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

Favorite Sights

Brian with boys at the orphanage

Brian is home from his trip to India.  Feels like Autumn has been full of plans to get to India, being in India, coming home from India and now up to Chicago for more training.  This is one of my favorite pictures from the trip.  I love to see him smile.

Travel by Map

Anyone who knows me knows I LOVE the Muppets.  B's impression of the Swedish Chef is Bork! Bork! Bork!, so my ringtone for him is the Chef's theme song.  My drumming son's ringtone is Animal singing to Bohemian Rhapsody..."Mamma...Mamma!  Mamma!  Mamma!"  I am downright giddy about the Muppets coming back to television this Fall.  Anyway...

I can't help but wish sometimes that we could travel by map like the gang in the movie.  The journey of life can be a tough one and pushing a red button and skipping to destination in moments seems like a great idea.  But God reminds me that I miss heaps by going straight from here to there without so much as a bump in the road.

B being kicked out of his job of 22 years just 2 months after we were married crushed us.  Being a new family without means was scary (is scary--we still haven't found any steady income).  At the same time we decided that we'd accept that bump as a blessing and reinvent ourselves, while maintaining God's calling for us to be a homeschooling family.  If you've watched part of our lives in person or through Facebook or this blog, we've tried scores of business ideas.  Some worked.  Some failed.  Some have kept us at home.  Some have taken us to other parts of the country and some out of the country.  We've "traveled" together quite a bit.  Our road has felt like a Belizean backroad after a tropical rain-burst; full of ruts, washouts, turn-arounds, pits, pedestrians in dark clothes after dark scaring the dickens out of us, and hanging tight to the mountain for fear of falling off the cliff.  There were times we'd literally bump our heads on the roof of the truck while driving through a pothole. We are seven years into this ride and we are road weary, but we are in it together.  I want to push the button!

The silver lining to our journey has been creating bonds with my adopted children.  I know my husband of seven years as if we've lived together twenty-five.  Our family works well together.  It's like we've gone through the ultimate team-building skills weekend and come out strong as an Olympian wrestler.  My kids have held sea urchins in their hands, marveled at Carlsbad Caverns, seen the Canadian side of Niagara Falls, fed the homeless on Thanksgiving, started their own jobs, and learned to cook and have been able to make meals for an entire Venture Crew over charcoal including a blueberry dessert in a dutch oven!  I have gained the experience of talking to strangers.  B has had his dream realized of working for Kingdom purposes and that that doesn't always have a map to travel by.  Day by day.  Moment by moment.  We live.  We travel.  One step at a time.  (or leap, or dive, or trip, or flap, or jump, or stroll, or drive, but NOT by map!)

Summer Nights

It's been a weird summer.  The boys started working.  C is at McDonald's and H is detasseling and derouging corn.  K has had a heavier burden of chores at home while B's work with iTEE Global kicks into a higher gear and I train new stylists at the salon.  (Breathe!)  We have had some fun, although it is harder and harder to find time when all 5 of us are together.  

James Taylor concert

Pounding the Post

All smiles before croquet