Perfect Days, Gentle Days...

 

I rise while the day is still in its beginning stages, but the night was really the beginning. 

 

 "...and the evening and the morning..."

A little bitty decides that it is his wake up time as well. 

I think nothing of the "interruption" to my quiet moment with the Lord and my coffee warming me from the bit of chill in the air. 

 He is, after all, my job, my joy, my life.

 

"...to love their children..."

The sun beams in after breakfast and we gather together to read from the only Bread that lives and drink from the only Water that will ever satisfy.

 

"...If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water..."

 

After words read, we pray for those in our country who are hurting. 

In our world, who are lonely. 

We pray for needs, yet unmet but that will be provided in His time.

 

"... the lilies how they grow: they toil not, they spin not; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these..."

 

For our gardens.

 

"...While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease..."

 

Fingers fly swiftly over keys and bow goes fleetly over strings and my heart beats in time to the beautiful reverbs of sound I hear throughout the day. 

 

"...make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation..."

 

Learning takes place with me as teacher. 

And without my presence. 

Always learning. 

Always growing like the new fruits and vegetables planted in the gardens and vineyard.

 

"...As for God, his way is perfect..."

 

 

The days are long but the gentle time spent on loved ones will be my reward.

 

"...the servant of the Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient..."

 

Life, With my Hands Full....

Are my hands full?  Yes, yes, I think they are.  It would seem that the older your family got, the more time of your own you would have.  But that is not so, not yet anyway!  I am sure one day that will be the case, as I have heard the older women wax eloquently with their memories of their households and compare with the loneliness of their houses now.  (Quite often, by the way.)

One thing that I am often asked, among the plethora of other questions, is, "How do you do it all?"  I usually respond with, "only by the grace of God!" and then move on to explaining what I am about to tell you.

I don't do it all.  No one does!  No matter what you see on any blog, read in any magazine article or book, or hear others tell about another person, no one does it all!  It isn't physically, or universally doable!  But we all sure try, don't we?  I know I sure do!  All we can really do is what we are supposed to do and then a little more as the Lord leads us.

Early next week, I plan on instagraming a Day in the Life.  (graceful_homesteading if you would like to follow along.)  It won't be perfect, it won't be pretty, but it will be us!

 

A little back ground about us for any new readers!

 

We are a large family, by the grace of God, of 13 original members (so far, and yes, I birthed them all, no, no twins) and we have added or about to add, one son-in-law, one daughter-in-law, and three grandchildren(23 months, 14 months and 2 month!)  So that makes for a lot of fun when we are all able to get together!

 

We only have eight children at home right now.  Ages 20 down to 18 months! 

 

It still makes for:

 

20+ loads of laundry a week

4+ gallons of milk/almond milk a week

5 dozen eggs a week

25+ hours of homeschooling a week

21 meals prepared

8+ loaves of bread baked

2+ hours of piano practice a day

10 beds to make daily

1 toddler to nurse

 

 

Not to mention countless:

 

diapers to change

boo-boos to kiss

toilet paper rolls to change

baths for littles

dishes to wash

and...

.....et cetera.

 

Life as usual for us! 

Life with my hands full!

 

The Milkman Cometh and He Bringeth Vegetables Too....

Since we last talked, well, before yesterday's post, I have changed a few things in regards to shopping and eating. 

• I used to go to the farm and get fresh raw milk and eggs...then we got sick and I stopped going to the farm.  (Not that it was from the milk or anything because we had tests run and it wasn't anything like that!)
• I used to go to the little fruit stand man and get my fruits and veggies.  But, I found out he just runs down to the state farmers market and gets his stuff, from all over.  So I stopped going.
• I used to swing by target, but now I don't go into that city to get veggies and stuff.  Or the city next door to that city to get the milk and eggs.

 

Remember now, I strive to eat naturally, although not organic on everything, and that includes baking our baked goods.  Bread, tortillas, crackers (Sami does this), etc. it is all made from fresh whole spelt, kamut, buckwheat, wheat berries that I grind myself!  We've been grinding our flour since February 2000!  I love it! 

 

 

15 pounds of Kamut

5 pounds red lentils

5 pounds buckwheat

10 pounds spelt

50 pounds of CCF white wheat berries

 

I usually buy sucanat, oils, xylitol, flax seed, chia seeds, oatmeal (25 lbs.  We order every other month.  This should last me two months with what I have already here at the house.  It cost 112.00 total, including tax, shipping fee and non-workers fees.

We will, eventually, get more honey when the time comes from our hives but right now we must let them rest because a few weeks ago, husband and son split one into two.  And then we had to split a second time for three hives but that one didn't do well and failed to make a queen.

Burr comb peeking up from the hive when he opened it.

Two hive today in the sun.

This is all organic fruit and vegetables.  The milk is raw milk from a dairy here.  I have this delivered to my house one time a week.   It is delivered by the produce place, which also delivers to local co-ops.  I add on the milk.  I can also get all local, organic stuff delivered if I prefer, but this is good right now.  This is 60.00 a week.  When the garden starts producing this will go down to 120.00 a month because I will order every other week.

I go to the local Grass Fed beef place and get beef, some cuts and ground, and natural raised, msg-free pork sausage.  I usually spend about 80.00 here per month.

Love this place!

 

I've been buying the rest of the stuff at Aldi ( where I purchase a few various and sundry things like laundry detergent, butter, toilet paper, canned tuna, mixed veggies, tomato paste, almond milk, green beans and some fruits ) and I spend about 150.00 a month.

 

Or local grocery store, or very rarely Wal mart.  For diapers, pullups (for night time), wipes, organic baby foods , decaf tea, coffee, oil, chickens or chicken brea-sts.  I usually spend about 150.00 per month.

 

This ends up being around 680.00 per month for everything right now.  I like that I am getting organic veggies delivered and it only upped my budget 60.00 a month!!!

 

So, the milkman cometh and he bringeth vegetables with him! 

 

 

 

Anyway....

 

Whew....life sure has been busy lately! 

 

 

There has been a very lot going on.  So much that I cannot keep up with it all.  So here are some pictures for you!

Digging in the garden to keep the weeds at bay before we plant in it.

Just a fraction of the seeds we have started.

This is the back garden.

This is the garden area.  Notice there are no raised beds this year! 

We have already planted:

Corn

potatoes

garlic

lettuce

tomatoes

carrots

peas

brussel sprouts

green beans

pumpkin

watermelon



Many hands!

Little hands even help!

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It is so busy when brothers (and Granbaby J) visit.

We were so blessed to have Granbaby J stay with us for a few days.  This picture is of Al and I putting the two babies to bed.  She had to have nursies and paci and he drank his cup of milk.  It was so fun.  We took this time to spend together talking while they settled down.  So sweet!

 

This is the two of them on the rainy day trip into town!   

 

She loved to take his food bits!

 

 

She didn't mind sharing her "school time" with him.  She does the touch and feel flash cards for "school".  She wasn't talking for the longest time so I started doing these with her and letting her watch Baby Einstein videos here and there and now she is forming more words. 

 

Two babies = twice the mush!  LOL!



This is uncle loving on nephew and auntie trying to bust open the flash cards!  LOL!

 

Oh!  And this is a wonderful way to contain three little ones while everyone else was busy elsewhere!  Thank you Graco! 

 

 

 

When Granbaby J left, she was lonely and a little bored...

 

 

 ...so we had to go over to our friends house and she was able to have a picnic with Baby B!  Except this time he kept trying to snatch her little jelly sandwich bits and she kept pushing his hand away ever so sweetly!  LOL!!!

 

 

Now things seem to be headed back into normal so I hope to see you around....after the tea party where they saved me a seat!

 

 

What have you all been up to?

Sharing today on the Homestead Barn Hop

Break....

Ecclesiastes 3:1a

 "To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven..."

 

 

 

Ecclesiastes 1:9
"The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. "

 

 

What a Blessed Life I Live!

God is so good to me.  He gives me little daily blessings, abounding in grace all of the time.  This past Sunday I was blessed by two of my girls (14 and 6) singing in church.  They sang Casting Crown's, Who Am I.  It was beautiful to me.  It went well with the sermon which was entitled, The Unlikely Disciples. 

Pastor mentioned that Jesus' ministry penetrates every layer of society.  His teaching transcends divisions of culture, ethnicity, sex, wealth, and age. 

The text was Matthew 27: 50-61.

Notice the women mentioned there.  They were mothers of some of Jesus' disciples.  They were older than the Lord Himself.  Women...The Unlikely Disciples.

So was Joseph of Arimathea.  Older, wiser, in a different age group.  He was a rich man and a member of the Sanhedrin.  An ally of Nicodemus (who had come to question Jesus in the cover of night...also a member of the elite).  The rich leader....The Unlikely Disciple.

 Even though it was not mentioned here, but elsewhere, children were also present within Jesus' ministry.  Matthew 19:13-15 and Matthew 18:1-6 .

 

Children can be sown in the seeds of the Gospel and can be shown how to sow what they have learned.  We all should sow seeds as His disciples and expect a spiritual harvest.  We all should prepare our hearts to receive even the most unlikely followers of Jesus.  Yes, praise God, I am blessed.  Children...The Unlikely Disciples.

(Feel free to listen to the video I got on my phone of my beautiful ladies singing a duet this past Sunday.  I was holding my little sleeping baby and trying not to cry at the beauty of my blessing so it is not professional.  This was R's first time singing alone like this in front of lots of people.  All the other pictures above are from Resurrection Sunday.  We had an impromptu invitation ready to give at church and our friends went home, grabbed their ham and sandwich fixin's and joined us for lunch and talking afterwards.  Always be ready to give an invitation to whomever the Lord leads on your heart to give.  Be open and you will always be blessed!)

Daily Bread in Sunlight

 

You all know how we mill our own wheat berries and other grains and make our baked goods, right?  I have shared this wonderful bread recipe on the blog before as well.  Today I want to share this recipe we use a couple of times a month for a dinner side and it makes in our bread maker while I do school or run the house! 

 

 



Our daily bread in the sunlight.
This is not the Angel bread though.

 

Angel Bread ~ And it is heavenly!

 

1/2 to 2/3 cups of milk (we use almond or rice milk)

1 egg

1 tsp. salt

3 Tbsp melted coconut oil (you can use melted butter but the texture won't be the same soft and fluffiness you would get with coconut oil)

2 tbsp sugar (we use sucanat and I think coconut sugar would work well too here but haven't tried it)

2 c. flour

1 to 1 1/2 tsp yeast.

 

Put all in order in the bread machine and make a well in the center of dry ingredients, then add yeast.

Put your bread machine on the lightest crust setting.  On mine, I use the Sweet cycle and light crust.  Yours will be different.

If you don't have a bread machine, then you can make this by hand but I recommend the bread machine for ease.  I start it after lunch and it is ready and hot and waiting by dinner.  Sometimes if we are having a chicken meal, I will add herbs to this and it smells and tastes wonderful too.  (rosemary and basil go well with chicken)

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The other day I was reading on a friend's blog (Hi Karen!!) and she mentioned that she made mixes from this site to ease her life a bit.  I thought to myself,

 

 "what a wonderful idea and such a time saver too..."

 

 but I did not pursue it because when wheat is freshly ground the wheat looses most of its nutritional content within about 72 hours.  Then I was reading in an older magazine from the 90's for Titus 2 homemaking types I had bought from a friend (Hi Elizabeth!!) , and there was an article on homemade mixes using whole, fresh ground wheat!  It said that you could do the mixes but to just put them into the freezer instead of out on the counter and use within a month.  So today I mixed up a batch of muffin mix and it is sitting in the freezer waiting to be used tomorrow morning for breakfast!  I was going to do the pancake one too but didn't have the container to put it in.

 

Here is the recipe from the magazine for the mix.  I used this one because it did not call for any other flour than whole wheat.  The site has other flours though. 

 

Basic Muffin Mix - Marilyn Moll

 

8 cups whole wheat pastry flour (I used hard white and not pastry)

2 cups sugar (I did use white sugar, but next time I will be using sucanat.  I have to see how the sucanat will do in the freezer first!)

4 T baking powder

2 tsp salt

 

Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl and stir to distribute well.  Store in a ziplock freezer bag or other canister in the freezer.

 

To use:

 

2 1/2 c. plus 1 Tbsp muffin mix

1 carton or 8 oz. lowfat vanilla yogurt (I will omit this and use 8 oz. almond milk)

1 egg

1/4 c. oil

2T milk (I'll use almond milk)

 

(she has also 1 cup blueberries and 1T grated orange rind but I will not use these)

 

Grease muffin tins. 

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Put the muffin mix in a large bowl

Beat together wet ingredients

Add wet to dry and stir just until moistened

Spoon into muffin cups

Bake 20-25 minutes until done.

 

Makes 12 muffins

 

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Do you do any mixes to make your life simpler?

It seems like it will be easier than what we do now....haul out the wheat bucket, grind the wheat hoping not to wake the still sleeping children, then let the wheat sit a few minutes while you hug and cuddle scared, screaming little toddler,

 

Pretending to be afraid!  LOL!

 

 Get everyone who woke from the screams of little toddler onto their morning chores since all is well after all! Then decide it is too much trouble and now it is late so you get everyone cereal instead!  LOL!  My, my.....yes, it seems much simpler and healthier too.

 

Sharing today at http://walkingredeemed.org/

Not Forsaking...

^" Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus,

 By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh;

 And having an high priest over the house of God;

 Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. 

 Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;) 

And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works:

Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching."  - Hebrews 10:19-25

This past weekend we had the pleasure of hosting old friends  in our home for dinner and fellowship once again.  Seven children, with 5 raised to adulthood already, these friends have been an encouragement to us.  They have raised their children for the Lord and we see the fruit of longevity in a marriage and training up a biblical household through them. 

Dinner consisted of a big pot of chili, a big pot of chicken and dumplin's, fritos, sour cream, cheese, ice cream bars, sweet tea, chopped veggie plate, french bread and chocolate milk!  I think we licked all plates clean.  Afterwards we sat at the table and visited.  Then the father of the family asked Al if he minded if we got some bibles and read Proverbs 5 and 6 together.  So that is just what we did.

You can probably guess along with paper bibles there were also electronic bibles too!



She played quietly nearby with a little musical purse.



After reading and discussing, they played a rousing game of Down by the River.

These two got along grand!  This is an aunt who lives with them.  Such a joy and treasure to be around when they visit.

Group shot!

They felt comfortable enough to ask for bibles and read them with us!  And that my friends, is the way it should be.  We should never feel like we cannot discuss the Lord with anyone.  Anyone...even though they might disagree.  We should always be ready to tell about the hope that lies within us!