Today I...........

* Cried over a terrible tomato tragedy which I can't think about, let alone talk about. Now now. Not today.

* spent hours in the garden in the middle of this hot and heavy-aired day with sweat glistening on my back and forearm. I realized I sorta liked seeing myself sweat like that. It's good to work up a sweat now and again.

* Realized I liked even MORE, the (well-earned) hose shower the kids and I played under afterwards in our every day clothes. (!!!)

* Heard the contagious laugh of children who are surprised by "old mother" doing something silly like playing in a hose.




* Talked to a friend on the phone for 59 minutes and 47 seconds after months and months, (ME! The one who hates talking on the phone!) I wondered what ever had made me wait so long.

* Spoke harshly to the children and apologized. They always enjoy the forgiving, and so do I.




* Made sausage gravy for supper tonight and Corynn just KNEW it was because that was her MOST favorite meal.

* Won a pair of cowboy boots on ebay for Andrew and they arrived today...but when he tried them on---they were too small! I was terribly disappointed but little Panda voice kep reassuring me "Dat dust awight Mama." "Dat dust awight."

* Had a meltdown on Mattie. And somehow, he made a crying gal laugh.

* Did dishes. LOTS. oddly---I never once pined for a dishwasher.



* Snapped beans. LOTS. They are dehydrating as we speak.

* Boiled corn. It is freezing as we speak.

* Watched an egg come out of a chicken!!! A case of the right place at the right time and a new (to us) chicken who doesn't quite get the nesting boxes yet. For a brief moment I relived that moment when a baby makes its final move out and you are FREE. I *FELT* it. (That happens when I see a calf birth too.)



* Noticed the pink clouds at sunset.

* Gave Jed a pat and apologized for all the flies that have been pestering him lately. He licked my hand in return and took a nice cool drink of water.



* Picked up all the books on the floor in the living room and returned them to the library basket only to discover a book that I borrowed but never even opened. I sat down on the couch for a brief moment to see whether I ought to renew it or if it wasn't worth it and didn't get back up for an hour. It's worth it.

* Wrote two letters and sealed them with a kiss.

* Tried to decide what to do with the bushel and a half of peaches I just got...and fast.

* Harvested enough cucumbers to make my first batch of pickles

* Tucked everyone in except Corynn and read her four chapters of a Magic Tree House Book. I didn't mind the sticky heat even when she pulled herself close and pulled my arm around her shoulder.

* Could not understand why almost-six-year-old-child snuggles are so rare.



* Had a shower "experience". You know...the kind that takes your breath away with it's coldness but then feels so good you are left virtually incapable of leaving. I did, eventually, force myself out and now here I sit, cool and refreshed. Oh-evening showers are So nice.

* Look forward to wrapping my toes around Matt's slumbering ones in just a few minutes.

~~~~~~~~~~~

This day was filled with trials and testing, failures and sins because I am me. Unclean to the core. But it was also filled with renewal and cleansing, forgiveness and strengthening.

The house is asleep; the only sounds the click click of this keyboard, the hum of the dehydrator and the nightsongs from the window. The kitchen is cleaned from a hard day within and my list is made for tomorrow. It goes something like this:

* blanch more beans
* make more pesto
* can pickles
* stuff squash
* live with JOY
*speak with tenderness
* act with patience
* be one day further ahead down this road called sanctification

** recognize each of these moments as the gifts that they are.

Celebrating gifts 26-49 with the gratitude community~

Foto {Weekend}

Foto Fridays are becoming *very* unreliable these days, aren't they? At least I am posting something at SOME point this weekend, very unlike last weekend--I just realized TODAY that I never posted anything last week! Yikes.

I think part of it is because....I don't think I know anything else. I've been scrambling my brains trying to come up with SOMETHING else to tell you about taking photos~when I realized, of all the tidbits~I never did share with you my one great passion.

Macro (Up close) photography.

I use the term LOOSELY, mind you, since I have no macro lens~ but even without the "big guns" I find myself drawn to those super-close-up viewpoints.

To me, the camera is my microscope~I notice things more through the lens of a camera~the silk of a petal, the dust of a moth, the sparkle of a dewdrop, the twirl of a spiders web...



Each time, my breath is taken away at the awesomeness of this world and it's Creator.


With or without a macro lens, a close-up shot will give you a more intimate, detailed picture of your subject, even if it is of a smaller portion of your subject. With an added bonus, mind you, of keeping your background uncluttered!

I found a few examples in my Picasa archives of a single subject, taken with both far away and up close vantage points.

Perhaps they may convince you to get up close and personal with your subjects.

Of course, one of my favorite subjects is flowers...

The photos taken with a further perspective are nice but you would entirely miss the gently curled silk of the narcissus petals and the texture of the yellow insides of a waterlily had you not actually looked that deeply into the subject.

And my other favorite subject: my lovelies.

Was Adele' really that small once upon a time?!?

Can you tell the difference between photos? Do the more up close photos have a more professional air about them?

It is worth it to get up close and personal every once in a while (or more)~and to notice the little things about your subject that might be hastily overlooked any other time.

If only because~ sometimes the littlest things are the most magnificent.

A Link

Previously, I have dehydrated jerky, jalapenos, bananas and apples and that is ALL I have ever used my dehydrator for. It is a well-used piece of my kitchen equipment, but not with variety~just with quantity. I guess, because I had never done it all before and was never taught, I never realized the great potential the dehydrator offers.

This year though, I decided to embark more fully into the land of dried foods, mainly because I have a sweet, adorable calf getting larger by the day and a freezer that is already stocked full. And~ I won't pretend that the last four or five days where electricity randomly went out (for many hours) didn't get me a wee bit uncomfortable when I realized how much food would be LOST if it didn't turn back on soon.

The other day I took to making squash chips. I figured they might be yummy (and less fat than fried potato chips) when eaten with homemade dips. It was a trial run and SCORE! Turns out, they ARE good (besides the ridiculous amount of seasoned salt I put on them. ick) I have another batch working now.

That feat got me thinking about what other foods were dehydrate-able. (Don't ask me why I never thought ALL foods were...) and led to my discovery of THESE videos....

How to Dehydrate and Store Food

This lady is pretty admirable. I never realized what you could do with a dehydrator! And her message is a good one. The fact is, we need to start taking control of our lives and not being so dependent on everyone else (or the grocery store). I think it was Part 4 or 5 where she shows her homemade kitchen shelf JUST for dehydrated things and I gasped at how pretty it was. Oh my. Eventually, she covers cooking with it too. What a treasure trove!

I have determined to use my food dehydrator every weeknight for the rest of this week and next. We'll see if I can do it (and what the results will be.) Hold me to it, will ya??

I am on Part 7 of the videos now and looking forward to the rest. Thought I would post a link here, for those interested, in case someone else might glean some good information. ESPECIALLY since we've been talking about it here lately (Bonnie and Peggy!)

That's all. (said in a very Meryl Streep Devil Wears Prada voice)

Go with It

Learning is fun.

Learning is fun because LIFE is fun.

Homeschoolers are generally well-known to believe and live that life motto but it doesn't have to be limited to homeschoolers.

A picture in a book made a spark, cookies and icing blew oxygen in just enough to fan the flame, and an atlas and books illuminated our minds the rest of the evening.





We now know what the Eiffel tower is, what country it is in, what river it is beside (hey! The Seine is in a song we know!), what France's flag looks like and why the colors are the way they are.

We know these things not because we homeschool but because we live in a BIG and INTERESTING world, and learning about it is always exciting and ALWAYS fun.

We also know that the building an Eiffel tower out of wafer cookies and icing is harder than we originally thought.

But JUST as tasty.

Goings-On

These summer days.......



Miss Adele' is corn-eating

Miss Corynn has taken right to making friendship bracelets, usually about the time I bring out my crochet projects.

and Lil' Mister never tires of the creek.

As for me....

Our nightly garden visits are yielding baskets-full.

Apparently, I can grow more than lettuce (something I have been curious about asI harvested spinach, lettuce, and more spinach and lettuce just a few weeks ago!)

I've been enjoying the fresh from the garden goodness and the challenge of USING it all, for now and preserving it for later.

Last week I had to thin out the beets and used the beet greens. Dumb Blonde Rebecca never knew people actually ATE the beetgreens! *blush*

These days I feel very "vegetarian"ish.

Well....not QUITE.

Gifts and Gratitude

It's been an ugly, ugly weekend. So ugly, it was hard to see anything BUT the ugly; to think of anything BUT the depressing.

Sometimes a change in perspective is a painful thing to do...it can be hard work. Sometimes digging yourself out of despair is too exhausting and curling yourself away from it all seems the only (easy) way out. ALWAYS, that work is worth it though.



This is me, only on the second week of the 1,000 gifts, Gratitude Monday, floundering and flailing, forcing myself to find the beautiful in the ugly, the gifts in the given. The harder I work at finding it, the more that I see.

12 :: Ugly: Empty gas gauge-as bone dry as the "gas money envelope" The beautiful: A husband who, uncharacteristically, takes the long way home from church.

13 :: Ugly: the pit in my stomach, the empty stare of my eyes, and the quiet of my usually bubbly mouth. Beautiful: the teasing and playfulness of husband causing eruptions of laughter, when I needed it most



14 :: Ugly: A bed on the side of the road, stained up, splattered, dusty and old-but free for the taking. Beautiful: a three year old Panda who feels like a very big boy

15 :: Two nights (in a row) of bed-wetting (from two different children) Beautiful: Windblown sheets on a sunny day



16 :: Ugly: money always being spoken for, never an opportunity to splurge Beautiful: credit card paid off last month, our first month of no credit card payments. Freedom! THAT'S a beautiful thing!



17: Ugly: old, dirty dead-bug filled jars in crusty cardboard Beautiful: very necessary canning jars on the cheap, that will be more than beautiful when filled




18: Ugly: brown splotched pea pods Beautiful : peas plucked from their shells by a set of big hands and two sets of small ones. All together, happily working side by side.

19 :: Ugly: Plastic bottles, disposable containers, garbage littering the world, laying in wait for future generations. Such a disposable, wasteful culture. Beautiful: weaving plastic bottles around metal hooks and making warmth.




20 :: Ugly: holey plants, eaten and being eaten. Beautiful: metallic colors clutching fiercely~ tickling fingertips and children



Once I begin looking for the beautiful in the ugly, the gifts in the given, I begin to see the beauty without noticing UGLY at all.

A few, just plain beautiful...gifts, unwrapped daily

21 :: a computer to figure out how cook pattypan squash (?!?!) because I have PLENTY of it.

22 :: visits with good friends under the moon and candles



23 :: a scene from my own childhood~ little, lanky girl surrounded by a sea of school supplies. Just admiring, fingering, and anticipating. and

24 :: a CVS and TARGET who are giving me more than ample school supplies for free or pennies, seeking out the ad each week has become a real highlight for me!

25 :: Books!~ Abe Lincoln had to walk many miles to borrow a single book to read, and we have oodles at our fingertips; under our own roof, the roof of our library, and the online canopy of inter-library loans. All free for the taking.

Going Visiting

Good friends make life so pleasant and I've recently found a few more.

It started with a free bed on the side of the road which I happily and thankfully snatched up.

I returned with a strawberry rhubarb crisp in order to thank them for their kindness (and, just because, I included an invite to the book exchange.)

Turns out, we have quite a lot in common.

Thus, a friendship was born.

They have just the sweetest girls. I can always tell the quality of the parents by the quality of their teens.

We enjoyed a wonderfully fun day at their house, admiring gardens (and BEAUTIFUL garlic-just LOOK!),

exploring, laughing, wading, sheep petting, admiring, and getting to know one another.

By the end, we were happily exhausted.

It was a GOOD day.

I want sheep!!!

They had sheep

and a horse

and a homemade cable car. How COOL is that??!

And now...I have sheep and cable-car lust.

Don't freak out...

Ever see a cicada molting??

Maybe these photo are gross to some, but considering cicadas have a 17 year life-cycle and the "birth" lasts but a moment, I considered the opportunity to witness it to be a real, once-in-a-lifetime treat. The children, too, were thrilled.

How can you not be mystified at such a thing?

Just as I was with our Monarch, I am amazed at the smallness of the wings and how they stretch right before your eyes (but without your notice).

For those interested: you can see the whole molting process here. It is fascinating.