Saving Souls and Decorating

Are you familiar with the Salvation Army?

According to Dave and Neta Jackson, authors of Hero Tales, "The slums of East London were a sad place to be at this time (the late 1800's). It was said that every fifth house was a "gin house" with special steps to help even the tiniest children reach the counter. By five years old, many children were alcoholics. Some even died.

But the street corner preaching of the Salvation Army worked. In fact, so many people came to know Christ and stopped drinking and gambling that business began to slow at the gin shops. The owners, who had been getting rich by selling alcohol to these poor people were not happy and did everything they could to stop the street-corner preachers. But God would not let them stop the work of the Salvation Army."

I think the mission of the Salvation Army has changed somewhat in the ensuing hundred-odd years, but it's my understanding it's still a Christian organization, still helping the poor. That's God's work right there.

Another reason why I really like the Salvation Army is you can score superfab deals like these:

Make me feel like I have a grown up bedroom now! We need a headboard and some grown up decorations on the dressers, like I dunno. Candles or statues or something. What do people put on their dressers anyway?

And for the record, we did not get the baby at the Salvation Army. He came with the room. :-)

Favorite Quotes of the Moment

But first to dream and then to do,---isn't that the way to make a dream come true?~~ Meindert DeJong, The Wheel on the School

I found the stork picture here

I do not understand how anyone can live without one small place of enchantment to turn to. ~~Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings

I liken our marriage to a once great civilization that was sacked by a horde of Viking dwarves. ~~??

Thanksgiving always precedes the miracle~~Ann Voskamp

On every level of life, from housework to the heights of prayer, in all judgement and efforts to get things done, hurry and impatience are sure marks of the amateur.~~Evelyn Underhill

Wherever you are, be all there. ~~Elisabeth Elliot

God gives gifts and I give thanks and I unwrap the gift given: joy. ~~Ann Voskamp

I would feel more otimistic about a bright future for man if he spend less time proving that he can outwit nature and more time tasting her sweetness and respecting her seniority. ~~E.B. White

People think the FDA is protecting them-it isn't. What the FDA is doing and what people think it's doing are as different as night and day. ~~Herbert Ley, former FDA commissioner

Books impacting me right now:

1000 Gifts by Ann Voskamp

Sweet Deception by Joseph Mercola, M.D.

Premeditated Parenting by Steve Nelson

Play Ball!

I just love these baby giggles. And the little girl growling and toddler chuckles aren't bad either :-)

Sugar

So you may remember I gave up sugar for Lent?

Here's all the sugar Kevin had to hide from me.


Just kidding. He's going to spray sugar on his fields (if he can ever get IN the fields).

Lent is basically over and I'm trying to decide what to do now. I am feeling more and more convinced that I need to make some serious changes to my eating.

Have you ever heard of the Paleo Lifestyle? That's essentially eating as our hunter/gatherer predecessors did. It would be no sugar and no gluten, lots of veggies and meat.

I also did a nutritional typing test on mercola.com, which seven months ago, identified me as a protein type, but when I just retook it, said I was a mixed type. Nutritional typing is helpful for achieving optimal health. Which of course is what I want.

Plus I need to lose at least 13 more pounds to get my BMI out of the overweight category.

I want energy without resorting to coffee.

I don't want food to be a constant thought in my brain.

I want to eat foods that don't mess up my insulin.

I want to feel well, and I want to be healthy and young, with amazing immunity in the long run.

I believe that the right foods can do it.

I'm pretty sure giving up sugar has been a good start. No food from a box is a good start. Nothing with more than five ingredients is a good start. Food the way God made it is a good start.

But where to go from here...

Baa, Baa Black Sheep

Or whitish grey as the case may be...

The shearer sits a sheep on its rump so it is quiet and still. He's amazingly fast and doesn't nick the sheep skin a bit. I had no idea how much fleece I would be getting when I asked our neighbor if I could buy one.

Two bags full.
That's a lot of fleece.
Especially for a girl who had to google "how to wash fleece" and doesn't know how to spin.
But when I learn, and get a spinning wheel. I'll be ready!
That's not a sheep. That's a Great Pyrenees named Ranger, and some kids: mine and a mama goat's.

More signs of spring

A Day: In Status Updates

Dark. Bad. Quiet. Good.

Apple muffins: YUM! Shredded knuckle: Not so much.

School started promptly at 9:00. First interruption: 9:20. Not bad!

Denton actually says Ga-Ga.

I want a friend in Alaska.

Brielle's sunflower sprouts are amazingly resilient.

B: I don't want to help Tadrian! He always drools on my hand!

Why do I not feel as awesome in my apron as my grandma looked in hers?

I like big equipment as much as the next girl, but the third hour of "back 'oe" "back 'oe" "back 'oe" (repeat. and keep repeating...) may have turned me off of excavators for life.

Too bad this sour cream isn't actually sour cream.

Loving our new mealtime prayer song.

Quickie Mop doesn't begin to describe it.

Never realized how good of bunk beds a new bookshelf would be.

It's awfully hard to put on a coat with a baby on your back.

Ooooh--a new L.L.Bean catalog.

Perspective: When I had just a 2 year old and a baby, I thought life was pretty busy and crazy. Now when I have just a 2 year old and a baby, I feel like I'm on vacation.

Does it count as being in a smaller size if you can't keep it zipped all day?

All the chirping birds make it difficult to make yourself heard out of doors. Not that I'm complaining. And if I did you wouldn't be able to hear me anyway.

I adore my UPS man. He always seems to know just what I like.

I just used the word varmit. If I don't watch it, pretty soon I'll be a-settin' on ma porch a'hollerin' fer them pesky critters to git on outta heyar!

Do I need a special spray bottle for olive oil?

Home raised steak.

"Frontier House": reality tv before reality tv was cool. I'm not 100% confident I would have rocked Frontier House. But I would have tried hard. And learned a lot.

I don't have enough time to do nothing when I go to bed at 10.