calves from the rising flood waters.

 

 Our next door neighbors home.  Normally this is all grass not water.

 

 The farmers working on getting the calves and their houses moved to higher ground.

 

 Flood waters getting pretty close to the diary barns!

 

The back forest part of our property. Normally not wet!

Planting early is a crap shoot!

You know we aren't proponents of gambling so I don't know why we try and start plants before its really time in Michigan. It really is a gamble.

Lettuce doing great!

More lettuce doing great.

Spinach- not harmed by the freeze we had but not doing exceptionally well. We think the two year old seed is not good.

A different type of lettuce, not doing as good as the other two, but trying. This was new seed (at least we bought it this year).

My poor lemon balm. It was so pretty and then we had two nights of freezing weather. But all I have to do is trim off the blackened leaves and it will be just fine.

My lavender can't quite decide what to do. Most of it looks dead but there are some signs of green life.

Chives doing just great- They are about to blossom. I will cut off the blossoms and let them grow more. At the end of the growing season I let the blossoms go to seed and the chives replant themselves.

My beautiful tomatoes- all dead. The blueberries are fine though.

Corn- kaput!

Pumpkins and basil- kaput.

Cilantro barely hanging on.

Strawberries looking good.

New tomato plant being kept up on the deck for easy moving inside on any more cold nights.

Even the lilacs (My very favorite flower.) around the area bit it. They were flowering but not quite to full potential when the freeze happen. Lilac season abruptly ended.

Now most of the shrubs look like this.

I did find one still blooming quite nicely.

If you want to see some fine lilacs and get some ideas for using these edible flowers check out this. I don't have any lilacs in my yard but next year I will scavenge some from the sides of public roads to play with. (I see people doing this every year.) Unless of course I have land by then. If I do I'll plant plenty of bushes.