I’m heading home to WV for Thanksgiving this year. It’s rare that I go home–we usually spend the holiday with my husband’s family a mere 90 minutes away in SC. And I LOVE spending Thanksgiving with his family. But somehow the food isn’t exactly what I grew up with. Oh, it’s delicious. Adding homemade macaroni and cheese to Thanksgiving is […]
My husband knows how to get me. For the past several months he’s been able to procure raw cow’s milk for us. Having grown up on a farm with a milk cow, this is just about the best thing he’s ever done in my opinion. I still don’t like the chemical taste of pasteurized, homogenized milk. It makes me deeply […]
We had a couple of inches of snow from Hurricane Sandy. Nothing compared to what folks further north are contending with, but it was pretty dramatic for Western North Carolina. Now the snow is gone, the sun is shining and . . . it’s still autumn. Oh, plenty of leaves are down, but the oaks are still hanging on with […]
Last Friday I wrote about the bacon shortage that isn’t. A friend pointed out that most of us have gone without something at some point and survived it. Which got me thinking about what I’ve had to go without and how I handled it. Electricity. We’ve all had to suffer through a power outage a time or two. Where I live now our longest outage has been a little over two days (during a snowstorm with record lows). When I was a kid, outages could last much longer on a farm in WV. And in SC there were hurricane outages. But the unifying theme for all of them is–going without power hasn’t been all that bad. When we were kids it was even fun–sleeping in front of the fireplace, building a fire in the driveway, not having to bathe . . . I have less fun as an adult, but it’s still little more than a temporary inconvenience. And there’s LOTS of time to read! A Telephone. There was a time when no one was really living at the family farm and the phone was disconnected. When we spent time up there, we had to get by without a phone. If there was an emergency, you could take two clothes pins and a handset with exposed wires to the nearest working pole and, ahem, borrow the neighbor’s line. Calling friends was NOT an emergency. Yes, this was before cell phones. The Internet. The farm again–for […]
So, if you’re a big fan of pork products like I am, the news this past week proclaiming a coming bacon shortage was not welcome. Turns out though, the porkocalypse is a bunch of hogwash. Yes, the drought has caused ingredients in hog feed to rise and yes, the price of pork is likely to go up a bit as a result. The USDA predicts your package of bacon could cost as much as 3% more in coming months. Let’s see, on a $5 pack that would be 15 cents. Hmmm. I think I can swing it. And so goes the latest, greatest crisis. Which made me think how often we (and by we I mean I) get ourselves in a lather over . . . nothing. E-books are going to be the death of real books we can hold in our hands. Self-publishing is going to destroy traditional publishing. If this agent/editor/contest judge says “no” then I might as well give up writing and try to teach Thistle to come when called, because obviously that’s only slightly impossible while getting published is completely impossible. Yup. And we’re all going to have to stand in line for bacon come Christmas. So on this lovely Friday in September I just wanted to say to all of you (and by all of you I mean me): It’s going to be alright. Jeremiah 29:11 – “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the […]
Yup, he showed up a little over a week ago and asked if he could live out of his van at our church. After checking him out with the Sheriff’s Department we said, “sure.” He’s a nice man–came to Sunday School and stayed for the service last week. He’s a traveling preacher looking for a chance to witness and/or preach. At first, we called him “the homeless man.” But as we talk to him, bring him food, provide him access to life’s little necessities and just generally get to know him I’m beginning to think he isn’t homeless at all. Jesus sent his twelve disciples out in Matthew 10 with these instructions: “Go to the lost sheep of Israel. As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give. Do not get any gold or silver or copper to take with you in your belts—no bag for the journey or extra shirt or sandals or a staff, for the worker is worth his keep. Whatever town or village you enter, search there for some worthy person and stay at their house until you leave. As you enter the home, give it your greeting. If the home is deserving, let your peace rest on it; if it is not, let your peace return to you. If anyone will not welcome […]
I don’t usually post recipes here. I LOVE to cook, but that’s not what this blog is about. Every once in a while, though . . . There’s a great website called Six Sisters Stuff that has loads of delicious recipes (and crafts, I think, but that’s not my area). This easy, no-bake dessert is very much like a Reese’s Peanut […]
