Routine

"Monkey?! Get the camera!"

"Why? Is something cute happening?"

"No, just routine"


The fastest tongue in the west (so fast I couldn't get a pictue of it)















The start of something good















duck and goose creche











This morning















4:00 PM or so

A Diller, A Dollar

"You know Mom, when most kids go to school, the teacher's aren't still in their pajamas."

Very, very true.

Jewelery

Ah, well...I guess it's time to write something again?

We've had some life happening around here...Jon's dad, Denis Audet passed away on November 15th. It was an amazing thing--watching him 'decrease' (for lack of a better word) and seeing Jesus 'increase' over the last few months. We were all waiting for the miraculous healing. Waiting for him to wake up some morning and be perfectly healed and fully energetic. And it did happen, just not here. Jon had been there that afternoon and was planning on going back the following morning to do some repairs, and the last thing his dad said to him as he went out the door was, 'See you in the morning'.

And so we will.

Then it was a whirlwind of Thanksgiving preparations and finding ways for all the family to get here for the memorial service and then grieving together when they got here. And then it was the memorial service--a wonderful tribute to a life well lived--and the let down afterwards. And now it's the living without a beloved father.

And so we've kept ourselves busy. Jon's been helping his mom clear out some of his dad's stuff and rearranging her apartment. Kristine and I have gone back to school, and I've realized again how much I have to 'forge' this relationship with her. And how very important it is to both of us that we do forge this relationship.

I don't make many friends very easily. I have just a few very good friends, and I am very choosy about with whom I make those friendships. Not because I'm snobbish--although I've gotten that reaction more times than not--it's just because relationships are precious to me and I'd rather have a few, well guarded, well tended relationships than a hundred casual acquaintances. Just as I'd much rather have 3 or 4 large beautiful gems than a whole bucketful of agates.

On the other hand, there are people who I would not call 'very good friends' (in a tea sharing, woe bearing, laughter living friendship), but are people whom I love very dearly nonetheless. These are the people who consistently live out Christ for everyone to see. They never fail to encourage me even when they have no idea that they have and continue to do so. They don't burden me with their own troubles, and they don't expect me to care (but I do, just because they are so precious), but they want to know mine and, somehow, lift me up. I sometimes look at these lovely people from (as I perceive) afar, and wonder how I could add their graciousness, their sparkling sweetness to my own 'collection' of gems and really envy the people who do 'own' these friendships. And it's just then, at that very moment that I'm gazing wistfully at their charisma, that they, in unconscious charm, tell me what a precious and beloved friend I am to them. And I feel myself the richest girl on the planet.

Den was one of these jewels. He was wonderful here. It was so much fun to see him sparkle as he shimmered and reflected light with his faceted character. And all I can think of is Malachi 3:17. "They shall be Mine," says the Lord of hosts. "On the day that I make them my jewels; and I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him."

What a beautiful sight it is! To see all those jewels--those saints who have forged a relationship with the King--shining, reflecting the light of the everlasting sun.

How good and sweet are the memories of Den's life. But how much better is the knowledge of his future!

Snow-covered dirt clods and etc.

We has a sprinkling of snow this morning while I was milking. Kristine came running from watering the goats: "Mama, Mama! It's snowing! I TOLD you it would!" I had nay-say ed her earlier after looking out the window.

We like to celebrate the little things. So since it was snowing, we had to make some Snow-Covered Dirt Clod cookies.



















There really wasn't very much snow--so the sprinkling on the cookies had to be suitably sparse.









She's been just a little bit sick, so I'm not sure what that look on her face is meant to convey. Eating cookies under duress, maybe? 'It's going down, but then...?' LOL poor girl slept this all morning, and only rallied when the cookies were in the making.



This is Allie the Alpine (goat) and Opal the Himalayan (rabbit). They are both very sweet and friendly and perfectly tame. Opal loves to sit on Kristine's lap when she gets a chance and to dig burrows in the garden. Allie won't eat apples, but likes carrots. She's bred and due to kid in February.









And here's the trampoline. This is where Kristine can be found on any sunny day. I've been known to join her from time to time, and we have fun counting how many 'knee-up' jumps we can do in a row.





She also works and works to come up with a new trick to show. This one's a somersault. Very nice.



She really doesn't like the cold, so she pretty much lives in her long underwear. I think she put it on sometime around the first of October and hasn't had it off since. Smart kiddo.

Lena, Midas and Milk

Here she is: Our little Lena. She's a LaMancha, Alpine, Angora cross. You can clearly see the LaMancha in her tiny 'elf' ears. LaManchas are known for their great quantity of milk along with their very sweet, personable disposition. Lena would rather be with a human than with the rest of the goats! She's so-o sweet. She loves to be petted and coddled and generally babied. She won't be old enough to breed until next fall, and then we hope to have a saanen buck to breed her.

Don't you just love that face? It's pretty weird to get used too, but once you've met her you don't even care. Kisses and nuzzles and alfalfa-sweet whuffles are her favorite things. Her face isn't really that puffy--it's her shoulders you see just below her jaw to make her look like she's really got a mouthful.

The angora in her will give her a nice winter coat. All curly ringlets. I hope we don't have to shear her in the spring.

And here's Midas:

King of the Buff Orphingtons. He has a beautiful comb and wattle. Pretty docile too, as docile as a rooster with a harem gets, I guess.

And here's the in-house seniority:

When I bring the milk in to strain and cool,the cats and dog come and arrange themselves decoratively around the kitchen and dining room. Selah the calico usually sits as close to me as she can--preferably on a high stool--and makes the casual comment that perhaps I would be so kind as to share the wealth. If she doesn't have the stool to sit upon, she does her best to weave the message between my legs until I relent out of concern for my balance or irritation at her insistent, repeated demands. When the milk is placed on the floor, she delicately laps as much as she desires while Charley and Bootsy look on anticipating how much she will leave for them. They never challenge her right to the first share and don't complain if she leaves nothing for them. When she has finished, Charley takes his bit and maybe finishes it off. If he's not finished it, and even if he has, Bootsy cleans the little bowl very carefully.

Diggin' a ditch

Here's the masterpiece. We'd had trouble with this area before, and Jon had filled more dirt into this north west facing corner, and it had stopped leaking. Until the storm.

What would be the basement on any other house is the main living space in our house. So the builder thought he'd make it more comfortable (so Jon says) and build it out of wood rather than cement block. Sounds kinda strange to me, but that's how it is.

The corner you see in the picture is like this: the wall straight ahead is wood. The wall on the left is a bedroom added on later and made from cement block as you can see in the pictures below. I think the problem might be where the two materials meet. And the storm dumped such an amount of rain that the gutters overflowed and the rain ran right into the corner. So Jon spent a

couple of days digging out, and then fixing it up somehow--Kristine says it involved some mud 'snowmen' and mud angels (and I think it was a good thing I wasn't there)--and he's already filled it back up. I thought that maybe, since he'd had it all dug out, that he'd put in a back door there. It would be very handy there coming out of the laundry room. (As if we need another half-finished project around here. Isn't that what life's about?!)

This is the closet in that bedroom after he'd torn out the sheetrock and insulation.

We're putting a wood floor in this room--it's half way done at the moment--so I guess it was a good thing this happened now and not after we'd finished the floor.
















This has nothing to do with the leaking back bedroom. It just happened to be on the camera with the other pictures. It made me laugh, so I thought I'd share.

I love Chinese food. But I can't afford to eat it as often as I like, and I hate the crazy recipes and deep frying required to make it myself. So I'm always on the lookout for faux Chinese recipes--ones that don't take any odd ingredients and don't require me to do much more than stirfry.

I came across a recipe for lemon chicken that involved some lemon flavor jello. And it was quick and easy and I had most of the ingredients(except the lemon jello). So I substituted lime jello. It turned out this lovely shade of green, and it was delicious. Kristine protested loudly at the unusual color until I told her she could go without any supper, and then she ate with gusto and asked for more. And Jon gave it an enthusiastic 2 thumbs up. Maybe I'll keep the substitution.

Hail Damage

Almost a month gone by and no word from me. Don't you wonder why?



Well...just look at my plums! They were just coming ripe--and it would have been the first 'real' harvest off this tree.

The hail was golf ball size, and it went on and on. 25 minutes of being pounded with frozen golf balls will do a lot of damage to a poor plum tree. I was in shock for a while over this.



A week later I did manage to pick enough fruit off this tree to make one wonderful plum tort. The best. Too bad there wasn't enough to make a bunch and freeze them for Christmas. Sigh.














How about my tomatoes? They weren't even coming ripe yet--well a few on the outsides, but they were still mostly green. Just beaten to a pulp. What a mess. The chickens got a lot of the worst ones, but we left some damaged ones on the vine to see if they might just ripen up. No such luck. They rotted there. This disaster caused me more distress than the plums--it was a week before I could go out there without crying over it. Whew! Who knew I was so attached to my tomatoes?



We did get about 10 gallons for making tomato sauce--I was very excitted--and then I burned it. Bummer. There are a few more I can still salvage, but nothing like the 50 quarts I was hoping for.

My peppers were looking great this year. And then the hail came. Peppers with golf-ball size holes in them were all that were left. They rotted on the plant. Chickens loved them.

Our beans were done, and our fall peas had just been planted. We should be getting those pretty soon. The carrots are fine and the beets. The ducks got the broccoli earlier this spring, so no loss there (heehee).











And the squash. The winter squash were the least affected, but the vines just look horrible. The summer squash was, natually, completely lost. Good thing I already had my fill of it. How much zucchini bread can one eat? More than you think, originally, but then even that much is too much. Good thing everyone around here likes it.



These squash are just beginning to ripen now. The variety in the picture is called a 'striped cushaw' and is our absolute favorite. It has pink seeds and a pale yellow, very sweet flesh. They are huge--so 4 plants will keep us going all winter long. I bake them whole, and then scoop out the flesh and freeze it in 4 cup servings. That's enough for a meal and enough left over for pumpkin muffins or, maybe a pie.



There was some damage done to the house. Not as much as we'd thought (or hoped?), but enough that Jon's been digging trenches around it and tearing out sheetrock, and generally adding to the mess. Maybe I'll explain more later.



As it is, I guess I'd better be focusing on God's Benefits: No one was hurt. We didn't loose any animals or trees. The tornado that touched down a mile or so south of us, didn't bother us at all. We have insurance for the house. There are grocery stores we can utilize. I don't have to do all that work canning and freezing(even though I love it). We've been needing to tear out the sheetrock anyway--now the insurance will pay for it.



And that's why you haven't heard from me for so long. A lame excuse, I know; but sometimes I gotta retreat from my busy social life and do some self-care. Rest assured, I've had my chocolate and coffee and am ready to jump back in.