Lessons learned from the Fridge

Maggie, Anna, and Lizzie (a.k.a.my work crew) left last night to go to Mom and Dad's in Virginia for the weekend. Anna will be playing 3 piano pieces for Mom's church on Sunday (offertory and prelude). This picture shows Allen and Ruthie, supposedly bored now that their entertainment has gone south.

This past fall has been extremely busy for our family, so yesterday I took my children bowling, and today I am having down time. Real down time! Allen and Ruthie are quietly beading (more on that tomorrow) and I have all music turned off. Even the hum of the food dehydrator (especially the hum of the food dehydrator!) drove me nuts, so I moved it into the mud room and shut the door. You know I need down time when I won't even allow music!

Then I cleaned out the refrigerator. Usually I only have to clean it four times a year and even then, it's not terribly bad. (I do a lot of touch-up cleaning.) But this week someone spilled a jar of pickles that hadn't been closed tightly, and well, you know how bad my reefer was.

So while I was cleaning, I had a lot of time for reflection. To look at the outside of my fridge, it doesn't look too bad (shoulda gotten the smudgeproof stainless!) as you can see here:
Sort of like our lives: we look good on the outside by going to church, dressing modestly, training our children, etc. We can hide a lot of sins by keeping our doors shut!

Well, today I dropped one of the shelves and it broke. But I can still use it, it just lost its "pull out" feature that we never used anyway, and you can't tell that it's broken. That made me think of all the people who are broken on the inside.

But my biggest lesson today came from the pickle juice. The juice spilled from top to bottom, getting on each shelf as it passed to the bottom. Our lives are that way. The things we do affect many other areas of our lives, and also affect other people. I had to pick up each item in the fridge and wipe it clean, just as we have to confess each sin daily and before partaking of the Lord's Supper.


But what a wonderful feeling when every last sin is confessed and your fridge is clean as a whistle!

This isn't the first time that I've learned from my fridge. Our old fridge before this one was a tiny fridge. It reminded me of the government-issue fridge back in Navy housing (but not quite). Anyhow, that fridge had a break in the inside front from where a child had stepped on it to reach the top shelf. I hated that break! All the crumbs seemed to collect there, and it just looked bad!

Well, wouldn't you know that the first week after I got my new fridge, and I dropped a frozen chicken in the exact same place and it was broken the same way?! I had 6 pairs of eyes watching me at that moment, waiting to see what I was gonna do. So I simply said, "Okay, Lord, I'm listening to whatever it is you want to tell me!"

So almost every time I see that break, I ask the Lord if there's anything that He's trying to tell me. Ever hear of a Providential break?

Well, thanks for listening. I'm going to take a long break and try to tackle the range that is just as dirty as the fridge was. Hopefully I won't bore you with any range lessons!

Many blessings ~ Kathie

P.S. ~ In case you wonder why I have a container of Breyer's ice cream in my fridge section, I was given the nice container to keep my freshly ground wheat in!

Bowling Fun

Today when we went on base to get our weekly allergy shots, I treated the youngest 5 children to two games of bowling. It was so much fun!

We used to go bowling regularly with other homeschoolers, but with all the children taking many music lessons, it got too hard to schedule.

Unfortunately, the base stopped their $1/game and raised it to $1.75 game which made this afternoon a $36 event, including shoes. But we had so much fun and my children kept thanking me for a great afternoon.

Hope you had a great afternoon, too. The sky is white with clouds, but they are rain clouds, not snow clouds. Have a nice weekend.

Many blessings ~ Kathie

The John Marshall Family

Last night we went to hear the John Marshall family sing. What a treat! To learn more about this talented family, go to http://www.johnmarshallfamily.com/. The Marshalls started off their ministry 30 years ago with all ten of their children. Now they travel with the three youngest daughters. At the service last night we heard about 8 songs. We have all of their CDs and a bunch of older cassettes, but we had never heard any of the songs from last night.

We got to hear the harp, banjo, mandolin, piano, guitar, violin, and pennywhistle. Their harmony was impeccable. Such a blessing.

The church where we went, The Blessed Redeemer Baptist Church, was having a revival. So unfortunately we didn't get to hear Mr. Marshall preach, but the visiting evangelist delivered a great sermon. My children rarely get to hear a "hell, fire and brimstone" -type sermon, so last night was really different for them. At our church, Pastor has to say something really profound to get a weak Amen from our congregation. But the folks at the revival really know how to shout!Yesterday Maggie was home alone and got an urge for a homemade chocolate chip cookie. She didn't want to make a whole batch (she must've been feeling ill!) so she just threw in a bit of flour, sugar, pinch of egg replacer, salt and baking powder, a handful of chips, and put it in the toaster oven. She said it was the best chocolate chip cookie she has ever tasted! It sure looks it!

Have a wonderful Saturday. Start preparing your heart for the sermon tomorrow.

Many blessings ~ Kathie

Family Christmas Dinner at Sandgates

Twice a year, Mom and Dad treat the whole family to dinner at Sandgates, a riverfront seafood restaurant nearby. In the summer, the children have fun walking the piers and enjoying the beautiful river views while waiting for the food to arrive. But tonight it was dark when we got there. The restaurant was decorated beautifully for Christmas. My three brothers and their families were there.

I lost count of how many dozens of crabs we ate. They were the best crabs I have ever tasted. The best part is that I was given the dozen leftover crabs to bring home for breakfast tomorrow morning.

Mike got an oyster sandwich, but my children and I ordered softcrab sandwiches. They were wonderful. The cook was really nice about not dipping them in egg and milk.

We went through 4 dozen steamed shrimp. Sandgates makes their own cocktail sauce that is simply the best.

My hubby and brothers ate steamed oysters. My brother Mike ate fried oysters and they sure looked good.

We decided this crab was the largest.

We all like the relaxed atmosphere. A few years back when the hurricane Isabella came through, our family's annual trip to Bethany Beach got canceled, so Dad took us all to Sandgates for a most memorable dinner. There was no electricity for miles around, so we ate in dim light provided by generator. But the crabs were plentiful and everyone was in a festive mood. The bathrooms didn't work, so it was really roughing it! But we will remember that dinner forever.
Afterwards, Mom and Dad came to our home for tea and fellowship. Dad sat in front of the fire, but Mom and I had fun playing two-piano music. We even played some of Shelley Garlock Hamilton's two-piano music ~ I could hardly keep up! Sure was fun.

Have a good Friday. Hopefully it will be a little warmer than today. If it isn't gonna snow, it might as well be warm!

Many blessings ~ Kathie

First snow of the season!

This morning we were at Homeschool Co-op when the snow started to come down. I wasn't concerned because we got bumped off the map where the snow totals were listed. At the very most, the weatherman said we might get a dusting.
So this is how deep our dusting is. The ride home wasn't bad, but as soon as I turned onto our dirt road, which is on an incline, I slid all the way to the bottom. I tried pumping my brakes, then gave up and tried to enjoy the ride.

Lizzie immediately started a fire in the fireplace and got the woodstove started, so we are toasty and enjoying the snow.

Our neighborhood consists of 8 homes. The first home is located almost a mile in on our dirt road that has two steep hills. When it snows, the hills aren't so bad as long as no one comes the other way. So my neighbors call me to see if anyone is leaving on this end of the road. One neighbor smashed four cars in a matter of minutes. (Three of those cars were supposed to be rescuers!) So around here, we take snow seriously.

Have fun and enjoy the snow.

Many blessings ~ Kathie

What To Expect From A Twelve Year Old

Last month I entered a blog contest sponsored by Kim at Life in a Shoe and I won $150 worth of CDs from Vision Forum! Somehow in the midst of being very nauseous with her 9th pregnancy, Kim was able to send me the CDs. This morning, on our way to church and back, our family listened to the first CD in the set of CDs called The Family Rebuilders Library (8 CDs total).

The name of this CD is "What To Expect From A Twelve Year Old." Talk about giving your child a vision!! My twins will be twelve in May. Allen has told me twice today how much he enjoyed this CD. The speaker is Dr. S.M.Davis. Dr. Davis draws from the Bible and from history for his many examples. I am really excited about listening to the rest of the library.

We didn't get to finish this CD, but when we do (this week, hopefully), you are welcome to borrow it. Every child, 10 years and older, should listen to it. But truthfully, you should get this CD for yourself to listen to several times. Sometimes in the course of our busy lives, we lose our vision for our children. This would be a great CD to watch with your youths once a year to regain that vision.

On another note, my bread that I tried to rise slowly overnight in the fridge, flopped...although I did notice it got eaten. Tonight I set up another batch and tomorrow I will add fresh garlic cloves before baking. Can hardly wait!

Tonight's sermon was very interesting. Pastor taught us that Jesus' claim to kingship was legally through his earthly father, but by blood through his mother.

I hope you had a restful weekend and a worshipful Sunday.

Many blessings ~ Kathie

Bread Experiment

I really wanted to bake my bread outside in the dutch oven, but it was too windy and the charcoal wouldn't cooperate. And I couldn't get the inside bake oven fired up in time. So I decided to bake both loaves the same way and compare the differences between the white and whole wheat loaves. In both pictures, the left loaf is the white loaf and the right loaf has freshly ground whole wheat.

Here they are baked! I really expected the white loaf to be much bigger but it isn't. Let me tell you, the loaf on the right is packed with nutrition. And there wasn't much difference in taste except that the right loaf tasted wheatier.

Tonight I will make another experiment and see if I can have the loaf finished baking when we get home from church.

I'm off to the sewing room to accomplish great things!

Many blessings ~ Kathie