Author: valuesdr

Thoughts on our Moving Sale

valuesdr

We had a massive moving sale this weekend. It was amazing to see how much stuff we have accumulated over the past couple of years of being at this house, even though we have purposefully streamlined our possessions and tried to align our lives with Jesus’ teachings on non-accumulation.

It was hard to see some things go. I still had quite a few baby outfits from when our twelve year-old was born, which have been handed down to each of his siblings in turn. I can remember how he looked in them. They are gone–not sold, but given away at the end to a guy from town who offered to do a “clean-up” for us.

My mom tenderly saved so many of the baby doll clothes I played with as a child. They were hand-made by my mom, who is an excellent seamstress. They were so detailed and beautiful….many hours of labor in that bag of clothes. They sat in her cedar chest during my teenage years and she couldn’t wait to give them to my daughters after me. Now they’re gone. Given away, too. Maybe another little girl will appreciate them as we did.

My sister and I spent many happy hours “playing school” at our old school desks. My mom stored those up, too, and my girls have used them for the past 6 years. I remember what a labor of love it was to re-finish them (finally!) a couple of years ago. They are gone, too…but the sweet memories remain.

All of this doesn’t really make me sad. But what made me cry was seeing my 10 year-old’s favorite stuffed animals sold for a quarter a piece–because he cried, too. He said, “I thought I’d get at least 50 cents for them!” At first, I was a little disappointed because I assumed he was worried about not having an extra dollar or so in his pocket. But after talking through it with him, I realized that he cried because those things all had value for him (mostly sentimental, of course). And it hurts a little to know that the things that mean so much to you, are just about garbage to someone else.

Those are just a few thoughts from a very busy weekend, and a much emptier house. But we accomplished our goal of getting rid a significant amount of our “stuff.” All part of the process. We press on…and it’s all good.

“Sooo….that’s my life in a bag”

valuesdr

In preparation for moving to Kenya in February, we’re having a massive yard sale over Labor Day weekend. Today I supervised the children as they went through all of their possessions. Their instructions: Make a pile for yard sale or giveaway, fill their backpack of things they want to bring, and throw away the rest. It’s interesting to see what each of them finds important enough to make the trip. (Note: books and clothes are being packed separately as necessities; they’re just packing their personal items.)

Isaiah (age 12)

He’s my “engineer-in-training.” Always working on a project. So in addition to his Bible, notebooks, watch, solar-powered battery charger, and a few small toys, here’s his “stash”:

He showed me everything in his backpack, ending with, “Soooo….that’s my life in a bag.” A sobering thought, indeed. It brought to mind this verse:

“Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.” (James 4:14)

Jonah (age 10)

Our budding naturalist who still very much likes to play!:

Rebekah (age eight)

Likes to read, write, and do arts and crafts:

Stuffed animals are one thing I’ve long discouraged the children from owning. I’ve never seen them do much but collect dust and get thrown around. However, they each have one or two that are special for one reason or another. Bekah’s teddy bear is no exception. When she got some money for Christmas last year, she really wanted to buy a special stuffed animal for herself. I told her that it was her money to spend, but encouraged her to do so wisely and through prayer. After a week or so of praying about it, she said, “I do want a stuffed animal, but only if God wants me to have one.” That day we needed to go to the Post Office, and oddly enough, there was a box full of stuffed animals there. The post master said that they were left over from some outreach that they had done over the holidays and we could pick up a few if we wanted them. That night, Rebekah wrote about it in her “Praise Book” journal of answered prayers and said she would save her money to buy a Bible. For her birthday shortly after, she received a Bible as a gift from her Auntie. That made her praise book , too! 🙂 Now both of those items are in her Kenya bag.

Deborah (age 7)

Deborah is a real collector of “stuff.” Here’s what she narrowed it down to:

Hannah (age 5)

You know the expression, “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure?” Somehow Hannah ends up with the stuff no one else wants, and she thinks it’s treasure, indeed. Any time she gets anything new for herself, she usually ends up giving it away. She’s a sweet soul.

Micah (age 4)

He wants to bring everything to Kenya! It took a lot of work to narrow it down so that everyone was happy.

Jubilee (2) loves her new “pack” and is wearing it around the house, perfectly empty and happy as a clam.

What would your “life in a bag” look like?

Busy Tomato Days

valuesdr

Last week we spent three days processing tomatoes. Looks like we will do the same this week. We planted a lot more tomato plants this year but are getting quite a bit less, due to lack of rain.

Last Monday, we had almost two, five-gallon buckets full of tomatoes. Here are some photos of the kids working:

Peeling and squeezing…

Bringing in carrots

Here’s the pot full:

And the gallon of tomato juice we made:

Seems a shame that we only made 3 quarts of spaghetti sauce for all that work! But it is yummy sauce, and really we only worked for a couple of hours, from start to finish.

The second tomato day last week, we made 2 more quarts of sauce, and the third day we did 4 quarts of salsa.

Today is another salsa day! Looks like we will get  4 quarts (which is good, since 3 of the 4 quarts from last week are already gone! How did that happen?) Today Rebekah (age eight) is pretty much running the show, as I’ve been busy with the baby (and blogging!). After a few times of going through the process, everyone knows how to do their part fairly well, with supervision.

Praising God for the harvest, and for the many hands that make light work.

$20 per Month Grocery Challenge

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Early last month, my husband dropped a bombshell on me:

“I want you to stop grocery shopping until we leave in February.”

Ummm…no. Can’t do that. Are you crazy?!

Well, that’s what I thought…not what I said. I heard him out.

His concern is that once we move to Africa, it’s going to be very shocking for all of us (especially the children) to go from our rather “abundant” diet to a much simpler menu. (Think ugali, which my twelve year-old still grimaces about because “they don’t even put a little bit of salt in it! It’s just corn that has the texture of clay!”) Not only that, we do have a ton of food in storage, plus the garden, and…what are we going to do with it if we don’t use it up before we move? Finally, wouldn’t it be great to save up the extra money from the food budget and use it to pay for our airfare, or to fund additional missions work?

All good points, I had to concede. Still, I couldn’t envision spending only $20 a month on groceries. What about milk? Butter? Cheese? (I love cheese!) We can’t even buy diapers (though I use cloth sometimes), household cleaners, and hygiene products for $20 a month, never mind some of those things we would need to supplement our food storage items.

So, after discussing it calmly and rationally, I realized that Marc meant $20 on food only. So the other things would be additional expenses. Whew! Maybe we can do it…

It’s been about a month now of eating out of storage and the garden. I spent about $5, on a pound of butter and a gallon of milk. Granted, I still had some butter in the freezer, and now I don’t. So we’ll see how our budget looks in the coming months as I use up a lot of what I have. But you must understand how much we have! We don’t actually keep our food stores in our 1400 SF home; there’s no room. We keep it in a back bedroom at my father-in-law’s house next door. Here’s just one photo:

And that doesn’t show the utility shelf of home-canned and commercially canned goods–also quite an ample supply. We have a large family and wanted to have an “emergency” store of food–and even at the recommended 30-day supply, that’s a lot of food! So we had purchased a bunch of buckets from Emergency Essentials quite a while back when they were running a sale. We were using them a bit for regular food preparation, but not much. Well, now is the time to use it up as much as possible! Pictured is rice, wheat, pinto beans, black beans, and oats. Our canned and other dry goods include tuna fish, spam (yuck, but the kids like it, and we wanted some non-perishable protein on the shelf!), canned chicken breast, salmon, some fruits, beans, yams, pickles, tomato juice, yeast, powdered milk, and some pasta. And I’m sure that’s not a complete list. From the garden we have the usual crop, which we’re eating fresh and canning or freezing as well.
Given the size of our food storage, the $20 per month grocery challenge probably isn’t “do-able” for the average family. But we’re going to see how we do until February. I’d like to post some of the recipes I’ve made but that’ll have to wait for another day. So far, everyone has been happy with the meals (except for one soup, which had too much spice for the children’s liking). And I haven’t even resorted to ugali!

Like Mother, Like Daughter

valuesdr

While putting the girls’ laundry in the machine this morning, I found this:

It’s a little blurry, but hopefully you can tell that it’s my 8 year-old’s “to-do” list. Only difference between me and her is that I like to cross items off my list, and she prefers check marks.

Oh, and I don’t very often have a visit to the “gift shop” on my list. 😉

"Woe to you who are well-fed now…"

valuesdr

We have been making an effort to simplify our eating and rely on what’s coming out of our garden or what we have in storage (I’ll be posting more on that later). As a result, we had a very hearty garden vegetable soup with some Indian fry bread for supper last night. Knowing how much my husband likes spice, I had put about a cup of salsa into the huge pot of soup, trying to strike a balance between Marc’s tastes and the children’s (who prefer things a little milder). Though it tasted fine at first, by the time it simmered and got put on the table, I suspected that it would be a bit spicy for the kids. I was right. So for supper, they had Indian fry bread and complained through a few bites of soup. Only the boys and I finished our whole bowls full.

This morning, Marc awoke to emails from our partners in Kenya.We’ve already been hearing about the many refugees who are fleeing the drought in Somalia to find relief in Kenya. Now, Patrick tells him that food prices in Kenya have tripled, as the drought is affecting crops there as well and the influx of people is driving demand higher.

Patrick had already planned a Kingdom-Expansion training meeting for this coming week in Kajiado. Kingdom-Driven Ministries had sent him a small amount of money to fund the transportation, accommodations, and food for the approximately 45 people who will attend. Today, Patrick asked if he might have more money, to bring needed food to the locals–to put the Gospel of Jesus into practice. He said,

“We have to purchase and carry food from Nairobi as Kajiado is currently under severe drought. If we had relief food even for $100 we could get 5 bundles of maize flour: 60 packets of 2kg; we could reach 60 houses with 2kg packet each. Faith without works is dead in itself.”

With all this in mind, I sat down for morning devotions with the children. As we talked and prayed, I was nursing 6 week-old Enoch. I told the children that the mothers in drought-affected areas would not be able to produce milk for their babies if they did not get water and adequate nutrition for themselves. Our baby is colicky and everyone hates those times when Enoch cries and refuses to be comforted; tears came to my eyes as I told the children that these mothers listen to their hungry babies cry in just the same way…until they get too weakened to cry any more…and then, they die.

And I thought about our meal the night before, the soup that many of the children barely touched. Maybe you grew up hearing about “the starving children Africa” and how much they would have appreciated the food you complained about. Well, I told my children the same thing this morning–and I was dead serious. We know people there who are affected by the current drought, and others who are trying to do something about it. In fact, we’ll be living in that area in February of next year! It is real. The only thing I could say to the children after sharing my heart was to tell them the words of Jesus:

“Woe to you who are well-fed now, for you shall be hungry…” (Luke 6:25)

“Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You something to drink?… The King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.’” (Matthew 25:37, 40)

Needless to say, we will be doing all we can to help in this situation. If the Lord prompts you to give to the physical needs of the people of East Africa, so that our partners there may also minister the Gospel to them, please visit Kingdom-Driven ministries and contribute. Donations of any amount are greatly appreciated and we trust that the Lord will bless your giving.

First Bean Harvest

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Marc and two of the kids picked beans for about two hours on Sunday morning, and then the whole crew got to work snapping them. Yesterday I worked all day on cleaning and canning.

Rebekah took these photos while they were at my father-in-law’s house working (finger smudge on the lens and all!):

…And here’s the finished product–46 quarts:

Marc had fun looking through our Facebook photo archives to compare it to last year’s bean harvest. We did better this year on our first picking (12 quarts compared to 46),  and we should be able to pick again this weekend.

How does your garden grow? 🙂