Sunshiny Sundays Are Restful

Sunshine on a Sunday means this...

 

Sunshine on any other day of the week means this...

God's Plan For Us: Ice Storm

Had an ice storm last night followed by a light snow.  The roads are treacherous today and church was cancelled but the beauty is incredible.

Shout with joy to God, all the earth! Sing the glory of his name, make his praise glorious! Say to God, "How awesome are your deeds!"

Psalm 66:1-3b

God's Plan For Us

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over the flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.  Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger."

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."

When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about."

So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph and the baby, who was lying in the manger When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they has heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.

Luke 2:8-20

God's Plan For Us

 

 

"The truly Significant took on insignificance so that the truly insignificant could find true significance in Him."

 

-Dr. Rich McCarrell

God's Plan For Us

Proverbs 31:12

 

She brings him (her husband) good, not harm, all the days of her life.

God's Plan For Us

Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value.

Proverbs 31:11

Women, this is what we need to be working towards.  I can honestly say that I don't meet these standards right now but the Bible says I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. So this is obtainable by the doing of the Lord and not myself.  My job is to submit to His will and be obedient.

Confidence - full trust

Value- worth, merit, usefulness (notice it isn't necessarily a materialist notion of value)

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!

God's Plan For Us!

A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies.

 

Proverbs 31:10

 

Wife:  A woman married to a man

 

Noble: Exalted moral excellence

 

Character: Moral quality or integrity

 

Moral: Ethics or standards

Ruby: One of the rarest, most precious of gemstones

Are women these days striving to be a wife of noble character or are we merely rubble?

God's Plan For Us!

It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.

Galatians 5:1

Family Time & The Family Economy

With our new school schedule we have added an evening "family time".  Our first family time together last week was met with mixed reviews.  Farmer John wanted to get everyone involved with his future business, Bamboo On The Fly (tentative name), and so we all tumbled out to the garage to work on his current Bamboo Fly Fishing Rod.  I must admit only John and our two littlest (Reagan and Taylor) were overly excited to do this.  Later I realized that I had to confess sin because I was less than championing my husband's vision at the time. (Which is really silly because I very much want him to leave his "corporate" job for a home-based, family biz.)

Yes, we put a blowtorch in the hands of our 13 year-old son!

 

 And our 15 year-old daughter

 Not our 4 year-old- she was content to make up her own games with balls and badmitton birdies!

 

Here I am with the torch.  The pieces of bamboo for the rod are slid into the copper pipe and then the pipe is heated with the torch.  This dries the bamboo.  You could see the steam being released at the tube ends.

 

 

As you can see the garage is highly unkempt.  Farmer John is on vacation this week and so one of our projects (practical arts for school) will be cleaning the garage.  By mid-October we'll be getting heavy frosts/freezes and the cars will need to be parked inside overnight. (Farmer John does not want to scrape ice at 3:30 in the morning!)

 

Leave me a comment if you are interested in a Handcrafted Bamboo Fly Rod!

 

If you are wondering about family economies check out Kevin Swanson's Generations Radio show (search the archived shows for "family economies) and Herrick Kimball over at The Deliberate Agrarian writes frequently on this topic too!

 

God's Plan For Us...

And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; And to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; And to brotherly kindness charity.

 

2 Peter 1: 5-7

God's Plan For Us...

 

Psalm 51: 10 -12

Create in my a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me.

God's Plan For Us

 

 

By wisdom the Lord laid the earth's foundations, by understanding he set the heavens in place; by his knowledge the deeps were divided, and the clouds let drop the dew.

 

Proverbs 3: 19-20

Losing it Mondays!

200 lbs must go!

Hmmm... I have some fat showing too! I'd like to drop 20.

This is the start of my husband's journey to health.  He just entered a weight loss contest at work and weighed in today at 360 lbs. His ideal weight is in the 160's.  That is 200 lbs. to lose folks.  He has been able to lose weight before successfully, however some injuries happened that made working out too painful and he gained it all back.

With the start of this contest and a new shift beginning at work it is ideal for us to begin working out again. And I do mean us... the entire family.  We do it together from John on down to Taylor. I think we will start with walking.  It shouldn't be too hard on the joints and we'll take it slow and build up.  By the time winter comes round we should be in shape enough to start our work out videos and weight training. (This will be on top of any homestead work like chopping and stacking wood.)

We don't have too much of a change diet wise.  We've already cut out most junk food and eating out and I buy mostly whole foods. (I confess to having artificially colored corn on hand for children who immediately want food when they get up.)  We will need to increase our vege intake and watch portion sizes.  One thing John has to monitor on his own is sampling the Costco samples and not being tempted by the food court at work.  The frozen yogurt isn't too bad but calories add up.

I just want to state right now, we will not stop eating eggs from our free-ranging chickens or grass-fed meat, cream and butter.  These things are healthy for you!  I will not buy low-fat anything or diet anything- it's not natural people.  I will cook from scratch the things we like and take a meat on the side approach.  I will practice and perfect catching wild yeast at home and turning it into healthy bread. I also want to research "cleanses"- not the kind bought through a program or a store but made from scratch at home.

I think our biggest challenge is just getting moving and finding more energy. And of course for me... I keep hoping to catch a joy of cooking.  I love to bake and will make loaf after loaf of bread to perfect it but there is something about cooking that just doesn't do it for me.  But I really do need to transform into a chef.  That is unless some one knows Bobby Flay and he wants to just come live with us. We've got a great spot for him in the basement... as long as we aren't working out.

So join us every Monday and see how and what we are doing to make ourselves healthier.  I'll want to know what you are doing too!

Country Sundays are the best!

Spent a wonderful day of rest with my husband and my two youngest daughters on Sunday. The teens were off to Mid-Summer Lord's Day at Harbor Baptist Church in Holland so it was just parents and littles for the day.

The festivities started on the way home from church.  We were almost home and notice dust coming from the farm across from our house.  They are building a new barn to house their dairy herd but they don't usually work on it on Sundays.  As we drew closer we saw a cow out and about and then another... and another... and another.  They were running around the construction site, up and down dirt hills and out into the road having a marvelous time... at least 20 or 30 of them. (They have a dairy herd of 300'ish and a beef herd of around 100'ish.)

It isn't unusual for a calve to get out of its pen from time to time but this was the first time we had seen any bigs out.  We quickly put the car in reverse and went to go get the farmer.  He was just on his way out to catch them when we drove up and had his farm hands with him.  He thanked us and disappeared to corral cows.  They got them under control pretty quickly.

We found it all rather funny and I'm sure the farmer is glad we did.  Apparently the lady who we bought the house from was not amused by such happenings and was constantly complaining and making life hard for the farmer.  Now, he may be an industrial type farmer but I still respect what he does and appreciate the hard work it takes, not to mention I still buy my milk from the store so his service is vital to me. I don't understand why people don't treat farmers better.  Do they not like to eat?  This isn't Star Trek where replicators just make food appear.  Someone has to work hard to provide it! (I might add that this is a young farm family... second generation... we want to be an encouragement to them.)

After the cow excitement we spent the day relaxing outside.  (City daughter wasn't home to complain about the great outdoors.)  We had target practice, watched chickens, built a fire and roasted marshmallows and just in general had a marvelous technology free day!  I am so thankful for God and his wisdom to give us a day of rest.

 Daddy and daughters (Every girl needs a pink gun!)

 Reagan (Katniss Everdeen) Lewis

 Target Practice!

 Dancing in the great outdoors...

 

 Chickens on the move...

 

 The rare red-headed, blue clothed squirrel posing in her natural habitat! (There isn't a tree in our yard that she can't climb.)

Construction site across the street where the cows were playing.

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.

God's Plan For Us

 

Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord, For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

 

Ephesians 5:22-24

God's Plan For Us

Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ...
       - Philippians 1:27a

As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.
     - Ephesians 4:1-2

God's Plan For Us

Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the first fruits of all your crops; then your barns will be filled to overflowing and your vats will brim over with new wine.

Proverbs 3: 9 -10