Well….kinda…

I’m (hopefully) simplifying my life and online presence. This blog, although I love it, has become too much to think about. Not the writing part, mind you, but the rest of it: managing the website, keeping up with the updates (and mostly not), paying for it, getting lost in the weeds, ETC. So I’ve moved my blog, I hope successfully (there’s that “hoping” again), to Substack. I’m excited about it; I’ll have the opportunity to keep writing, share chapters of books I’m working on (and get your feedback), and to maybe find a larger community of faithful homemaking writers there. I really hope you’ll join me there–even the app is easy to use and read from. If you feel so inclined, you can even monetarily support my work, which will help me to get more books (and podcasts!) published. Either way, I hope to see you there. HERE is where you can find my latest blog, where I settle the question (do I?) of whether I am settled now.

Blessings,

This is part of the driveway to our house, and where I take my walks now.

This is a final installment of finding our home. You can read part I here, part II here, and part III here.

Our realtor wasn’t happy. And he said the seller with whom we have an accepted offer also wouldn’t be too happy. Nor would their realtor. Unhappiness all around!

The next day, our own realtor and I met at the old cedar house to talk with the owner. At this point, she encouraged me to show the house and land myself. “It’s YOUR house,” she insisted, “show him around!” I appreciated the opportunity to do so; Tom and I needed someone objective to help us have our heads on straight.

Arnie asked the seller all the right questions, gently interrogating her about potential, and real, water issues. About the roof. About any pest problems. About wiring. This little woman was both businesslike and jovial, not only answering questions, but offering information we didn’t yet think to ask about. I could tell our realtor was softening up a bit.

By the time Arnie and I meandered outside to the woodshed, the gardens, the greenhouse, the forested areas, the lawn, the workshop, the cider press storage room, past the fenced pastures and then to the pole barn, I sensed his discomfort with the predicament we were in. “Keri…this (waves his arms all around his head)…is what you and Tom have been wanting!”

“I know…but what about the other offer?”

He sighed and put his hands in his pockets. “Write them a letter. And allow them to keep your earnest money. And…we’ll see what they say.”

******

It took two days to hear that we were released from our other offer. I felt bad for those sellers, especially because they chose our lowest offer to begin with. But they sold the same house a week later for far more they were going to get from us. So I was relieved. And as soon as that was done, the four of us (myself, my husband, our realtor, and the cedar house owner) signed all of the required paperwork in the large kitchen with the vaulted ceiling above and the red brick floors below embracing me into home ownership once again.

Before we left, the seller pulled me into the living room and asked for my full attention.

“Keri, you listen to me.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said (she was the sort of woman everyone should “Yes, ma’am”).
“Now. I’ve talked to my husband and all three of my kids. Everyone is on board with this deal and no one wants or expects any more of an inheritance. Our family is all FINE. I don’t want you to give this deal even one more thought. God blessed us with your family buying this home and we couldn’t be more pleased. Ok?”

“Ok,” I sort of choked out, and we hugged and praised the Lord together.

The truth was, I was still worried about the money part. Maybe it was a fear-o-man thing, but I worried others would think we were trying to take advantage of an elderly woman. But I also knew our bank account, and that what we could offer was what we could offer. There were no more pennies to throw into the pot! Our offer—in fact, the entire last eight years of roaming around renting and moving— was something akin to casting our bread upon the waters…and the Lord gave it back many days later.

******

We’ve been here three months now. Last week, we hosted an open house. Both our realtor and the seller joined the dozens (and dozens) of people who filled this house in celebration. All three fire places on the main floor were burning and crackling, our shelves were up and full of books and photographs, and all of the stainless steel and cast iron pots and pans were hanging over the large island in the kitchen. Candles (balsam fir), an enormous pot of chili, teens and young adults scrambling to finish the 1000 piece puzzle in my office, and my son home from university happily playing barista for hours. Screeching toddlers running about with Matchbox cars, and laughter and conversation from all areas of house. Houseplants and flowers kept arriving, and we all sang Happy Anniversary to a grinning couple here. It was magical.

I don’t know how many of our friends greeted and thanked the seller of this house and property on our behalf. But before she left, she beamed and said, “I’m pleased. We’re all just real pleased.”

Thirty-four years from now–as long as the seller lived here–I’ll be about her current age. I pray and most wholeheartedly hope that I, too, will remember that the cattle on a thousand hills belongs to God. For neither of these two houses available for our purchase had anything whatsoever to do with our bank account. The real difference was our walk with God, and our family. That’s not something money can buy.

Also, I will testify: the joy of the Lord, unlike that elusive idea of happiness (and the mirage of what we think will bring it), is a deep abiding well within the soul, where no circumstance can ever touch.

No matter where God has you live.

Praising the Lord with you all,

When I don’t know what to do, I play and pray.

This is a continuation of finding our home. You can read part I here, and part II here.

********

I had to call the seller back. She had left me not one, but two voicemails. I took my cell phone to the highest location in the house to ensure a decent reception and took a deep breath.

We got down to business quickly. Instead of answering her inquiry, I asked if I might read our letter instead. I could hear her murmmered affirmations as I was reading, but once I got to the offering price I could hear the air suck in on the other side of the wire. I quickly assured her that, as Christians, we both know our sovereign God ordains all things, and that this transaction was obviously not in God’s will for either of our families. She agreed, and we parted amiably.

Back to searching real estate. After eight years of renting and over a year of earnestly looking for a home to buy, it was hard to be persistent. At this point we called our realtor (again) and got the whole process rolling (again) in our own community. Actually, it’s been a whole lot of again-ing since we moved out of the big house. Anyhow, we found maybe four houses to go look at. They were either seriously lacking in repair (not to mention level foundations), but had scrubby land attached, or they were clean and ready to move in, but had tiny backyards (which do I put in: a playset or a garden?).

That weekend, we visited a tidy home in a cul-de-sac, 35 minutes away from my husband’s work. It was a lovely home, but came with restrictions such as no visible clotheslines, and no dogs left outside in the evenings. I wasn’t sure how my old, large, livestock, outdoor-only dog would acclimate to a garage with a roof and walls, but we could afford this house so we joined thirteen other interested parties. We put in an offer over list, and our realtor even donated part of his own commission to make our offer look better. I think after all this time, he was just as motivated to get us into a house already!

Two days later, I was on the acupuncturist’s table when I got the call from the realtor. My practitioner and I listened on speaker.

“Arnie, I am literally on pins and needles here. Tell me.”

“Well, there was another offer on the house, and unfortunately, you were outbid.”

*sigh*

“Oh kay…”

“BUT.”

“But?”

“But they chose your family anyway.”

(eyes blinking rapidly now)

“What?”

“Yeahhh, they were just excited about having your family in their home. So they took your lower offer. Congratulations!”

Celebrations all around! Get the needles out of me and let me run home!

Tom and I signed all of the paperwork and we shared the news with our friends and family. We were very much in awe that a seller would take the lowest offer just to have children in a house, and so thankful, praising the Lord.

Two mornings later, I wrote out the earnest money check to take to the title company. We were really moving (AGAIN), but this time into our own home, not a rental. My phone rang, and I recognized the number. It was the seller of the old cedar house with the rambling property on acreage.

“Hi! It’s so nice to hear your voice! How are you?”

“Oh, Keri! I am such an idiot! This house belongs to you and your family! I can’t believe I let money get in the way of that and I am so sorry!”

(eyes blinking rapidly now, again)

“But…but remember our conversation? How it wasn’t God’s will? It’s ok! You’ll find a buyer and you’ll get every penny your family deserves. It will sell in days! And….I need to tell you. We already put in an offer for another house…and it was accepted.”

I could hear her own eyes blinking. The two most miserable people now, one on each line, heavy. She offered half a dozen scenarios that sounded implausible to me, but how could I just say no?

“Let me see what can be done,” I said.

This is a continuation of finding our home. You can read part I here.

********

Well.

Let’s just say I had to sit with my husband’s decision for a while. A while being maybe a whole two weeks. The whole wrestling thing. What was he thinking? Why? What about (all the fill in the blanks)? Where are we going to live? And what am I supposed to do with these paper thin tops now?

If you’ve been married more than ten minutes, you know the struggle. But if you’ve been a born again Christian for more than ten minutes, you also know you’re the biggest sinner in the house, so grace abounds. Back to packing and praying.

We expanded our search, up to an hour’s commute. And downsized our wish list (maybe we don’t need land, or chickens, or that quiet of a neighborhood…).

One Friday afternoon, half a dozen ladies and I were around the table for study and fellowship when one of them ventured to offer an alternative idea for housing. A friend of hers was selling a home of 34 years, and wanted to do so outside of the market. As she described the house and surroundings, I nodded politely while dollar signs kept blooming all in my mind. At the end, she stretched out a piece of paper with her friend’s name and phone number and told me to call her. Ah. Well. Yes, of course. Of course. Why not.

I why-notted for almost a week. I knew I couldn’t go an entire week, because said table-friend would ask if I had called said house-friend once Friday rolled around again. But I kept imagining the opening: Hello, my name is Keri Mae and I heard you were selling a house. Hello, I’m a friend of a friend and might you have a house for me to look at? Hello, I already know I can’t afford your house, ha ha ha, but we should meet anyhow because you told your friend who told me and she told me to call you so here I am and maybe we could just have tea?

Turns out she had been expecting my call.

********

I drove down the gravel road avoiding the shallow potholes. Evergreens, maple trees, and blackberry bushes hugged the narrow lane. One of the things I missed most about the big house wasn’t the house itself; it was the long drive on the gravel road to get there. The slowing down. The crunch under the tires. The release of faster-better. The late Paul Harvey understood how beautiful a dirt road is, and I couldn’t agree more.

I drove through the posts at the end of the road and circled around the pasture. One of the posts listed and the fence wire was sagging, but the land it encircled was grassy, rolling, and punctuated with majestic evergreens and willowy bayberry trees. Several fruit trees lined the edges, and on the other side of my drive a hedgerow of wild roses, salal and decidious trees made a lovely boundary. I wondered where the house was.

I made it halfway around the pasture and the little lane split. I could now see the house, low and brown, set way back on the left, so I made my way now onto a split gravel road with a grassy strip down the middle. The seller opened the slider into the kitchen and welcomed me as if I were a friend already. She was a head shorter than I was, slightly stooped, with a crop of short gray hair. She had a big smile and bright eyes.

“Do you want to see the house first or the land first?”

I quickly considered what might be less insulting to ask for first, but ended up asking for what I cared about most. A house I could fix. Land just was.

“Let’s see the land.”

She seemed real pleased with that answer, and she took me all around the property, pointing out the various areas she had tended. I recognized and pointed out many plants: Japanese snowball, dogwood, huckleberry. Peonies, butterfly hydrangea, hawthorn, and clematis. Beauty bush, stonecrop, and boxleaf. Every time I pointed something out or asked what something was, she seemed satisfied. Although much of it was overgrown, or lacking in nutrients, I appreciated the value of the time, work and money she had spent. At 84, she had been unable to keep up with it all, especially with her husband declining. She wanted the right family for her home, outbuildings, and land.

The home was a simple structure. All cedar walls and ceilings, maple hardwood and brick floors. Four woodstoves, four bedrooms, a real working kitchen (I could imagine cutting apart a fresh chicken right there on the island underneath the hanging pot rack). Seven skylights, vaulted ceilings everywhere, and—perhaps most important—room for our extra large, extra wide dining room table. I walked around like I was in a small castle, awed by the structure and faint smell, even after decades, of cedar.

“Well? What do you think? Do you like it?” This woman was mentally sharp and not in the habit of beating around the bush.

“Well, sure, it is gorgeous! And I can tell you and your husband stewarded the outside well when you were able. Why are you selling it? What about your kids?”

And off we went, discussing this and that, and never getting around to the asking price I didn’t want to know. Before I knew it, we had planned to bring my husband over the very next day.

********

I laughed when I drove him down the driveway. “I like it already,” he said, sharing my love for the slowest of roads.

********

The seller was delighted to meet him, and she was able to answer all of the questions my husband asked, whether electrical, septic, or about the well. She was forthright about repairs that needed to be made, and places where upkeep had been delayed. She seemed contented with his questions, and even more so that he had knowledge of what needed to be done.

We parted for the day, still unaware of an asking price. Still not really wanting to know.

********

That evening, Tom and I crafted a letter to the seller. She didn’t use email so it would have to be mailed the next day. We shared a bit about our family and our interest in her home and property. Both of us knew we were probably in over our head with what the property was worth, but seeing how we had no idea what she was asking, we decided we had nothing to lose and to offer what we could afford.

The next morning, I saw her voicemail message. She shared her happiness in meeting us. And, by the way, she laughed, “We never talked price!” So she left what she and her family were hoping to sell it all for, and though I wasn’t surprised, my heart still sunk. It was far, far more than we could afford. It may as well have been a million dollars.

I remembering sighing and putting down the phone. Did I mention I wasn’t surprised?

It took me two days to call her back.

I saw her across the corridor, struggling a bit with her Ergo carrier while tugging the baby’s feet into the slots below. A baby with Down syndrome is easily recognizable, perhaps more so for us because we have two children with that diagnosis. My heart raced across the room, offering her words of superlative wisdom and an encouragement that she would carry the rest of the day. My feet, however, stayed by our airline bags, because my mouth hadn’t decided what it could possibly say that would not at least initially feel awkward. As we both went our ways, I felt a bit like a ghost, moving about in the world with the Holy Spirit, with decades of experience, with a full heart towards mamas like me…but with trepidation and a cocoon of safety some might call privacy but others charge a lack of love. They will ask when they want help, I think, laughably, remembering my own young mothering and my thirst for someone to come alongside with cheer and comfort without my having to beg for the Lord to bring it.

So we—Tom and myself—boarded the airplane for our flight, and found our separated seats (no thanks to the airline for trying to squeeze out more dollars for the privilege of assigning seats together). I sat by the sorta-window, half hidden by the seat behind me. Next to me was a young man slouching so much I thought he’d slip out of his baggy pants and glide his skinny body right underneath the seat in front of him. Unlike that young mother, I didn’t have to cross an aisle to speak to him; we were both going to be trapped together 30,000 feet in the air BY an aisle.

“Heading home?” I asked. And that’s how we launched into conversation regarding where “home” is (we both wandered around in our childhoods), the military (I was a brat, he regrets not joining), and the pandemic (both feeling out of sorts but what can we do). I wonder how much more we could have discussed had we not traded seats across that aisle to sit with our personal traveling partners. I kind of regret initiating that seat switch, but maybe he appreciated the nap he got.

We all seem to be living life in our own bubbles, and this began long before social distancing. Jesus was good at popping those bubbles and engaging with people with real and earnest conversation in time and space. I have a lot to learn, and I know He’s going to teach me, first about an awareness of others. And about loving people more than loving my self-centered comfort zone. About caring about people enough to ask, listen, hearten, advise, and assist as I am able…instead of allowing social media, news outlets, and angry drivers (safe in their wrapped steel of shame) to shape my attitudes about what and how people think. In my experience, talking to people in person rarely reflects what the world is saying about them, saying about us.

Perhaps the flesh-and-blood folks the good Lord puts in our paths whom we choose not to talk to are the very people with which we should. We’re not isolated phantoms, and I for one am going to endeavor to stop behaving like one.

“We live in a culture that has lost its memory. Very little in the specific shapes and traditions of our grandparents’ pasts instructs us how to live today, or tells us who we are or what demands will be made on us as members of society.”

Gretel Ehrlich

The Solace of Open Spaces

Last Thursday, Tom and I traveled to that enormous land called Texas to spend time with our eldest daughter and son-in-law, and to be of whatever help we could be over the weekend. Tom busied himself with numerous needed repairs and projects around the house, and enjoyed several short walks to the home improvement store. My daughter and I visited a few nurseries and came home with the beginnings of a salsa garden: tomatoes, chilies, cilantro, and peppers. Strawberries and flowers also found their way into our little boxes, and we spent a lovely afternoon in the soil planting hope. I left for home on Monday, satisfied that perhaps the fingerprints we left were a blessing.

Also. We are going to be grandparents. I am going to be a grandmother. I keep saying this to myself, trying it on. It’s not a bad fit, methinks; it’s just new. Folks want to know what I’m going to be called. How does one name oneself?

My only experience with grandmothers are the two very different women I had in very short stints in my life: one, an American who grew up during the Depression and would only rarely talk of her upbringing on the edges of a history that took persistent prodding and extremely careful listening. The other, a Greek woman who lived deep in the Peloponnesian mountains (which took arduous hours of driving steep and windy and narrow mountain gravel roads), with whom language barriers left conversations unspoken. But I still remember as a young girl always–always–the delight in these women’s eyes when they saw me and how they appreciated my company. It was always easy for me to be with either of them.

Baking bread at the outdoor oven with my Yia Yia and little brother.

Well, I don’t live in remote mountains (yet) and I didn’t have a difficult childhood (thankfully). Also, neither of them were still raising their own children when I showed up, so that is also different. I still have seven children at home. I don’t have a rich history from either woman to draw from, whether it be traditions or beliefs or even what their own deep thoughts and dreams were. That, to me, is a very real and sorry American sort of individualism, but there we are. What I can do in our current life is continue to plant seeds of love wherever my grandchildren are, and hope to have as beautiful of a memory in their hearts when I, too, am gone. God may be gracious and allow those humble offerings to be enough, no matter where they all end up living.

Blessings,

seeds from many gardens ago

“A little thing is a little thing, but faithfulness in the little things is a great thing.”
Hudson Taylor

I planted seeds last Thursday, about three weeks after I found out my CSA farm is taking a break this year to work on building projects and various overdue repairs. I don’t have confidence that my harvest is going to be anything like that bountiful weekly box, but doing nothing is a sure way to reap nothing. So I planted.

Asian greens, collards, kale, and chard. Arugula, chives, raab, and chicory. Radicchio, mainly because I just like rolling the word radicchio around in my mouth. And—forgive me—but also lamb’s quarters, miner’s lettuce, and chickweed as well. Teeny greens sprouted up rather quickly under the workshop lights, and so far my toddler has not pulled up any of the labeled popsicle sticks (I realize this is as inevitable as his pulling out the rod from the cloth beam on my loom, so I’ve already made my peace with it). Fennel, dill, brussels sprouts,escarole, corn salad, mache, and mustard greens, too.

If I get even half a dozen bunches of greens to my table, I will be thankful. If I get even half of that into my kids without having to hide it all in sauces and soups, I will claim my garden is victorious indeed. But methinks the whole process of planning and planting isn’t really about the harvest, as I am spoiled for choice in a country with abundant supermarkets. Maybe it’s about the clarity of mind I get as a result of clearing a patch of ground and scratching upon the loamy soil. The simplicity of smoothing the bed with the palm of my hand and noticing. Just the noticing.

How a breeze tickles one set of maple leaves and skips across the branches, flicking greens along the way. Or how the chickadees bounce through the air to the sunflower seeds in the feeder, always taking turns, one at a time. Or how pregnant the magnolia buds look already. Many times, I think, someday I shall die, and still these evergreens will drop their cones for the grey squirrels living down the embankment, and wispy white clouds overhead will still tease apart and sail across the sky. It’s a comfort to stand quietly in the garden and to know that this trowel in my hand works the most good in my mind, if not upon my table.

Certainly this must also apply elsewhere in homemaking. Dusting, polishing the furniture, scrubbing the floor. Cleaning a sink, making a bed and smoothing the covers. Switching the laundry, pulling out a baked cake, setting shoes by the front door in straight little rows. Certainly, I might find “better things to do with my time”, but what better things would keep me as humble? If no one sees the treads on the carpet from the vacuuming, was the vacuuming a waste? Or was it as important as planting a seed I had no guarantee of sprouting?

Jesus said his kingdom was not of this world. My work then, perhaps, also is not of this world, but instead a quiet witness and act of faith. Undocumented, uncelebrated, unknown, but born from a love of God and expectation that He will gloriously do what He has promised. I see the sprouts. I know He is coming. I will plant more seeds.

Blessings,

“July. Last night from one in the morning until four, I sat in the bed of my pickup with a friend and watched meteor showers hot dance over our heads in sprays of little suns that looked like white orchids.”
Gretel Ehrlich
The Solice of Open Spaces

I take advantage of the break in hail and rain showers to cut rows in my garden beds. One by one I plop in small knobby seed potatoes, the amount fitting a potager souvenir rather than a potential pantry filler, and cover them gently. My experience with growing food has not been a wildly victorious succession of overflowing larders, but rather the slow accumulation of gathering experience and perhaps the occasional pleasure of announcing at suppertime that these carrots, those beans, came right out of the back yard thirty minutes ago.

The soil is loamy and soft, and smells like promises. I cut in more rows for onion sets, and lay the spindly greens on their backs in the troughs. Once set upright, they look like the garlic coming up nearby. I wonder what’s coming up at the CSA farm we used to get our produce from during the year, and wish I could drone myself over their fields and get inspired. It used to be a lovely meandering walk down skinny country roads and across mucky fields to their farm, back when we lived in the little cabin. I’d peek into their hoophouses and inhale the thick aroma of plump tomatoes while catching up on all manner of news, or lean against the rough railing while one of the farmers lunged a horse. These were (and still are) real people with real dirt under their nails and astoundingly intelligent in all manner of history, literature, and vocabulary. My brain couldn’t keep up (nor comprehend the books they loaned me), but they were friendly and the kind of folks you’d want to crowd in with on a blustery wet evening by an open fire with a hot mug of probably some sort of from-the-land root infusion and listen to hours of poetry written by the mister himself, followed by a stunning stew and fresh bread and laughter for dessert. The kind of friends you’d sit with, in a pickup, in the middle of the night to watch meteor showers.

I pick at the weeds stretching forth in various patches wondering if any of them are edible. A cool prickly breeze strokes my face and I know rain is going to fall out of the sky within minutes. I wipe my tools clean and place them back into the mailbox in my garden. I’m growing food, I think. Actually, I decide, a proper stew. And then I’m going to build a house with a proper woodburning stove, own a pickup truck, and spend more time with friends who write poetry.

Big drops start plopping on my shoulders from the sky as I head inside. Promises, indeed.

And what kind of habitation pleases God? What must our natures be like before He can feel at home with us? He asks nothing but a pure heart and a single mind. He asks no rich paneling, no rugs from the Orient, no art treasures from afar. He desires but sincerity, transparency, humility, and love.

A. W. Tozer

The van clattered down the steep driveway with dishes sliding about within boxes of charity donations. I’ve lost count over the years since our initial downsize how many full vehicles we’ve taken to the charity shops, and I am still astounded we have more to part with. Certainly, packages still arrive in our home over time: home goods, groceries, gifts, and donations (“because you’ve got a big family and could use this”) but the trickle of such has slowed considerably over the years and I’m convinced stuff multiplies on its own overnight.

Perhaps it is the current hunting for house plans and furthering the development of our property, but the fire in my belly for paring down has been hot. It has been fueled by many books I’ve read and very much resonated with, not only on downsizing, but on minimalism. I’m inspired by the lifestyles of people such as Yumiko Sekine, Mark and Sally Bailey, and Steve and Brooke Giannetti. The photographs of rooms that really get my attention are neutral toned in color, full of light and texture and space (even on the shelves). These homes also have carefully curated and/or handmade items, and evoke a sense of peace, retreat, relaxation and simplicity. Those are the kinds of spaces where I can think, pursue interests, relate, pray, and simply Be. Sometimes when I look around at our own stuff, what I sense instead is unnecessary work, burden, upkeep, and guilt.

The useless work for me comes from having too much of anything. It requires more cleaning, dusting, and space to store—which requires ongoing money (which takes more needless work) to pay for that rental or mortgage space it is taking up. The burden comes from obligations to other people to take their things or to keep their gifts. The upkeep is in maintaining repairs or mendings or, dare I say, a visual representation of the kind of person I’d like other people to think I am by what I have and show. And the guilt? The weighty files and files and files of papers, shelves of books, and half-finished projects in bins that I’ll read or need or complete “someday” and all of the “should’s” associated with them.

At the end of the day, sometimes I am exhausted simply by being the presence of so many objects and not enough open space. So, I crawl through the closets, the shelves, the cabinets, the storage bins, asking myself questions such as:

Do I like this (do I even remember I had it)? And if so…why then is it hiding in a closet, storage bin, file cabinet, or the back of a drawer? How can I bring it out to the light and display it or use it or wear it? Can I use that lovely bowl as a flower vase? Or that scarf as a tabletop cloth? Can I frame that photograph and hang it up? Can I bring it into a seasonal rotation into the house or on my body? Do I even want to?

Is this still useful to me? If so…when is the last time I used it? If it went away tomorrow, and I needed it again, would I be willing to purchase it again? Is there anyone else who would love it and use it even today? And, if it’s so useful, why haven’t I worn it, changed the batteries, made the repair, upgraded its system or patched the holes?

Am I keeping this “just in case”? In case of what? If it’s for my children, how emotionally invested am I that they will take, keep, and love this thing? If it’s for an emergency situation, do I know how to use it, cook it, and maintain it? Am I willing to bring it into our normal routines or into my wardrobe rotation? Can I even name half of the items I’ve donated in the past that I originally kept “just in case”?

Is there a “should” associated with keeping this? Is there a sunk cost, a heirloom, or outside pressure to find room in our house and heads for this thing? If this thing were to get stolen or lost in a fire, would I be grieved…or relieved? Am I worried anyone would think my house was too dark, too light, too full, too empty, too fancy, too plain?

Lastly, when I look into a room, how do I feel? Do I feel peaceful? Does my home feel like the retreat I want it to be? Is it a place that allows for curiosity and new learning situations? If not…then I’m not finished downsizing and curating yet.

Does your house match up with how you want to feel? Maybe, unlike me, you want it to feel full and and find energy in that. Maybe you love the rich feel of a library with a dark ceiling and thousands of books because it makes you want to curl up with a cat and a good book. Or maybe you need a bedroom with absolutely nothing but a bed and a pile of wrinkled linens to feel restful. Whatever it is, I find that this is one of the funnest (and most challenging) parts of homemaking: creating a home where values such as sincerity, transparency, humility, and love take a greater stage and importance than whatever objects we have or have not. Remember, your home is supposed to be serving you. If you are instead serving your home, perhaps it’s time to load up the van.

Blessings,

“If you don’t sacrifice for what you want,

what you want becomes the sacrifice”.

(Anonymous)

Thursday morning found me in the garden talking to my podcast listeners. In my own head. I had them/you all in my garden and strolling around the winter beds, asking questions, opinions, sharing experiences and wonderings, showing what’s growing, what’s limping, what’s collapsed. I was catching up with where our family has been, what we’re doing, and where we’re going. Again, in my head.

I miss people. I miss podcasting. The sacrifices we make for the things more important, yes? And yet we must consider those sacrifices time and again, checking in to see if they are still valid. Sometimes, yes, sometimes, no. Sometimes…maybe.

So there in the garden I turned on my video on my phone and started talking and sharing. I didn’t script anything out and as you shall see, I even held my phone the “wrong” way. But if you’ve been waiting for our podcast to return (we want that, too), I thought maybe you’d enjoy a little vlog in the meanwhile. It’s getting produced and uploaded onto our YouTube channel, so if you’d like to see it, make sure to head on over and subscribe so as not to miss it when our internet allows its upload.

Do let me know if this is of interest to you, this vlogging. And if you are commiserating with winter damage or if you’re joining me in hope with the promises of spring. Spring is really coming, friends, in every way.

Blessings,

The snow fell tentatively at first, but by morning there was one big floof of thick white softness over the landscape and flakes were still coming down. I was glad for it. The children would be completely distracted by snowballs and forts and sledding and that would leave me with a spell of quietness broken only by the massive heating system regularly blowing warmth into the rooms.

I decided to make doughnuts, because a neighbor long ago made it a tradition to bring us fresh baked doughnuts on the first snow, and somehow my children now expect such things to be undeniably done, neighbors or not. I envisioned wet and cold ruddy-cheeked children with mugs of hot cocoa and doughnuts, a table of laughter and gratefulness. So I peeled and chopped the apples for filling and let it sit upon the stovetop with the typical apple seasonings of cinnamon and whatnot.

As I was working the dough, I thought about the site preparation we were in the midst of. Our septic report had came back fortunately-unfortunately. Fortunately, we could have a septic system. Unfortunately, it could not be gravity fed, but rather one in which mounds would not only be visible, but also require the annual and billed inspection by whomever with a badge upon our property to scrutinize its careful and continued operation. Appropriate, perhaps, given the soil conditions. But in practice, in the best light, an annoyance. Do we want this annoyance? I wrapped the dough to rise and stared outside as the tea kettle warmed, watching my children sledding with the dog tumbling around joyously and flipping powdering snow every which way. What to do with this land we’ve bought now? And what is it about having your own proper piece of land to own that seems to make the world a little more secure?

Some days, I’m more dispirited by the borrowing. Borrowing homes, borrowing land, borrowing time. And then, in the we-hope right time, borrowing money for a mortgage. Other days, I feel a sense of freedom in knowing I belong nowhere whatsoever, that I can BE anywhere at all in the world. On days when I feel like I’ve perhaps gone to pieces in homesickness—an odd orphan landless sort of gnawing—I find myself decluttering even more. Am I reading or rereading all of these books on shelves? Is anyone here, in any way, reading or referencing them? No. Why do I keep them? They’re….neat? And so forth, the questions and internal dialogue within my head continues. Daunted by circumstances and restrictions and regulations in which I have no control, I find myself emboldened and energized by throwing things away, lightening our load further, finding even more s-p-a-c-e within our living quarters (which, ironically, shrinks with every expunging of superfluous material goods). The current house plan we are considering for the nine of us still living at home full time is just more than 2000 square feet. Is that too much? Too limiting? Just right?

I start the salted caramel for the doughnut dip while sipping my tea, a lovely blend called Prince of Wales tea. It’s difficult for me not to imagine Prince Charles, the early 1980’s version I remember with Princess Dianna, when I see the box. I wonder if he drinks his own tea. I wonder if his mind wanders like mad all over the place in a spot of quiet as well. Does he ever have to think about septic systems? Prince Albert did, I think, back in the day.

The doughnuts are fried up, filled and dipped. Dripping coats and hats and boots and socks and scarves are peeled off and litter the entire entry way and part of the living room as well. I haven’t the energy to fuss over it and instead fill up the mugs. Laughter and gratefulness indeed fills up the table. And with a table like that, I think, who needs land?

Blessings,

I open the door to my small home office (really a tiny cave in which to hide that everyone inevitably makes their way into). Papers of all sizes are strewed about all over the floor in small bundles, haphazardly organized into categories. I step lightly in the midst of them all, my heel crinkling this or that, and find my small square into which I sit crisscross-applesauce (I can’t help but continue my Kindergarten-teacher name for that). I don’t know where to begin. But here we are, still sitting on property that we are now ambivalent about but the rental lease and land mortgage clocks are starting to tick-tock louder in our ears.

I look around while comfortably cupping my hot motherwort-sage tea in my lap. First, there are the piles of potential house plans. We are restrained not only by the allotment given to us which with to build, a narrow strip between wetland buffers and neighbors, but by all of the lessons we learned in our initial downsizing (you’ll need to search “downsizing” in the blog search bar for loads of that adventure). How much space does a person need? How about a whole family? What about a growing family? What about a family in which children are beginning to fly off? Do we make room for heirlooms? How much house do I want to keep clean, keep, repair, and pay mortgage and tax on? What does what we keep–or not keep–say about us, and do those things reveal what is truthful about our beliefs? And then…in whose eyes do those things matter? Do those eyes ultimately matter in these kinds of decisions? All of those boxes still–after many years and many moves–in storage for Someday, Passing Down, What Ifs? Do we keep those, still, for Someday, Passing Down, What If? You see the dilemma, and how many gallons of tea I wash down before I even begin to touch any of these pyramids of papers.

It sounds ridiculous to me, in a “just pick a house and make it work” kind of way. But I’m still working through how and why I ought to MAKE something work versus considering the lifestyle we desire to live and having the house serve THAT. I don’t want unused rooms, wasted space, things and furniture we keep just because we “should” (according to whom, then, we ought to inquire). I don’t need a walk in closet when I could currently pack my entire wardrobe into a single suitcase. But, you know, I really want that room for my floor loom, our 4×9 foot dining room table, and the eight beds we still use.

Other piles: ideas for various rooms from books and magazine cuttings. Everything from windows, walls, colors, cabinets, materials, and lighting. Then there are the piles of “this goes nowhere in particular but I like how it makes me feel when I look at it”, such as texture, plants, and wood grain.

I go through the house plans once again, and decide to copy the main living areas from one of the plans onto grid paper, practically lying now on top of it all with a ruler and pencil in hand. Piano? Check. Dining table? Check. And so forth. Meanwhile, I email the septic design company, and contact the surveyor for further work. An hour goes by, the babies are asking if they can wake up now from their rest time, and it’s time to start puttering in the kitchen towards supper. I stand up and sigh. So much decision to be made, but it’s trepidation mixed in with hopefulness and excitement and a bit of fun besides. Ready or not, our cloud is moving once again, and so we shall move forward as well.

Blessings,

Last Wednesday, I went to the local bookstore to use up a gift card that my son won through our library. As I picked up our order, the employee asked if I was a teacher, in which case he would gladly give me a discount. Well. I bet you can guess what happened next.

“I am a homeschooling teacher. Can I have a discount for that?”

“Naw,” he slightly guffawed, “that doesn’t count.”

(just waiting a moment for you to gather your bearings as I had to gather mine….)

“Actually,” I chuckled as I looked him straight in the eye, “I used to BE a public school teacher, and (chuckle chuckle) I can tell you without a doubt that being a homeschooling parent is far, far, FAR more difficult.”

He gave me the full discount.

If you are on my email list, you can expect to begin hearing about my next book, which is about homeschooling as a lifestyle. I think this is what makes homeschooling so challenging: it’s not simply (simply! ha!) adding academics to housework and meal preparations. It’s about embracing education as a normal and natural means of cultivating and developing curiosity about God, people, the world, and how things work. It’s about encouraging those interests every unique individual has, and giving means by which inquiring minds can scratch those itches. It’s about–like my book PRESENT highlights–enjoying one another and loving one another and serving one another, and having writing assignments (as an example) endeavor to serve those ends, rather than simply having a five page essay due on a random Thursday.

That may not *count* in some people’s heads, but in the Real World, it counts. It counts a lot.

Blessings,

There’s a break in the rain, and I resolve to take my second look into the garden this winter. I like gardening, though I like it better when the sun is warm and robins are hopping around curious of what I’ve turned up. And I like it even better when the soil is musty and I’m surprised by new buds or leaves or pods or flowers.  Checking on the garden in winter is lonely and quiet and cold, but it beats the unattended consequences of not doing so.

The garlic has pushed its way through the crusty ground, littered with maple seed pods that helicoptered their way down in sheets last fall. I’m always cheered to see these little shoots, as they are the last things I plant in the ground every year before the first frost. And, somehow, in the wettest and coldest and darkest of times, they are busy about growing and swelling and working to burst above those thick layers of decomposition overhead. Plus, garlic. Garlic makes me and my kitchen very happy.

Leeks make me happy as well, though I am inexperienced in growing them. They look good, but I am greedy, wanting thicker waistlines. So I leave them be, an experiment of sorts, to see if they will survive winter and reward me in the spring. Behind them I’ve left broccolini alone as well, straggly, fallen over, partially eaten by earlier moths. I’m curious to see what they will do.

Fennel and beets and kale are alive. They struggle with pests as well, but perhaps the winter will kill those off and then my plants can get back to growing and thriving. I find that pests usually do not hang around for the tougher demands of winter and decide to leave these plants be. I scratch out some of the weeds underneath them and trust.

Inside the hoop house, my experiments continue. It is my first time trying to grow anything in the winter that can be harvested IN the winter. I find it musty and moss has taken a definite hue to my pavers. Perhaps I need more air flow, and I consider how to do that while maintaining any semblance of heat (is it even five degrees warmer in here?). The considerable dilemma I face is not the temperature, but the lack of light. I have no desire to use electricity to make that happen. I plant (har har) in my head that paver cleaning is a task that will need to be undertaken. Perhaps by children and vinegar.

Faithful sorrel, however, looks good as usual. Leaves have been nibbled but it seems to flourish regardless. That’s how I want to be–perhaps nibbled upon by pests and circumstance–but blooming regardless and a blessing for others.

I’ve never grown salsify before. I don’t hardly know what it is, much less how to prepare it or how it tastes. But it likes it here in the hoop house and I am happy to let it grow. I hope to be satisfied by a whole new food this spring.

I picked off small green caterpillars constantly off brussel sprouts last summer. And then I left it unattended for a short time. This is what happens when growing things are left unattended. I decide to continue letting it be. After all, it’s January. No new plants are going to replace it any time soon.

Lots of plants are alive, although stunted in their growth. Minutina, mache, dandelion, kale, Asian greens, radishes, and so much more. All still green and still authentically real food, but waiting for light, methinks, and for warmth. I’m curious what will happen in the next two months, but as I consider the calories growing throughout the garden, I am once again thankful for our country’s diligent and hardworking farmers, and for all of the truck drivers who roll on mile after mile after mile so that I can shake the spray water off a lush bunch of kale at the market for any meal I want, any time of day or year.

Still, I do my weak and small part to try to grow something for my family. We’ve been harvesting carrots all winter, and they are thick and juicy and the most carroty-tasting carrots I’ve ever had in my life. Perhaps I will grow more of them next year. Carrots and garlic and sorrel. It’s cold out here right now, and everything is quiet except the creaks and cracks of leafless trees swaying. But life is still happening under darkness, and life is still happening under duress.

And it’s not even that lonely, after all.

Blessings,

We drive home from visiting the property we bought, where we’d been taking slow climbs over downed blackberry brambles and sweeping leafless maple twigs aside to map out where our house might fit. Tom had the 100 foot winding tape measure and a compass. He’d already figured out the corners of the potential house and it was our job—mine and two of the children— to follow directions and somehow get through the soft beds of downed pine and cedar branches to carefully place the worn orange cones in the proper places amongst the ferns.

Every now and then I paused to listen, and other than the snapping and cracking of our small group moving through the woods (we couldn’t sneak up on a bear if we tried), all I heard was the intermittent splats of rain on my slicker hood and the occasional creak of trees rubbing against one another. We finished ten minutes before sundown, and swaggered and swished our way back through the brush to the van, satisfied with the job done.

Back home I simmer chai on the stovetop and ponder everything. The land itself (is this property—in size and scope and location—what we still want?). The agonizing house plan decision (how can I build and achieve the small size we want for the extra large family we still have?). The uncertainty of economics and culture and community. My mind feels like it is swirling around within the frothing milk in my pot, round and round.

And then. And then the pandemic. Lockdowns. Upon lockdowns. Our own people storming the congressional building. The insistence of segregating every person into one identity or another while isolating them from their relations and businesses. Masks, vaccines, first amendment freedoms, the gymnastical knots of new demands on and definitions in the English language. The utter atmosphere of anger, fear, anxiety and helplessness that is Everywhere I Go.

I’m supposed to raise up a house and build a family in this environment?

Well…yes.

It’s one thing to intellectually understand that there is nothing new under the sun, and to know enough history to see clearly that every march towards “progress” at the consequence, isn’t. It’s quite another to continue to marry, bear children and plant gardens. Or make tea.

The children and I settle in to watch an episode of “Superbook” where the Israelites are freed from their oppressors and invited to trust the Lord for their every provision. We discuss how a trip that perhaps could have been made in less than two weeks ended up as a sad forty year plod. We talk about how the root sin of pride gave its evil fruit in Pharoah’s actions, but how that same root sin gave its fruit of grumbling in God’s people. Oh, Lord, I don’t want to grumble and plod!

It dawns on me, perhaps a tiny glimmer of flickering light. Invited to follow the Lord through this current day desert of faithfulness and truth, shall I be distressed about the paths He gives me to pass through it? Shall I turn my nose from His daily manna of Scripture, more eager to consume whatever the world chooses to feed my mind? Shall my love for Christ be so meager that I cannot continue in trust in this good and faithful Shepherd, who learned obedience through suffering (the likes of which I will never know), and to whom I owe my very life in every way? What, after all, is twelve days of troublesome travel when compared to an eternity of blessed rest and joy in every way?

I take the last sip from my mug and that is that. The world is mad, I think (or perhaps I simply remember), so I shall count it as so to be reckoned. I shall still build a physical house of sticks on this world’s sinking sands, but my greatest work is to love the Lord my God and to stand steadfast in the truth while I build a foundational home on the Rock. Already I can see His remnants across the landscape lighting their candles in the windows of their homes too, quietly working with their hands, minding their own business, baking bread, reading Dr. Seuss, folding laundry. I choose to light a candle, too. It’s going to be all right.

I pull the tangerine olive oil cake from the oven and allow it to cool within its pan as I whip up the cream. The kettle is warming and I gather the smaller plates from the high shelf and stack them upon the table next to the paper napkins, the ones with the watercolor birds in lime and coral. The scent in the kitchen is a wafting warm citrus from the cake blended with the cedar candle flickering above the sink. I hear children down the hallways thumping around, screeches of laughter punctuated with shouts of protest, and as I open the tea cabinet, I consider: which variety will blend with the afternoon rain incessantly drumming upon the rooftop and meet the grey breezy trees swaying outside with its match of considered calm?

I cradle my favorite bronze woodfired mug while I steep the orange rooibos (what it is about winter and citrus?) and I think about perhaps writing a blog post. It seems daunting. Like reentering a room I’ve left aside for a season, and I fear the dust and homesickness that will respond to me if I whisper, “Do I have anything to say anymore? Am I even welcome here in my own space?”

I set the timer (oh, my beloved 15 minute timer) and sit by the computer, and begin…

Dear Reader,

I find the last year, and my break from blogging and podcasting, to have been considerably clarifying. I pray that the challenges of 2020 have been just as much for you as well. One, to our relationship with God, and to the revealings of where and to what exactly our hope, our trust, and our provision has been dependent upon. Two, to the reality of the health of our marriages, and where self-pride—that most stubborn and core of sins—has wedged itself as a burr. Three, to an honest assessment of the relationships we have with each of our children, whether pleasurable (obedience and honor) or antagonistic (criticism and exasperation). Four, to a sober reassessment of the culture we are living in, and to the decisions that must be made of how now we shall live, and to what extent living by truth we will go. Five, to how we will look upon other people, whether useful or beautiful, whether with suspicion or with compassion, with our own narratives (or the ones we adopt) or with understanding on an individual level, with curiosity and a drawing out of the person within. Six, how we will care for ourselves, whether honoring our innate struggle for health and balance or continuing to fearfully seek outwardly for the magic pill(s) to overcome the damage we self inflict or receive through malnutrition and toxic overload. Seven, how we shall run our homes, as places of honor with which to shore up of the foundation of a nation, or as merely a place with which to gather and store our material possessions. I’m sure there are more areas which have been, if not clarifying, at least a bit on the needling side of demanding some sort of attention…

The chimes ring upon my iPhone and I set it aside. Cake must be sliced and served, tea poured, and conversation encouraged. I think, as I sip my tea and feel its comfort bloom within, that perhaps I do have more to say, and I commit to reengaging with my blog, my writing, my readers and my self. I’ll meet you here next week, if you’d like, for tea, and share with you more of my meanderings and goings on.

Blessings,

Many writers, artists, and other creatives attempt to encapsulate their coming year into a single word. This word—such as love, abundance, service, or spirit— serves as a touchstone, a means of testing the quality of a particular activity or attitude throughout the year, and as a remembrance of that year in its passing. For many of us, whatever our individual and unique words were in January, they are now collective and unified: the word for 2020 is GRIEF.

Grief is a snake of sorts, living mostly hidden underneath the brush of life, but surprisingly popping up its head at unexpected times and places. Once the initial stunning shock has passed, we become statuaries and instead stare and slowly feel the weight of its presence like pouring watery sand into our bodies through our heads. We focus on the head of the vermin as the static of the rest of the world falls away. What shall we do? Kill the thing? Run? Beg it for mercy? Try to stroke its neck? Pretend it doesn’t exist?

This is the global experience in 2020 with the pandemic. Regardless of an individual’s point of view, a snake is a snake is a snake. Grief upon grief, and it is beyond even the ability of angels to lay judgement upon whose grief is worse than another’s (who but God can count and keep teardrops?). Whether shouting or shrinking, every human has been affected by its crushing grasp.

In John chapter 6, Jesus prepares his disciples for inevitable grievous consequences of following Him. As he educated them with the reality of excruciating disappointment and future martyrdom, He tested them, asking in light of these things, if they would remain faithful regardless. He asked, in considering the abandonment of others who were tickled by His works and words, “Will ye also go away?” Peter’s answer embodies the Christian response to all of the horror and tragedy and sorrow and anguish of this life pregnant with the pangs of sin, “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God.”

Some say that such faith in the midst of sorrow is akin to leaning upon a crutch with which to walk through life. To which I say, a hearty crutch with which to beat a snake is a powerful thing to have in hand, and I do not delude myself with power I do not possess when greeted with its fangs unarmed. However, trust in God’s sovereignty and knowledge of even a snake’s obedience to its Creator allows this sacred cane leaned upon, as Jacob, to become not only a help, but a hope. Someday, this very hour perhaps, every crutch will be beat into a plowshare and our harvests will be all goodness and righteousness and truth, the snake forever relieved of its head and home.

I also find much comfort in the fact that even through the choking smoke, I see bulbs all over the rhododendrons for “in the bulb there is a flower”. This line from “Hymn of Promise” has rung in my heart throughout much of this season. It was originally written for funerals. I dare say that the entire year has been one long plod of funeral after funeral: loved ones dying from disease, the scourge of loneliness and depression, economic catastrophe, family strife and severing, loss of goals and dreams and tickets to every relief of life’s burdens, governmental overreach seesawing with governmental impotency, centuries of rebellious thinking fruiting into riots and ruin, and a church that has leaned upon pragmatism and compromise and fear of ridicule or rebuke has found its salt tasteless and its light ridiculous to illuminate anything whatsoever, much less harbor a haven for wandering and confused sheep.

Natalie Sleeth wrote “Hymn of Promise” when she was pondering the “whole reawakening of the world that happens every spring”. This hymn encapsulates the hope we have in Christ, in His future and sure victory for anyone who has been broken not only by the world and its systems, but by his or her own poverty of piety. It points to the declarations of creation all around us, if we would but have eyes to see and ears to hear and fingers to touch, that God is still active and moving about His purposes, and not even the gates of hell can stop His church, much less hinder a butterfly coming forth or an apple forming. In the end is our beginning, Natalie writes quoting from T. S. Elliot, and in this ghastly year of endings and goodbyes, we especially keep our eyes upon Jesus.

He says, “Follow Me,” because He is the way. Let us run after Him who walks on water and binds up the brokenhearted with His own flesh and blood. Every sin will be cast from the earth and every tear dried forever. Let it be so, for our Lord comes, and unlike our weak words of whatever year it happens to be, His Word is sure and without end.

Ecclesiastes 3:1   To every thing there is a season…

The problem with God requiring truth in the inward parts (Ps 51:6), is that God requires, well…truth in the inward parts. And the truth is that I need to close up the blog for a season. I guess I can sort of blame it on my Present Journal. I’ve been going through it, asking myself the same questions I pondered years ago, before I deleted my blog off of the web in order to *try* to live in integrity with what I believed and wanted, and to *try* to live a life undistracted by the things (in that case, the Internet) that were taking me off course.

So it’s hard to ask the hard questions. About where I am in my goals. About how my walk with the Lord is. About what I hope to do with my children. About where my focus needs to be, and where my distractions are. At this time, I need to not only write about being Present, I need to BE present.

Snail mail from my readers (you!)–thank you!

 
Oh, the same fears pop up when I consider taking a break, especially as a blogger:

What if I disappear? (I won’t)

What if I lose readers? (I will)

Will there still be an outlet for me? (I hope so)

What if it’s a mistake? (What if it’s not?)

Taking loving care of our dying dog. I need to be with my kids more.

 
When I recently considered my goals, I recognized that keeping a blog simply wasn’t high on the list. I’ve never wanted to “grow the blog”, take advertising, or incorporate pop ups (aren’t we all a little weary of clicking little x’s yet?). And yet, if you are a blogger, you know…just the back-end of keeping up with the technology, maintenance, and updates is a lot of work. And for the last ten years (minus my previous hiatus), I’ve enjoyed the work. My first blog post was in 2006. Before opening this current website, I wrote 868 pages worth of content. This post is number 499 for this website. That’s a lot of blogging. And plenty of reading material if you want to go back and catch up 🙂

My home, our nest, needs more time and attention.

What am I going to do instead? Well, I imagine I’ll start out being a little dazed…like, someone took my blankie away. But it does seem to be the season for that, of letting go. Sell our “dream” home, send away my livestock, say goodbye to my gardens and downsize to a tiny rental. Sell or donate a ton (literally) of stuff. Then lose a bunch of stored stuff in flooded storage rooms. Trees smash our van (while we’re in it), the oven/fridge/washer/septic/electrical konks out, our sweet kitty dies (yes, I’m still sad about that) and so it goes. Every day I declutter, I downsize, a little more…and then a little more. Maybe I’m downsizing where I spend my time right now, too.

I’ll be helping my daughters restore this dollhouse.

I have a lot of things I want to do in my home. It needs fresh paint, some reorganization (again), and a lot of clean up from the flooding both in the storage areas and in landscaping. It might feel a little odd not putting together blog posts about everything. But I’m really all right with the idea of an undocumented life. I’m ready to close the curtains for a while.

What are your homekeeping goals?

I’ll be working in my kitchen more. I’ve always wanted to decrease my dependence on the grocery store, and I really have no excuse not to be canning or dehydrating or baking more. The lack of space has discouraged me from doing much, but…really…how silly…I have tables, stools and extra hands. I love cooking from scratch, and want to do better.

The apothecary

 
I’ve really enjoyed seeing the clients I’ve had, to educate them on the use of herbs for good health and healing. I hope to be expanding my practice a bit, to educate and coach others to support their bodies in natural ways. I have no desire to make medicine for anyone, but blending teas and incorporating seasonal herbs everywhere in my kitchen and bath? Yes, please!

I still write my rough drafts long hand.

 
I still plan to write. I’m still working on my next book on Slow Schooling, and I have several more in mind and in notes. I really want to focus on writing them, so I’ll need to spend less time writing blog posts. Furthermore, I desire to be a better writer. I’d like to invest in writing classes and do some hard work there. What can I say? I love the written word(s!).

My handwork basket awaits

 
What else? Well, there is always handwork. Knitting, sewing, embroidery. Basket weaving, felting, book binding. Rag rugs, quilting, applique, spindle spinning and crochet. All are things that encourage the kind of togetherness and conversation (or audio book listening) with my children as they work on their own crafts.
 

Preparing a sampler warp on my new-to-me loom

Of course, there is homeschooling to be done as well. I love homeschooling. There is always something to learn, and my goal is to cultivate minds that are (a) able to learn (ie. knowing how to read) and (b) want to learn (ie. curious about all sorts of things, from history, to people, to the sciences, etc..). And, above all, to know Christ. Because, really, does anything else matter?

My hands are full of little hands

I suppose that is all, and probably enough.  If you haven’t read my book, Present, I’d like to invite you to read it and consider how your own life might be different (or the same!) in order to live in integrity, with truth in the inward parts, wholly *present*. If you have read it, I’d love it if you could leave me a review. And, if you’re very brave, maybe you’d want to work through the Journal.

My word for the year. I think I’m going to need it.

Tom and I plan to continue the podcast (for now). It’s something he loves to do, and I love him, so it’s a fun sort of “date” to get behind the mics together. If you’d like to keep up with us, make sure to subscribe.

Thank you again, dear readers, for the journey here!

Blessings,