Countryside Pictures, Eggs and Relativity
Good morning sisters in Christ!
It was a very welcome break from what we've been through the past few months and we are looking forward to some time without rain to get working on the van. (Spring weather is rainy:-) In the meantime we are resting and waiting upon the Lord to see what shall become of all the issues going on in this world.
I pray your day will be joyous in the Lord, standing strong and bold in the Word.
Today we had no rain (it's been raining off and on a lot lately) and we enjoyed the day while doing errands so I thought I'd take some pictures to share with you.
There are a lot of farms here and
we enjoy the opportunity to drive by them.
It's refreshing to us to be back in the
midwest where life is a bit slower....
...and people are not in as much of a hurry
as the big cities we were in this past winter.
And God's creation does what it was ordained to do.
Simplicity in the midst of a troubled world.
The ending of our day started out beautiful...
And got even better...
It was a very welcome break from what we've been through the past few months and we are looking forward to some time without rain to get working on the van. (Spring weather is rainy:-) In the meantime we are resting and waiting upon the Lord to see what shall become of all the issues going on in this world.
We did stop by a dent and bent grocery store, one of our favorites, and I bought some farm fresh eggs to boil. Brother Jim set up a bigger propane cooker for me so I didn't have to use my little propane tanks which cost more...
I know, you sisters are raising your eyebrows and looking at that pot saying.....what's that stuff on the inside? And all that black on the outside? eww...
LOL.
First off, that stuff on the inside is built up calcium from our well and we normally use that pot for shower water, no harm there. The outside has that nasty black on it from the propane cooker blasting it. Its not an inside pot, it stays out and is only used for such things as showers and things like this.
It's all good :-)
Yup, I've had to learn how to kill a LOT (did I say LOT?) of flesh in the area of off grid and full time van living. There are things I won't discuss about it but let's just say I've killed flesh in areas I never knew I had any.
Anyway, with that propane blasting it, they boiled up in no time.
We used to raise egg laying hens and we sure enjoyed fresh eggs with that dark orange yolk and shells so hard you had to bash it on the edge of the counter to dent it, so you could crack it open. With every batch of laying hens we've had one that liked to peck, some were like jackhammers going at your hand when you reached to get the eggs. They were just doing their job:-)
I like to take a can of tuna and mix it with chopped eggs and a little bit of mayo, then we eat it with saltine crackers. Pretty simple. I used to have a cookbook of recipes from the depression era and saw they used to make a 'mock' apple pie from saltine crackers, among other recipes. I never tried it but it's pretty inventive if you ask me. I did make mock apple pie from zucchini (no apples) and it turned out great. You can also can zucchini into mock pineapple. There are tons of recipes that show very inventive ways of using surplus of zucchini, not letting anything go to waste.
Something I've really learned to refine is everything we use. I've always been pretty good about that but there were times when I was busy or flush with income that I let my guard down and became lazy, taking for granted some of the small things. Since we've downsized (and looking at the world and where it's heading) I've minimized even more. The more we strip away, the more thankfulness we have for the minute areas in our life. For example, I was just talking about zucchini. Back when we were homesteading there was a year it flourished so much I had bushel baskets coming out of the garden every few days and I was thankful but will truthfully admit that I got rather tired of it. (I pressed on and processed all of it though.) Today, when I can buy 1 garden grown zucchini, it's as precious as gold to me.
It just shows you that it's all relative to what you have going on. Those bushels of zucchini were a blessing to me and I was thankful but now that I don't have that, I see I wasn't as thankful as I could have been.
As followers of Christ, let's not let relativity govern our lives. What I mean is we don't want the situations we are in to determine our peace, joy, love, appreciation, thankfulness etc (that would be relative to our situation). Instead let us always allow God's Word to determine our situation and let Him guide our hearts and minds. This will strengthen us and press us on in a continuous manner. I don't want to look back when times 'really' get bad in this country and see that I was not what I thought I was when times were good.
Give thanks to our heavenly Father for all He's done.
But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
Matthew 6:33
I like to take a can of tuna and mix it with chopped eggs and a little bit of mayo, then we eat it with saltine crackers. Pretty simple. I used to have a cookbook of recipes from the depression era and saw they used to make a 'mock' apple pie from saltine crackers, among other recipes. I never tried it but it's pretty inventive if you ask me. I did make mock apple pie from zucchini (no apples) and it turned out great. You can also can zucchini into mock pineapple. There are tons of recipes that show very inventive ways of using surplus of zucchini, not letting anything go to waste.
Something I've really learned to refine is everything we use. I've always been pretty good about that but there were times when I was busy or flush with income that I let my guard down and became lazy, taking for granted some of the small things. Since we've downsized (and looking at the world and where it's heading) I've minimized even more. The more we strip away, the more thankfulness we have for the minute areas in our life. For example, I was just talking about zucchini. Back when we were homesteading there was a year it flourished so much I had bushel baskets coming out of the garden every few days and I was thankful but will truthfully admit that I got rather tired of it. (I pressed on and processed all of it though.) Today, when I can buy 1 garden grown zucchini, it's as precious as gold to me.
It just shows you that it's all relative to what you have going on. Those bushels of zucchini were a blessing to me and I was thankful but now that I don't have that, I see I wasn't as thankful as I could have been.
As followers of Christ, let's not let relativity govern our lives. What I mean is we don't want the situations we are in to determine our peace, joy, love, appreciation, thankfulness etc (that would be relative to our situation). Instead let us always allow God's Word to determine our situation and let Him guide our hearts and minds. This will strengthen us and press us on in a continuous manner. I don't want to look back when times 'really' get bad in this country and see that I was not what I thought I was when times were good.
Give thanks to our heavenly Father for all He's done.
But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
Matthew 6:33