Thankful hearts!

 It was good to be with family on Thanksgiving! We went out to Vic's. The dinner was absolutely delicious - a beautiful group effort. 

Here are a few fun pictures. 

Hazel and Nova

Fischer and Kendal

Quinn and Cricket

Quinn - little beauty 

I am so thankful for family - young and old. 

It is so so good to have Merit home. 

I will try to get a pic of our 4 kids today.

It is foggy, dark, cold today! A great day for the spin bike - a good show - hot tea - leftovers...

 Our internal voice - although we are allowed to scream good things too - becomes habit. 

I am enough. It is good to whisper this or yell it if you live in the country 😅

It is really easy to miss those we love who are gone when there is that empty spot at the dining table. 

This time of year can be hard with being hard on ourselves; feeling we should do more, be more. Our best is enough.

Give yourself Grace

May you be encouraged today

Pictures from October 

It's cold brrr

I certainly miss our warm outdoor time with the goats, kittens,  and our horse. But we get out there as we can, when we can even with it getting dark out so early. 

The kittens are brave, finding warm forts in the hay. Bootstraps and the goats have their winter coats coming in. 

While Vance was away bird hunting in North Dakota, I found the motivation to help the kids clean their rooms. I am such a saver! But when they outgrow clothes - it is time to pass them along!

I had a big box going for senior center thrift store and a bag for New Hope. We threw several old school papers and folders in the trash. I had everything out from under beds and had a big fat mess happening. Hazel was so good about going through old toys and art supplies. The time and the quiet I had for these projects was welcomed! The progress felt so good. 

I am a collector of books! I LOVE books. I bet we have 1,200 in our home! Maybe another 200 in our shop. I found 70 or so books I could part with and somewhat reluctantly put those in a give away box.

Vance got home on Saturday. Willem was cooking eggs and grating cheese. I had a pile of books out, the vacuum cleaner in the hallway, a few messes in the front room. 

Vance quickly expressed that although his trip had great company and the bird hunting was fantastic, he was so frustrated with a messy house and kitchen on the trip. He wished things could have been clean and orderly. 

He wanted to walk into an orderly house - not projects in motion. 

I have had several weeks of feeling quite inadequate on many levels. 

When I get into a tough photography situation, I set to auto. Lazy. When it comes to editing and getting them to people I am the least tech savy person within miles. It feels so defeating. 

I baked a coffee cake for a gathering and it was completely undone in the middle.

Communicating with family members has not been my strong suit. I get busy and fail to connect well -

We all have had weeks like this or months like this. 

On Sunday each time I sat down I fell asleep. Maybe just for a few minutes once for a half an hour. My brain was so so tired. 

What I love is that  GOD's MERCIES are NEW EVERY MoRnInG!

And when I go through times of feeling inferior or inadequate, I like to take the focus off of myself. 

It feels so healing to write a couple of letters, drop a coffee or tea off to a teacher or two, make a donation to a local charity and these things make me smile. They bless me. 

Social media can make us feel like everyone else has it all together. It's a highlight reel not a highlight real. 

Comparison is so dangerous. 

We have so many Thanksgivings here! 

*God's mercies

*God's grace

*Wonderful teachers, coaches, and role models for these kids! 

*Today was a therapeutic day! The Tuesday morning Bible study I attend was full of blessings. Vance and I had a nice afternoon trip to Ephrata! Willem has a great attitude about basketball try outs. Hazel is enjoying cheer. Oren is enjoying school and has many stories each evening.

* We had a really yummy dinner and we get to crawl into our cozy beds soon. 

May you be encouraged today. 

 

We honor our Veterans

God bless our veterans. 

 

Thursday Musings

 To say I frequent the Senior Center Thrift Store is an understatement.

My car drives me there. An auto pilot sort of thing. I have very little say. 

I love to look at the rolled up fabric. Sometimes I find cut quilt squares... I have not sewn in five years. Yet, I am drawn - in a nostalgic way - to the fabric. Especially if it has a vintage feel-

Sometimes I have wrapped gifts in the fabric. I have made buntings and garlands with them. Marilyn has a bunting in her greenhouse that I made her several years ago with thrift store fabric. 

But as I looked around our home today, around clutter and books, fabric, some toys the kids no longer play with - I realized re-purposing and purging is what should be done today and tomorrow. 

I hate for things to be thrown away if I can re-purpose them or if someone else can use them. I am all about that. 

A couple of days a week, the Senior Center gets day old bread and produce that is ripe to over ripe. Avocados, peppers, strawberries, often times bananas, apples... and have helped many people out on many days. The food is free.  The bin was almost empty a couple of weeks ago. An elderly couple, maybe 85 pulled a couple of bags of apples out of the bin. I pulled out one of the last bags. I knew apples that were bruised could be fed to our horse. 

As I pulled the bag out, the apples were smooshy, very soft. At that point I did not really plan to take them. The older woman said to me "I can't wait to go home and make apple crisp with these! If you are going to bake them, it does not matter if they are soft." Her husband smiled. 

A true example of not wanting anything to be wasted. 

Good Wednesday Morning

This buck lives here. It's good, because he knows we are not dear hunters. 

 I haven't blogged for a while. I plan to be back soon with more of our happenings. 

It is SO cold today! 

And I am in the baking mood. 

When I took HJ to cheer practice this morn it was 23 degrees. I hope the kittens found a cozy hut in the hay. 

More soon....