recovering!

Posted on April 21, 2015 by Shanda

Good morning! I was awakened this morning by Jacob knocking at my door at 6:21 in the morning because I had promised to write him a check for seventy dollars for the prom. As soon as I stood up, the all too familiar chills and flu headache appeared. I wrote the check and tortured myself by stumbling back to bed even though I knew I couldn’t sleep anymore…I had to wake up Seth and Caleb.

So here it is several hours later. The smell of roasting chicken is in the air, as I am getting a head start on dinner later which will be Chicken Divan. Little Sarah is pattering about upstairs getting dressed.

I was sick an entire week and indeed, I am not yet quite well.

However, God is to be praised and glorified because He delights in caring for His precious children and I felt his love so much over the last week. Rich had a business trip from Tuesday to Thursday and I was so sick I had to send out a distress call over Facebook. My friends came through for me in such generous ways! By eight that morning four of the children were taken away……Caleb and Seth to my friend Diana’s house, and Grace and Sarah to my friend Heather’s. And each of these ladies had four children of their own at home, too, not to mention one year old baby boys. Heather took the girls to the Science center and gave me a candle, card, and jelly beans (which I gave to Jacob to take with him to his track meet). Diana had the boys spend the night and when she brought them back she also gave us dinner. Which reminds me, I really need her bread recipe.

My friend Barb came over with essential oils and took the boys to their orthodontist appointment. She bought me a box of tissues.

I carry the baggie of oils around with me, they are so very therapeutic! My sense of smell is returning!

Last Monday for whatever reason I very dumbly decided to go for a walk with the children. My only excuse is that I had taken three ibuprofen and felt that I was getting better (oh how I laugh now) …. anyway, the reason I went was because Grace came to me and said, “Mom, I thought I heard ducks but it was really frogs. They’re back.” Namely, Spring Fever.

The happy frogs were down by the rushing stream in a quieter tributary, laying eggs. I’m not sure what type of frog they were, they were NOT the bullfrogs. Once we were that far, we decided to keep on going and walk up the dam trail.

David was jumping on the trampoline being unsociable and Ethan was at practice, so it was Jacob, Emily, Grace, Caleb, Seth, and Sarah.

Jacob shot a tree with an air-soft gun (I know, this was bad of him) and we all ran over to taste the sap. He looked around for a Maple tree but could not find one.

It was a little cold for Sarah so Jacob and Emily left with her and Seth. They also had bare feet and the grass was hurting them. Grace, Caleb, and I continued to the old beaver pond in the woods to search out some more frog activity.

We saw a new bird species as we entered the woods by a tiny stream. We didn’t notice it at all until we were almost upon it, it was so well camouflaged. The pictures I took are truly pitiable. If you lean in very close to the computer screen you can see it…a small bird about the size of a bantam hen, with an upturned tail, black eyes, and long beak.

You may have to take my word for it. It flew away reluctantly in three brief flights; the third one being the last attempt we made to “get a little closer”. I looked it up later on and decided it was perhaps a Water Rail.

We sat down by the beaver pond to watch the frogs. Grace was right next to me. She had bare feet and said, “What in the world is under my toes.” It turned out to be a tiny tree frog. Then, she climbed a tree and just as she settled in the branches she saw a red spider. Nature loves Grace.

Dear Caleb. He proudly wears his waterproof boots.

Eastern Skunk Cabbage blooms. It really does smell like skunk…the kids call it stink weed.

bright green moss on a boulder in the woods.

Skunk cabbage growing through a leaf.

Walking with boys ALWAYS involves a few battles with sticks.

Heading home. Caleb was our silent third party while Grace and I chatted and laughed all the while…….

When I got home I decided to open the last bottle of blackberry/sage Kombucha. It opened like a shot and Kombucha pulp sprayed all over the ceiling. I had to walk around on the island with clorox wipes to clean it off. If the cork wasn’t held on to the bottle by metal hardware I would be typing this blog post with only one eye.

I never even drank it. I could not taste it and couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t spoiled. I’m sure it wasn’t, but after cleaning up all the pulp I lost my appetite for it. It sure got fizzy, right?

After Monday I didn’t pick up my camera again for four days (this is impressive for me). I did have my phone so I took a few pictures with it:

I was in the cupboard trying to find something to snack on when Grace saw the word flu. We had to laugh at the irony.

Jacob and David, I’m so proud of these sons of mine.

Caleb after a few days of neglecting to gather the eggs.

The glorious sky on Friday which prompted me to touch the camera again. The day was dark and gloomy until the very end when the sun came out briefly. I love the dark sky and the sunshine trees.

Snickers asleep on the porch.

Seth playing football by himself.

On Sunday I thought I saw the football down by the pond but then realized it was a Muskrat of all things. It sat at the edge for a while, I think it was eating, sometimes the force of it’s digging made its long tail come out of the water.

walking away

Lastly, I took this picture of Rich reading to our youngest two last night before bed.

*******

I have two book recommendations for you, if you are interested. The first is titled A Room with View, written in 1908 by Edward Morgan Forster. It’s a free download on the Kindle. After you read it you can watch the lovely movie adaptation.

The second book is one that I am currently reading. It was written by a Romanian Lutheran pastor who was imprisoned for 14 years of his life in different prisons because of his Christian belief. It’s titled In God’s Underground and was written by Richard Wurmbrand and is a one dollar book on Kindle. Here is a quote:

“The prison years did not seem too long for me, for I discovered, alone in my cell, that beyond belief and love there is a delight in God: a deep and extraordinary ecstasy of happiness that is like nothing in this world. And when I came out of jail I was like someone who comes down from a mountaintop where he has seen for miles around the peace and beauty of the countryside, and now returns to the plain.”

That’s not to say that he did not experience satanic temptations, torture, and deathly illness, because he did. But in the midst of it all he experienced over and over again God’s amazing sustenance. What a beautiful testimony this book is and I think EVERY Christian should read it to get yet another idea of how awesome God is, and what is available to us as believers.

Here is just one more quote and then I will close this post for the day.

“Words alone have never been able to say what man feels in the nearness of divinity. Sometimes I was so filled with joy that I felt I would burst if I did not give it expression. I remembered the words of Jesus, ‘Blessed are you when men come to hate you, when they exclude you from their company and reproach you and cast out your name as evil on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy!’ I told myself, ‘I’ve carried out only half this command. I’ve rejoiced, but that is not enough. Jesus clearly says that we must also leap.’

“When next the guard peered through the spy-hole, he saw me springing about my cell.”

Dance for Jesus today, my friends! Rejoice and leap for joy!

the smell of cold, wet mornings

Posted on April 10, 2015 by Shanda

i took all these this morning before 10

funny morning

Posted on January 28, 2015 by Shanda

“Surely your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life.” Psalm 23:6
(yesterday, early morning) The snow was falling and blowing all over the place….the flakes were small and icy cold.

(yesterday, around noon). The snow was till coming down and the road wasn’t plowed.

When the snow let up in the afternoon, Rich went out to plow the driveways with his tractor. Ethan, Seth, David, and Caleb got dressed to play on the mountains of snow their Dad made.

Torturing his brother.

They came inside with blotchy skin, it was so cold that it took a little while, and some hot chocolate, to defrost.

We began to see a little traffic on the roads again.

Sarah began throwing up.

Grace and Jacob, who was recovering from being sick, played a card game. David searched the cupboards for something to eat, Rich was in the other room on a phone call.

The rest of these pictures are from this morning. We rarely get a snowstorm that causes us to have to shovel our porch.

“This is ridiculous!” ~Sherlock the Cat

Shadow of the house where I was standing on the porch, and drifts against the garage.

You would think that with a three car garage I would not have to deal with this.

Sherlock is cute because he likes to all of a sudden dive into the snow and play like a crazy cat. it was too much for Parker the Dog, so he pounced on the cat to play, too.

(Emily are you reading this? I love you!)

a walking path through the snow

I took this picture back in the house, through the glass door. The chickadees line up to get a sunflower seed from the bird feeder.

Seth was the last child to leave for school this morning. He walked carefully to the bus. He normally runs full speed, perhaps he didn’t want to go?

***

This morning was a two hour delay and frankly, we needed it. I woke up to discover that Rich was already gone to work and all seven children were awake. Sarah was sick on the couch, and Ethan was making french toast. As soon as my door opened Seth ran to me and asked if he could have a piece of French toast, too. I stumbled into the kitchen and used the last of Ethan’s eggs to make Seth his requested breakfast.

Grace wandered around asking me for safety pins and I told her where to find them at my sewing table.

Jacob wanted french toast so I gave him directions on how to make the egg dip for the bread. I made myself a cup of coffee and added French Vanilla creamer.

By the time Jacob was done making his breakfast, Seth asked for another piece, so this time I used Jacob’s left over egg.

David made himself scrambled eggs and asked me to put toast in the toaster for him so I did.

Sarah asked me to sit with her. I got my Bible from my room and began reading the portions for the “bible in a year” program, with a reading in Exodus, Matthew, Psalms, and Proverbs. I read it all out loud to her. I read about the Nile being turned into blood and you should have seen Sarah’s face. She gasped and was properly disgusted. She asked several times, “Is this true?” and I was able to say in a motherly sort of tone, “This is the Word of God, and everything in it is true.” We laughed over the names in the genealogies of the Israelites. She said she thought they were weird names and I told her she was smart. (I was impressed that she listened so intently, but when you’re sick you don’t have as much fight in you.)

Grace was trying to wear a pair of pants that fit almost perfectly; the waist was about 2 inches too big. First she pinned them and then she tried a belt. She was getting annoyed with the pants so I had her slip them off in my room and I took them in on my sewing machine.

As I sewed, screaming began in the boys’ room. David found Seth playing the DS and took it away from him and Seth screamed at him and came to tell me about it. My bobbin had just emptied (of course!) so as I talked to him, I got out my manual and refilled the bobbin, letting Seth help me by pressing the pedal. “Slowly, Seth! Slowly!” David came and perched on my bed and I stopped what I was doing to say, “Dave. SETH was not the problem in this situation. YOU were the problem. If you see Seth doing something that you don’t like, you need to come straight to ME and I will help you. You are NOT Seth’s parent, I am his parent. You are only Seth’s brother so he is offended when you boss him around.” I made him give Seth back the DS (which Dave had put in his own dresser, even though it wasn’t even his) and then of course the GAME cartridge was missing, so I had to send Dave back to give Seth the game. *sigh* David was upset and wondering why HE was “always the bad guy.”

I got Grace’s pants taken in and now fit perfectly. She was happy and asked if I would put her hair up in a bun for her.

I left my room and immediately smelled burning eggs. Caleb was trying to make scrambled eggs and he did really well except he didn’t scramble them as they cooked. Instead, he stood there and watched them burn, wondering when to “flip” them. I ran over and flipped the eggs over and sure enough, there was a smoking, burned skin that I promptly tore off the top. I took the egg patty out of the pan and placed it into the bowl containing french toast egg dip remnants. I got Caleb a plate and some cheese, hoping with the cheese to make the eggs more palatable. He didn’t complain or say anything. He just ate them. I’m sure they had a taste of ash and cinnamon to them, but like I said, he had no comments.

Sarah was thirsty and requested a gatorade. I went in the pantry but did not find any so I got her a juice pouch. She wanted it in her teacup so she put the straw in and squirted juice into the cup, and some onto the coffee table, too. I got the wood cleaner and paper towels to clean it up.

I sat Grace down and put her hair in a pony tail, then braided it and sent her upstairs to pin it into a bun herself. I noticed later that it didn’t happen. She smiled and said that she gave up. She went to school with just a pony tail.

I noticed Jacob and Ethan both quietly reading their Literature books and secretly fumed, wondering why I hadn’t seen them doing their assigned reading YESTERDAY when they had the entire day off. I may have even said something sarcastically but received no reply.

Finally, the High School bus came and took four children away to school. I had another hour to get Caleb and Seth ready by washing faces, making sure their teeth and hair were brushed, and turning on an episode of Arthur. I had nuts and a banana for breakfast and Seth ate a hotdog, a bowl of applesauce, and half a banana so I think it’s safe to say that his appetite is back after having the stomach bug.

I emptied a dishwasher, loaded the other one and pushed “start”. I scrubbed off the island.

Eventually, the other two boys got on their busses and I could breathe a sigh of relief. I love them all to death, I was amused by the chaotic morning, but I admit it was nice to have them leave for school.

more snowflake photography

Posted on January 8, 2015 by Shanda

I went outside yesterday morning and saw that the snowflakes were just right for a few more photography attempts.

In other news, the boys have a wrestling meet tonight. Ethan, as usual, is doing things the exciting way. He cannot find his singlet here at home so he’s hoping it’s at school in the locker room. He won’t know for sure until he gets there! Fun times!

I took all the ornaments off the tree today while the rabbit was playing under it.

The rabbit chewed through 1) a strand of lights 2) Rapunzel the (brand new) Barbie’s nose. It’s completely off, rather looking like it was shaved with a razor.

I finished reading Unbroken. It was excellent.

hands

Posted on November 18, 2014 by Shanda

I snapped these frosty photos the other day. Down at the edge of the pond the grass and leaves had beautiful long lashes of frost.

Guess what our little artist, Sarah, has been doing these days?

The first time she tried tracing her own hand I told her it looked like the hand of a monster. I did most of the tracing but eventually I became reluctant about stopping my own projects to trace *yet another hand* for her, so she decided it was more time-efficient to do it herself.

‘Mom! I did it! And it doesn’t look like a Monster-hand!”

(it doesn’t?)

I taught her how to draw pretty jewelry, and fingernails, too.

This one doesn’t have fingernails. But it does have a ring on each finger.

All that is required is paper and colored pens/crayons. It kept Sarah busy for a long time and it gave her lots of practice with tracing, drawing, and designing.

lady-bugs

I traced two sets of hands on some of the pages, trying to save time and paper.

As you may have noticed, Billy-Cat came over to see what I was photographing.

He communicated to me that it was a much nicer idea to photograph a handsome cat.

*lick-lick making myself ready for my portrait*

*wait, let me pose first*

*this is my best pose*

*how’d it turn out?*

I have happy cats because Sarah and I went to the grocery store to buy them food. They ran out yesterday and had to gag down dog food. All four of them have full tummies and are in various places in the house, sleeping it off.

This is what our mantel looks like right now. Jacob did the painting. I love how the red in it matches the mushrooms. Grace and Dave went for a walk and brought me the piece of wood (to the left of the painting, it’s the same color as the rocks so hard to see), they called it an octopus and plan painting it purple (I admit it would be easier to see). My felt mushrooms are from the Masonville General Store in NY. I pulled up some greenery from the woods and added artificial flowers along the mantel, too. The “give thanks” banner is from Pottery Barn (last year). I love how if you take the “e” off the end of “give” and then next four letters from “thanks”, it spells my son Ethan’s name. Sometimes I move those letters to the middle just for fun.

fiestaware in the sunshine

Tonight, I’m making meatloaf for dinner, with spinach and mashed potatoes.

I’ve shared Sarah’s hands and now I will share her song:

Won’t you give her a hand?

how I go to the woods, by Mary Oliver

Posted on November 8, 2014 by Shanda

Ordinarily I go to the woods alone, with not a single friend,
for they are all smilers and talkers and therefore unsuitable.

I don’t really want to be witnessed talking to the catbirds
or hugging the old black oak tree.
I have my way of praying, as you no doubt have yours.

Besides, when I am alone I can become invisible.
I can sit on the top of a dune as motionless as an uprise of weeds,
until the foxes run by unconcerned.

I can hear the almost unbearable sound of the roses singing.

If you have ever gone to the woods with me,
I must love you very much.

ramble

Image

“The day was beautiful and the way was beautiful.”
Anne of the Island, L.M. Montgomery

***

Late this morning I took little Sarah on a short walk through the woods and into the field, wandering about, going exactly where we wanted to go. Underneath our feet were brown pine needles and crispy leaves. The sun was shining. Everything was bright, fresh, and lovely. We ate a few wintergreen berries and Sarah talked about nothing and everything while I dutifully listened and took snapshots.

These three mushrooms were growing up from behind tree bark; bark which was hanging off an old fallen down log.

Thanks to Aunt Colleen’s inspiration, I am taking up crochet again. I recently made Jacob a pillow and am almost done with a red and black striped one for David. As I admired this tree lichen I dreamed of finding yarn in the same creamy mint color and crocheting a doily.

I asked Sarah if I could put her in a tree and she generously agreed.

We had found a turkey feather.

She ran ahead of me into the field and saw a man walking his dog. I had to laugh as I wondered what he must have thought to see a tiny girl emerging from the forest, talking and laughing. He told us that he walked there all the time and his dog, Bruno, used to be a bird dog. Bruno caught 101 birds but is now retired because he’s old and his hips are bad. Regardless, Bruno was having a great time wobbling around on his loose hips while his owner drank coffee from a plastic mug in one hand and carried a walking stick in the other.

I tucked purple wild flowers and rose hips into Sarah’s ponytails.

She was so pleased with her turkey feather. In fact, as soon as her Dad came home from work she showed it to him. He said it was the nicest he’s ever seen.

While Sarah climbed a boulder, I admired a wavy, curly tree fungus. There were different sizes growing and I pulled a small one off. It was rubbery and strong, I could not tear it in half no matter how hard I tried.

We made our way back home by going down the trail a little ways and then through the woods to cross our stream onto our own property. On our way across, we saw a dear dear friend. I took pictures of Sarah’s face as she cooed motherly greetings at him……..

It was Billy-cat, coming to say hello to us.

After our walk I made Sarah eat ALL of her cheese sandwich including the crust, and then I gave her a chocolate pudding cup for dessert. She had a nice nap, and so did I.

****

We breathe below, but we live above; we walk on earth, but our conversation is in heaven. John Flavel

you are loved

my hen’s near death experience

Posted on September 11, 2014 by Shanda

Can you see the turkey???

Yesterday afternoon I felt that I must get out of the house and outdoors. I “made” David, Caleb, Seth, and Sarah come with me. David was the most unwilling, for some reason walks make him impatient, perhaps because we don’t just walk, we stop constantly to look at things. “Walk” is probably not the best word to describe our walks.

At the top of the dam trail I found a turkey feather. When we got up to the field the turkeys were there. In great excitement, the boys and I tried herding them toward us but as I ran Sarah began to sob “I can’t run fast! I can’t run fast!” so I stopped and went back to her, she was losing her breath in her sadness and crying so I sat down and held her, comforting her by saying I would never leave her alone. How terrifying to watch your mother run fast AWAY FROM YOU! “What IS a turkey?” she asked. Oh, dear Sarah. She hadn’t even seen them in the distance, she didn’t know what a turkey was, perhaps it was monster-like! No wonder she was so very upset. We sat and had a conversation about turkeys and the boys came back to join us.

At this point our “walk” had lasted all of 1o minutes and David said he was going home. “NO YOU’RE NOT” I cried. There were complaints from the children. “Wait a minute! You can sit in front of the tv, you can play video games, but you can’t sit in the grass?” “It’s too itchy!!” “JUST sit down, boys!” The whole walk-idea wasn’t working. But, as we sat I started talking to them about the praying mantis we found the last time we were up there…..”maybe we can find another one and take it home to put it in a jar”, I offered.

David actually thought that this was as good idea. We all got up and started to peer into the bushes at the edge of the forest.

We found nothing but bumble bees on the beautiful dark yellow goldenrod flowers. The boys kept going, though, and everyone started getting along again. We played by the stream for quite a while.

David studied milkweed. We are both sad because we didn’t see any monarch caterpillars this year. What’s happening to them??

We popped popper plants and sat up on the cement drain thing, which is sort of like a platform. The kids have to climb up to sit on it, the water drains through a pipe and we can look down into it. Sarah felt as if she was on a stage so she did her fighting moves.

Seth was exploring but kept coming back to mama for a quick “hello”.

Caleb was collecting beaver-chewed sticks and David tried catching a small crayfish without success. You can be sure there would be a picture of it if he got one!

Doesn’t the pile of sticks look like the work of beavers? I was watching Seth and had a little panic when I saw him shaking an arm to get something off himself. I immediately thought he had walked over an ant hill, but it was only a slug. “I hate slugs” he explained.

David begrudgingly helped his little sister down, but I could tell that he felt good about it after it was over.

The lighting at the end of the day is so pretty….Caleb had generously given each child a beaver-chewed stick to swing around on the way home.

The lighting at the end of the day is so pretty.

Billy Cat was ready to greet us as we returned, he was very interested in Sarah’s stick.

*****

When we got in the house it was time to go get the other children from school. I hadn’t given anyone dinner at this point so I loaded everyone up and we picked up J, E, G, and Emily. We took Emily home and drove to the grocery store, & everyone was loud. Grace was telling me about a hard part in her day, the little ones were bickering in the back seat (I don’t know what’s going on with them lately, I’m going to blame it on Rich being gone all week), and so on. I needed some quiet so I didn’t let anyone come in the store with me to get stuff for a taco dinner.

By the time we arrived home it was 7:00pm and I was feeling a lot of rush and pressure about getting dinner done so the younger ones could get to bed. They are so tired by the end of the day. In the midst of doing 8 things at once as I prepared dinner, GRACE CAME IN THE HOUSE to tell me I had to come to the chicken coop!! “I can’t, I’m cooking meat!!!” “DAVID CAN WATCH IT, YOU HAVE TO COME, MOM!!” She would give me NO HINTS except the reassurance that the hens were alive and well.

Would you take a look at this? On the upper left you see a bunch of feathers from one of my hens. The dead bird is a Hawk, which most certainly was in the process of KILLING THE HEN when ……….. SOMETHING KILLED IT. I am intrigued because it is a mystery how it could have died. Our dog didn’t kill it, I know, because the chicken coop is behind his electric dog fence. Was it a cat? Was it the rest of the flock (four hens?) defending their sister-hen? Oh how I would love to know the answer to this story!

As for the hen which lost so many feathers……..

She is wounded, but happily eating and drinking in the coop like nothing at all happened to her. She’s thankful to be alive.

All in all, the day yielded eight new feathers for my collection. Five from turkeys and three from the hawk.

I pulled the feathers from his dead body this morning and washed them.

the clouds are so pretty today

Posted on September 8, 2014 by Shanda

Psalm 19:1

The heavens are telling the glory of God;
and their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.

Psalms 36:5
Your lovingkindness, O LORD, extends to the heavens, Your faithfulness reaches to the skies.

timmy the mouse…beans…concord grapes

Posted on September 2, 2014 by Shanda

“After a mouse has been studied it should be set free, even though it be one of the quite pestiferous field mice. The moral effect of killing an animal after a child has become thoroughly interested in it and its life is always bad.” ~Anna Botsford Comstock

GOOD morning! How are you today? Did you have a nice Labor Day weekend? We did, too. A little bit of everything…rest, play, work, fun, and so on. The children are back to school today and I just taught little Sarah how to use the vacuum cleaner to clean up her own cookie crumbs. She did a great job. Now she’s going to watch Franklin (the turtle cartoon) until I’m done with my blog-writing, and then we’re going to the library for some new story books to read for the week.

Do you know what I think is fun about life right now? The unpredictable way of it, the way you can take a break on the porch with a stack of cookbooks and be interrupted by a mouse! Or when you host a Bible study at your house and someone’s grandparents bring you a bag of fresh garden beans. Or, when a little one is too sick to go to church and you end up going for a walk and find ripe grapes!

Who would have guessed these little events would happen to us this weekend, just small parts of the whole of course, (we did much more), but these are a few of my favorite things that happened in our family as we moved from August into September……..and enjoyed an extra day in the week-end. *I love my family*

“I SMELL A MOUSE”

I was, like I mentioned, sitting on the porch looking up recipes for green bean side dishes…..when superhero David rescued an adorable deer mouth from the jaws of death. He promptly put it in a bucket and gave it a cheerio. Seth was an onlooker, looking but not touching, but then when big sister arrived on the scene, she promptly named him TIMMY and picked him up!

I had told the boys not to touch it.

David was offended because it was HIS MOUSE. And she wouldn’t give it back! She said she loved Timmy.

She tried to put Timmy back in his bucket but he ran up her arm!

So she kept him longer. She said he loved her, too!

David continued to be annoyed.

Annoyed and stressed out. Grace was bonding with the field mouse. It is my belief that the mouse was in shock and didn’t know what was going on.

They started going into the house to show Dad but I began to yell about how unwise that idea was……what if Timmy got away?

So Grace came back, yelling at her brothers to stop trying to take him away from her…..not sure what Sarah’s doing…..

Grace, Seth, David, and Sarah marched in a line to the woods and released the mouse with blessings for a long and happy life.

I left the porch and set to work on my green bean side dish.

I used a recipe from the old cookbook Kara gave me through the mail (thank you, dear dear friend!!)

The beans were wonderful. I washed them, trimmed them up, and cooked them in a pot of water until they were just right (we like them soft).

Meanwhile, I fried three slices of chopped bacon and then sautéed finely chopped onion (3/4 cup) in the bacon grease.

When the beans were done, I added them to the onions and bacon, and seasoned them with salt, pepper, and paprika.

Rich and I ate them all for dinner (that’s all we ate). Grace tried them, too. They were delicious.

I took this picture while the beans were boiling.

We had a strange little illness go around the family…consisting of a stomach ache and head ache. Sarah threw up one night, but the others just had the aches. Caleb had it in the night before church and said he couldn’t go, he “just couldn’t stand it” if he went to church. Consequently, Rich left with the other children and I stayed home with Caleb…..after resting all morning and giving him Advil, I decided it wouldn’t hurt for us to go on a gentle stroll down the road.

He took a plastic bag in order to collect wild concord grapes. They were sour; our walk was punctuated by the sound of him vigorously spitting them back out…….I politely refused his generous offers of grapes from the bag.

They are abundant this year……and smell so good, much better than they taste. However, Rich also likes eating them. Later on, he was delighted to discover Caleb’s bag of them on the kitchen counter.

I made jam from them last year but we still have a few jars left so I’m not tempted to do anything with them this year.

The neighbor’s cows.

***

I hope you have a wonderful day where ever you are, school, work, home….isn’t it marvelous that God sheds his blessings (big and small) on us no matter what we’re doing? I’m thankful for time to get things done, an opportunity to write to my friends here in blog-land, a trip to the library, a beautiful warm day, with health and energy to do what I need to do for my family. God is good.

You are loved.

“Gentleness towards self and others makes life a little lighter.” Deborah Day