Break a Leg! (or My Nerves are Gonna Kill Me)

I'm supposed to be working on memorizing my lines, but I think that my brains have turned to mush. This morning the family watched The Three Musketeers at Indiana Repertory Theater.  It was fantastic.  I found myself getting nervous and having a mild panic attack thinking that in about 3 weeks I'd be on stage for the first time since high school.  I've never had a role this big and I am extremely nervous.  Pray for me!  I'm playing Juror #3 in 12 Angry Women and Brian is playing Juror #2 in 12 Angry Men. You can get tickets by clicking this link, but hurry!  They are going fast!

Break is over!  Back to the book!

Happy Chickens

My husband is a genius.  He built this coop and run for my girls out of (mostly) materials we had on hand, including the neighbor's old swing set that we took apart, old bed frame, metal shelf, and tractor tires (we only put on the tires to move it around the yard).  Thank you, Honey!

The girls having breakfast

Barred Rock and Black Austrlorop coexisting

Mine

Coop and enclosed run

Both sides have ventilation up top and open sides at bottom which can be closed up at night.

Open bottom of coop to clean and gather eggs (eggs coming attraction)

Sliding floor to enter and exit the run

Looking through one side to the other

My Nest

Cory started school at Indiana Wesleyan University nearly a month ago.  All five of us traveled up to help him get settled and unpack.  It was a very long and emotional day.  My first chick to try his wings.

On the agenda that day were activities for families, some for students only and some for families only.  Some activities had vague descriptions, one being the last gathering of the night which had families separate from their student.  Unbeknownst to any of us, it was encouraged during the convocation that parents were not to bid their child good-bye.  Brian and my heart sank.  Tears welling up in my eyes I felt my Jones stubbornness kick in and decided that I was going to do what I could to be able to meet up with Cory one last time.  Brian had the same thought, although while my sadness turned to anger, Brian's turned to problem-solving.  He had me send texts to Cory telling him what we'd just heard.  But there was no answer.  His gathering was in another building--but which?  We'd been following him all day not us leading him.  We followed noises, but it was so loud he'd never hear our text.

We milled about the campus for a bit hoping that he would be released soon.  Brian wanted to start busting down doors and trying to find Cory in the sea of hundreds of faces in an auditorium.  I didn't think that we'd ever discover him that way.  After a bit, we decided that we could start walking around.  Sure enough, their meeting let out, but the sea of faces were now running and cheering down multiple sidewalks out of several exits from different sides of the building.  How would we find him?  All we wanted was to say our good bye.  We hadn't gotten that last hug.  (Sitting here trying not to cry just writing this out for the first time.)

No good.  We tried going into his dorm.  We weren't stopped, but we didn't find him either.  We'd realized then that many families were staying over night and coming back the next day for more activities.  We could not since we had church next day and were close enough to campus that we didn't think of (or did we even know) the activities on Sunday.

Finally we decided that we had to give up.  We had no idea where he was or how long he'd be.  We drug our feet going to the van hoping that at the last minute he'd get our text and get back with us.

It wasn't until we were about 5 miles down the road that he got our text and we were able to turn around to give him our last squeezes.

He is doing well at school.  I keep telling everyone that it is like eating at a buffet for him and he has the appetite of a...well, teenage boy.  He attends a lot of activities.  He is joining Awaken Ministries.  He has found a home church.  He is trying to find some deeper friendships.  He has interviewed for a couple of jobs.  He is ahead on class work.  Typical Cory.  He posts lots of pictures on social media which is nice for me.

This weekend is his first time home for a day visit.  Yay!

This is NOT Peter's Garden

I've lost the battle, but not the war.  I broke down after losing all of my precious tomato, cantaloupe and pumpkin seedlings to the durn rabbits and bought replacements.  I bought a beefsteak tomato, a cherry tomato, a sweet pepper and a jalepeno plant.  I dared because my step-dad was  nice enough to gift us some used chicken wire that we decided to put up around the outside of our current fence.  It was only enough to wrap half the garden, so Brian was kind and went to town to buy enough chicken wire to finish the job.

This is the "before shot of the inside of the fence.  If you look toward the center, close to the fence, you can see part of a toilet paper tube I'd used to plant the pumpkins in before transplanting into the garden.  The rabbits ripped it out of the ground.

Brian is unrolling the gifted fence here.  It was the perfect height.  At this point, the chicken wire may actually be holding the picket fence up.

The finished fence has provided a safe place for my new little plants and the wire is barely visible.  Kiah came out to watch us staple the second batch of wire and she kept asking why we were only doing half.  I told her several times we'd already done half the garden and we were finishing.  Her young eyes couldn't detect the fence!  

There is one wee bitty gap in the fencing by the gate now.  I've been praying that if the rabbit finds the space that at least God will give him a blue jacket complete with golden buttons that will get stuck on my gate if he enters.  

Now, if I could only remedy the problem with the beast that keeps stealing my hummingbird feeder!

Frugal, Family, Fun

Today I am glad for the skills I learned from my family growing up and what for what I continue to learn as an adult on a tight budget.  I don't know that I considered us to be poor when I was little, but as I look back there were many things that we did that saved money even if that wasn't the goal.  Maybe it was my parents' upbringing that taught them to be frugal and it trickled down to me.  Whatever the case, as I looked at my sink this morning I realized that I was being quite frugal, having fun and it was because of and for my family.  Here was a frozen ham bone leftover from Easter, string beans from the market that are more affordable, tastier and healthier fresh, and my kitchen compost bucket, which is from a gallon of ice cream we polished off months ago.

Perhaps the word frugal can be substituted for the word stewardship.  It's making the most of and not wasting what you have.  Recently, I've been reading a lot about the concept of stewardship in that everything I have is ultimately from God.  My time, my treasures, my talents, all come from Him.  What should I do with what He has given me?  How do I not waste it?  How do I share it?

Interesting how He seems to tie things together.  Since being unemployed for the first time living in our new home (this is our 3rd summer here), I've been daydreaming about gardening and trying new things.  I started tomatoes, cantaloupe and pumpkins from seed, as well as a few flowers.  The seeds grew.  I transplanted them to larger containers--again being frugal and using empty toilet paper and paper towel rolls lined with paper coffee filters.  The seedlings stretched toward the window and I decided to move them to the garden.  While Brian and Cory were gone on a backpacking trip, the remaining three of us worked the garden with a hay fork, then tilled the ground, and planted the young plants planning for trellises and growth patterns.  Unfortunately, the ground is heavy clay that decided it didn't have anything left to give and a rabbit ate the choking plants.  With nothing left, I decided to make the best of the time I wasn't using toward weeding and watering to improving my soil and learning  how to make the most of what I already have.  There was that idea again.

I think that I'd like to share this journey with you.  In case you want to join along or know more. Here are some of the books and blogs I've read, shows I've watched, and what I've tried by trial and error.

Try this for a fun start.  I also really liked watching their show, It's Not Easy Being Green.

This is what I'm reading now.

I'm also reading this.

I also just finished a book by John Seymor called Self-Sufficiency, which had a little for me and a little for Brian.  

Achievements

This weekend we celebrated Cory's earning his rank of Eagle Scout.  He worked long and hard toward this goal and we are proud of him.

I had a couple of gifts I put together as a personal touch for him.  I made a scrapbook of his years of scouting, which Hezekiah and Brian turned into a slideshow.  Cory received dozens of patches over the years so I sewed those to some fleece and made a tied blanket.  I accidentally cut the left side of the blanket out of the picture, but you get the idea.

I also made these eagle treats with the help of Pinterest!

This is a shot before the ceremony so he still has on his old kerchief and slide.

My Big Man Artie

This is My Big Man Artie.  I have never met him, but Brian had the priviledge last Fall and Cory wrote a speech about him as being someone who changed the world for the better.  This is Art Rorheim.  He is the founder of AWANA.  Brian met him during a training session he had in Chicago with iTEE Global.  When Cory wrote his speech, this is the photo that he used as a visual aid for his presentation.

One of Hezekiah and Kiah's favorite things to do is to save random drawings or pictures as the background on my phone or the family laptop.  Mr. Rorheim made it to the laptop.  Our laptop is hooked up to the television and that is how we watch tv.  Brian didn't think it was near as funny as we did to open the screen to be greeted by Mr. Rorheim's smiling face.  He changed the background to a boring preloaded photo from Microsoft.

To continue our fun Hezekiah decided to print off a 8x10 of Mr. Rorheim.  Now the three of us take turns hiding our big picture of our new friend Artie in places only one of the other of us will find, then secretly re-hide it.  My Big Man Artie has been taped to the screen of my laptop, hung over a photo hanging in the hallway, attached to the lid of the laundry hamper to greet those getting ready for bed, hung upside down from a bedroom door to play peek-a-boo, and now we are waiting for him to reappear.

I can't help but think that the founder of AWANA would find our family game somewhat amusing.  I simply am enjoying being at home with the kids and playing games with them.  Thanks, Artie!

Uniquely Beautiful Women

I've been chewing on this book for almost 5 years now.  I read it from a Christian worldview, so I believe that the "powerful force" that resides within is the Holy Spirit.  I don't believe Estes viewpoint lines up with my belief systems, but it certainly makes me think, wonder, delve inside and see what makes me tick--how my pieces fit together.



Today's encouragement comes from Chapter 7 entitled, "Joyous Body:  The Wild Flesh"

I have been taken with the way wolves hit their bodies together when they run and play, the old wolves in their way, the young ones in theirs, the skinny ones, the fat ones, the long-legged, the lop-tailed, the floppy-eared, the ones whose broken limbs healed crookedly.  They all have their own body configurations and strengths, their own beauty.  They live and play according to what and who and how they are.  They do not try to be what they are not.

...

To take much pleasure in a world filled with many kinds of beauty is a joy in life to which all women are entitled.  To support only one kind of beauty is to be somehow unobservant of nature.  There cannot be only one kind of songbird, only one kind of pine tree, only one kind of wolf.  There cannot be one kind of baby, one kind of man, or one kind of woman.  There cannot be one kind of breast, one kind of waist, one kind of skin.

Estes goes on to state that as women, our confidence is often wrapped up in our appearance or our idea about our beauty/how we believe others perceive our beauty.  It leads to a preoccupation of our daily habits.  She says that we have a "hungry" one inside.  "But rather than hungry to be a certain size, shape or height, rather than hungry to fit the stereotype; women are hungry for basic regard from the culture surrounding them.  The 'hungry' one inside is longing to be treated respectfully, to be accepted, and in the very least, to be met without stereotyping.  If there really is a woman 'screaming to get out' she is screaming for cessation of the disrespectful projections of others onto her body, her face, her age."

Yes!  Isn't that what we feel?  Initially we would probably say no, we'd really like to be skinnier, bigger chested, younger, etc., but I think that we fight to be what we aren't all of the time.  Wouldn't it be better to just be happy with who we are?  To be the wolves who hit their bodies together when they play?  If we realize that God created us, made us uniquely beautiful, and in His image...ponder that one...then why would be try to be anyone other than ourselves?  God accepts us.  Dear sisters, listen to who He says you are.  You are His.  You are a uniquely, beautifully, handcrafted work of art.   

For you created my inmost being;

you knit me together in my mother's womb.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

your works are wonderful,

I know that full well.

My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place.

When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,

your eyes saw my unformed body.

All the days ordained for me were written in your book

before one of them came to be.~Psalm 139: 13-16

Be confident.  Be you.  

Women Who Run With the Wolves; Myths and Stories of the Wild Archetype