Home Sweet Home

Beautiful, isn't it?
This is the culmination of all my grandfather's working years, summed up in one specially built home and property... and now passed on to me and my family!
We hope you'll be able to enjoy it with us when you come visit, that is, once we permanently relocate to Southern Oregon. Until then, we'll all just have to vacation there!
The Lord is so abundantly gracious to provide a home for us in this way. We are so grateful, not only to the Lord, but to my family for passing this treasure on!

Another Birthday!

Yes, Nathanael just turned 14 on Saturday!
We had his party on Sunday after church. Good friends and family joined us and we all enjoyed ourselves! Nathanael chose carrot cake again (no surprise there!) and horses for the cake-topper. I think he might turn out to be a cowboy yet!
Not everyone likes carrot cake, so we made vanilla and chocolate cupcakes too!
And of course we had a pinata! And Miss Christine Cools was the one to beat it to pieces! She was the first to swing, which was appropriate because it was her first pinata ever. Way to go Christine! Good swings!

So much to tell you about...

The Garden:Wow, where did the summer go? I was thinking that it might be back for a little while... until about 4 pm today when it started raining again! That's the story of our entire summer around here - rain! I suppose it wasn't really that bad, but I do know that our cold and rainy June has really wreaked havoc with the garden. On Monday I picked my very first real tomato (I've been getting a few cherry tomatoes for about 3 weeks), and we began eating the very immature corn. The root veggies took a long time, but did fine (except for something totally devastating my beet crop). The cabbage finally filled out, the snap peas are still going strong, and the green beans are coming on slowly. The summer squash has been stop and go, depending on the part of the sun-for-a-couple-days-then-rain-for-a-couple-days cycle we're in. My hubard squash have done well, though I worry that they'll mature enough before it gets too rainy. I think there's only one or two butternut squash that will have a chance to mature - though there are a ton of new baby squash coming on. The real disappointment is the cucumber crop. I've only gotten about 10 quart jars of pickles off my vines this year - just not enough sun! To put it in perspective, I planted the same number of cucumber vines as last year, in the same amount of space, at nearly the same time of year. Last year I canned 37 quarts of pickles, 12 1/2 pints sweet relish, 7 pints sweet gherkins, and 12 pints of bread and butter pickles. Not to mention that we ate bunch fresh and gave a bunch away. Last fall we even finally just pulled up the vines because we were tired of picking the cucumbers! A far cry from this year! Yet, why should I complain? With each new jar of produce that I put up, I see how blessed we are that the Lord should even extend His grace toward us and provide for any of our needs! I can still pray for sunshine, though!
Canning:So far I've canned 36 one-and-one-half pint jars of green beans, 10 quarts of dill pickles, 4 pints of pickled green beans, 37 quarts of peaches, 5 pints of beets, and I have my 19 heads, or a shredded and cored 38 pounds, of cabbage fermenting in a borrowed crock (my 10 gallon crock had an accident!).

The Woodpile:
Thanks to some amazing friends and neighbors, we actually have a woodpile! Well, we had one before, but it was small! Now we have several cord of wood to be stacked! And Charles was so handy and built temporary stem walls under our covered area in order to make stacking so much easier! We spent one whole day cutting wood with friends (on Labor Day) and ended up cutting somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 1/2 cord of wood! Whew! That was some work! And during the course of the woodcutting, Nathanael acquired what will prove to be a manly scar... which leads me to the next section:

Injuries!
The Sunday before Labor Day, Mikael was the cause of a hurried trip to the nearest Urgent Care center! He had been playing in the gym with friends at church when he went after a ball and someone's leg got in the way, so he ended up doing a not-so-graceful nose-dive right into a wooden bench! Well, after we got some of the blood slowed down and had a look at the already turning purple nose that was a little crooked, we packed him up and headed off to Urgent Care! Pretty much, it was a waste of time: they looked at his nose, said it could be broken and told us they would set up an appointment with a specialist sometime during the next week. We stopped at Walgreen's on the way home and got him some Ibuprofen and an ice pack (which he's used almost once). After seeing the specialist on Wednesday, she determined that he really didn't have a broken nose, just tweaked the cartilage where it joins the bone in his nose. Her advice? Apply pressure to the nose at the junction of cartilage and bone, against the curve, several times a day for at least 20 minutes. Number of times this has actually been carried out? Possibly once!And that leads to Nathanael's head injury on Monday, Labor Day. A bit of background: These amazing friends of ours are also rather inventive, and they've developed a rather sophisticated system by which they process most of their firewood. They use a large farm tractor to move the logs onto and up the skids to the saw. The saw is a chainsaw mounted on a spring-loaded slide, effectively making it a large chop-saw. From there the cut wood rolls down a ramp to the hydraulic splitter, and then the wood is thrown over or down into one of the waiting trailers. The system is a great one, and is safer than most free-hand wood cutting operations, that is... if the bolt attaching the bracket on the saw to the spring-loaded slide is tightened after refueling the saw! Well, the bolt wasn't tightened after refueling the saw one time, and Nathanael was getting his opportunity to run the saw. He was making his cut when the saw started cutting at an angle and he was wondering about that when the bolt came loose and the spring loaded slide was free to snap back up to the top. The problem was that Nathanael's forehead was in the way! He was a real trooper - he pulled the chain-break on the saw and calmly shut the saw off and set it down. Then he felt his head and discovered all the blood! He had a fairly deep gash about 3/4 of an inch long, near the hairline on the right side of his forehead. After he was all cleaned up, he was fine. Later that night when some of the swelling was down, we super-glued the gash shut, but two nights later in his sleep he picked the glue off! He's healing well enough, but he'll probably always have that scar! Maybe I should have taken pictures of them both, but... they never really had a great scrapbooking moment. Mikael never really bruised up and his swelling went down, and Nathanael's would have been noteworthy only when the blood was running down his face, and I wasn't there to take a picture then. These wounds will have to go undocumented as far as any digital images are concerned!

Backpacking/Hiking:
Early in the summer, we as a family drove up to near Mosier, Oregon, on the Columbia River, 75 miles east of Portland. We hiked the Tom McCall trail on the Nature preserve there. It was beautiful country and the weather was in the 80's! That point in the background on the left is Tom McCall Point. Yes, even I made it up and back the 4 miles!

Later in the summer, in the latter part of July, Charles and Nathanael participated in a father/son backpacking trip into the Salmon Huckleberry Wilderness. They hiked in on a Friday morning and back out Sunday afternoon, putting about 30 miles of wear and tear on their shoes!


Freeze-dried dinner! Mmm-mmm good!

Camping:
We did manage to get one camping trip in this summer to Diamond Lake, almost 3 weeks into August. Charles' parents, Ed and Rose Baker, joined us there and we spent 4 fairly peaceful nights away from all the demands of our regular schedules. We played a lot of card games and board games, played horseshoes and ladder golf, found time to do some reading, a bit of walking and biking, and quite a bit of fishing! I think Mikey was the fishing champ in our family, though Charles might have been in second place if he'd gotten to go fishing that last day when Ed and Rose took the boys out and they all limited out in 2 1/2 hours! During their fishing fun, Charles and I were on a quest to walk the trail around the lake (approximately 10 miles) when my shoes began rubbing blisters on my feet, just in front of my heel-pad, on the outside bottom edge. In spite of blisters and due to not having a way back to camp at that time (remember: the other members of our camping crew were out on the lake hauling in the fish as fast as they could get their lines in the water) we continued on. Though I will admit that the pain was not something I'd like to repeat, I can laugh now at the rollicking way in which I walked on the toe of one foot and the inside edge of the other and then would switch off after a while. All told, we made it about 7 1/2 miles, at least 4 1/2 of which were after the blisters developed. Eventually the mighty fish-slayers finished catching their legal limit and came and picked us up. For the rest of that day and the next, I spent my time on my feet standing on my toes - it was the only way to keep from putting pressure on the very full blisters that were the size of a silver dollar on the bottom of my feet, and almost a half dollar size up the outside of each foot. I think my calves got in shape on that camping trip!And camping isn't done for the year just yet, as we plan on joining our church for their annual family camping trip near Estacada. We are praying for good weather for the weekend of September 24-26th!

Horses?

Yes, horses and ropes and even a calf or two to rope! Nathanael invested a considerable chunk of change this summer into a roping clinic put on by a friend of a gentleman we go to church with. Nathanael doesn't have a horse or any tack, but Ms. Lawwill was kind enough to loan him all he needed. He had a great time and learned a lot, and even was issued and invitation to join Ms. Lawwill and our friend, Mr. Skarpol as they ride and have a trainer come out every Thursday. So, now Nathanael is taking some riding lessons and doing great! Mikey even got to hop on for a minute!

Losses:This summer, on July 21st, 2010, my grandmother, Beverly F. Maplesden, went home to be with our Lord. She was a woman of prayer and thankfulness, completely devoted to her Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, whom she served with her whole heart. We will miss her much over the coming days, but we have a sweet hope and joy in knowing that we will be with her again when Jesus calls us home.

Travels:

We didn't do a lot of traveling this summer, other than several trips to Southern Oregon. Early in June my father called to say that he thought Grandma was in a very fragile state and that we might want to come soon in order to have real interaction with her. Charles immediately sought time off from his boss, which was given, and we traveled to Southern Oregon to spend 5 days visiting with Grandma and my parents. Grandma was indeed frail when we arrived, but perked right up and seemed to be on the mend before we left. It was a good time to have had before she went Home.
Our next trip south was right after Grandma passed. Charles once again got time off, this time a whole week, so with weekends we had 9 days in Southern Oregon. During that trip we built Grandma's casket, participated in her funeral and graveside, for which I was a pall-bearer. I was left to plan the after-service fellowship time at Grandma's home. I had many, many wonderful helpers get everything ready for a houseful of family and friends, and feed them all too! Charles was my steadfast hero! He scrubbed walls, toilets, windows. He watered flowers and laws, weed-eated a ton, and mowed too! More than that, he was my dependable helper and strength when I was all done in. The boys also did so much in getting things ready - quite the troopers! Cleaning, working and weed-eating was not exactly how they would have liked to spend a week of summer in sunny Southern Oregon! Charles' parents were of invaluable assistance in pulling off the whole fellowship event, and there were many others who helped as well for whom we are all so very thankful! After our week of work, work, work and then Grandma's services, we headed home on Sunday in order to get Charles back for work on Monday.
It was pretty hard on my Dad for us to go, so after getting our yard and garden in order through that next week, the boys and I drove back down for another week of visiting. This time the boys got to do more summer activities and enjoy the warm sunshine. Dad needed help with the business, having taken the week off before Grandma's services, so I worked during the week. Though we didn't ever just hang out and visit, and we did do a ton of work, it was a good week, especially for my father to have us around again for a while.
We are planning on spending another week down there in October, settling more things with Grandma's estate, taking some time to hunt, and maybe even do a batch of apple cider! We might get a 'vacation' yet!

Here are the boys with their cousin, Sydney, at my Dad's house in Sams Valley.

Leaven

So, I've been up to my elbows in bread the last two days, and it gave me some time to ponder the New Testament teachings on leaven. I sat down here to write about them and decided to look up the exact verses I was thinking of in my E-Sword program, and then I thought maybe I'd better read a few commentaries on these verses, and now... well, it's way more complicated than I have the time to relate here!
So, use some good Bible software (or several Bible commentaries) and look up a couple verses like Matt. 13:33; 16:11, Luke 13:21 and Galatians 5:9. Then, after reading several great thinkers' ideas about this, you can edit my blog and leave all the notes! No, really... it's not just as simple as "let a little of the bad in, and you'll get a whole bunch of bad." I like cut and dried, I like rules and regulations (as long as they make sense). I think I'd have been a good Pharisee. But really, as I always find, that's not how God operates. He's about our heart attitude, not only our outward appearance. So... long story short, let's allow Christ to be the leaven in our hearts, bringing about His will, permeating all that we do and say and think and feel by His Spirit.

And send me your notes after you've studied this a bit!

Today I re-read one of Charles H. Spurgeon's "Morning and Evening" devotionals that I had marked, it struck me once again as something I needed to hear. I thought I'd share it here and maybe the Lord will speak to you from it as well.

Continue in the Faith. - Acts 14:22

Perseverance is the badge of true saints. the Christian life is not only a beginning in the ways of God, but also means continuing in those ways as long as life lasts. It is with a Christian as it was with the great Napoleon: He said, "Conquest has made me what I am, and conquest must maintain me." So under God, dear believer in the Lord, conquest has made you what you are, and conquest must sustain you. Your motto must be, "Aim higher." The only true conqueror who shall be crowned in the end is he who continues until war's trumpet is blown no more. Perseverance is, therefore, the target of all our spiritual enemies. The world does not object to your being a Christian for a time, if she can tempt you to quit your pilgrimage and settle down to trade with her in Vanity Fair. The flesh will seek to ensnare you and to prevent your pressing on to glory. "Being a pilgrim is weary work and makes me wonder: Am I always to be mortified? Am I never to be indulged? Can I not have at least a holiday from this constant warfare?" Satan will make many a fierce attack on your perseverance; it will be the target for all his arrows. He will strive to hinder you in service: He will insinuate that you are doing no good and that you need to rest. He will endeavor to make you weary of suffering; he will whisper, "Curse God, and die." Or he will attack your steadfastness: "What is the good of being so zealous? Be quiet like the rest; sleep as others do, and let your lamp go out like the foolish virgins." Or he will assail your doctrinal sentiments: "Why do you hold to these doctrinal creeds? Sensible men are getting more liberal; they are removing the old landmarks: Fall in with the times." So, Christian, wear your shield close to your armor and cry earnestly to God, that by His Spirit you may endure to the end.

Garden in July

The garden is a bit behind this year. We've had much more rain and cold weather than the typical spring and therefore the growth has been slow and we couldn't plant as early as we would have liked.

Here's what it looks like now:

The south end of the garden gets a slight amount of shade throughout the day due to the tall trees that border the creek/yard to the south. This allows us to grow snap peas all summer long even when the temperatures are 80 and above. The lettuce and spinach are next to the peas, and will benefit of some shade as the peas fill in. the cabbages take up the whole next row and I'm planning on making another batch of sauerkraut this fall. Turnips, parsnips and beets are in sections of the nearest row in the picture.

Carrots on the right fill half a row. We often stagger our plantings, so today I hope to seed the other half of the row with the remainder of the carrots. The onions (middle) are Walla Walla Sweets and down the middle of that row I have transplanted my dill which I will need for pickling. On the left are our peppers. We have several varieties of sweet bell peppers and a couple jalapenos to use in salsa and pickling.

We only put in two rows of blue lake pole beans this year. They all look strong so I think it will be enough to pickle, can, freeze and eat fresh! The corn is planted in blocks on the left behind the beans. We have two varieties currently and will plant the middle section today with the rest of the corn.

We added a new planter this year up against the garage. The expectation is that the heat reflected off the south face of the garage and from the patio will help the tomatoes produce and ripen before we get too much fall rain or frost. We're also experimenting with cantaloupe in the from of the tomatoes to cascade over the south edge and really get some good heat. The problem, of course, is that we couldn't get things in ground or raised planter/bed very early this year, so much will depend largely on when the first rains of fall arrive.

(the house in the background is the neighbor's house - ours looks like it but is a 90 degree turn to the left of the current picture)
These are the raised beds we put in last spring. At this end of the right hand bed we have hubbard squash, which I steam and freeze for pumpkin pies or pumpkin cake. The color is brighter than pumpkin and I prefer the flavor, though most people never notice the difference once cooked. The rest of this bed has 6 hills of pickling cucumbers, 1 hill of lemon cukes and 1 hill of slicing cukes.
The bed on the left has butternut squash in the near end for winter eating. There are 3 hills of yellow crookneck squash and 3 hills of zucchini. We love the fresh summer squash in scrambled eggs, in stir-fry's and steamed. I also shred and freeze some zucchini for winter baking.
The tall bed on the far left of this picture used to have all my herbs in it (chives, rosemary, thyme, sage, oregano and lemon balm). Currently I am in the process of moving all my perennial herbs to an in-ground bed. I have strawberry plants all around the outside edge of this planter with basil, parsley and cilantro in the middle. We love our pesto around here, and it freezes nicely so we try and make a ton!

Well, that's the long of it!
I'll leave you with a few pictures of what the garden looked like when we were preparing it for planting this spring.

Flowers in our yard!

It's bloom season and in case you didn't know it, I LOVE my flowers!

Here are a few in our yard:

Add to this the sound of running water from the stream that cascades over the rocks in the creek bottom at the edge of our yard and the birds chirping as they rob blueberries from the neighbors bushes, and you'll have a perfect retreat from the hustle and bustle of everyday life.

The Lord has blessed us richly beyond what we deserve or could comprehend and I offer up praise to Him for His good and perfect gifts!

Want to come visit?

Summer days!

What have we been doing around here lately?
Well, the boys decided to release their 'pet' juvenile pacific giant salamander. They thought that even though Salli loved the worms they fed him each day, that he would enjoy his freedom. I think I'm going to miss Salli!

Here the guys are around the campfire after roasting hot dogs for dinner. We all went in and put sweatshirts on after this - it had been raining and cold for previous couple of days.

Here are the boys in the creek that runs along our yard. The temperatures have been in the 90's for the last couple of days and we're all seeking someplace cool - and the boys found it! Everyday they play for hours in the water. I joined them yesterday and found the air temperatures to drop about 15 degrees down in the canyon. I think I'll go back with them today!

And here are our growing boys, showing off just how much muscle they've been building doing all sorts of work around the house and garden this summer!
These boys sure do have a lot of fun around here, and so do we. We love these helpful, thankful, fun-loving boys!

Mount St. Helens

On Tuesday, June 15th, we went with a group of homeschoolers from our area on a field trip to Mount St. Helens. We learned a ton from Mr. Anderson, the owner of the 7 Wonders Creation Museum in Silverlake, Wa. He was an engaging teacher as we learned so much about what happened before and after the initial erruption, and just what we, as creationists, now have as an answer to 'old earth' thinkers. Great stuff! Check out his website and visit if you can! Here are a few pictures from our trip:

This is the best view we got of the mountain while we were at the Johnston Ridge Observatory. The weather was pretty socked in all day, and at one point in time we had a little over an inch of snow and ice pellets!
This is the view across the valley from the Johnston Ridge Observatory. It's hard to see in the picture, but there is some amazing topography there. Valleys that used to be there are filled in, new valleys created through solid rock, and a new river system created!
This picture is taken of the Toutle River, the one originating from the the Mount St. Helens watershed. This is many miles downriver from the mountain, yet we can still see the effects of the massive mudflow that reopened the Toutle River drainage to once again flow to the ocean. Almost 30 years later we can see how much of the river valley was under the mud!
Here we are at Coldwater Lake, just over the ridge from Mount St. Helens. The lake was created when the Mt. blew. Charles and the boys at Coldwater Lake, with the base of Mount St. Helens in the background (still totally cloud-covered!)

On the drive up the Toutle River to get to the observatory, we saw some amazing things. One of which was an entire area reforested and flourishing, some 44,000 acres of land hand planted with noble fir! Several herds of elk were also occupying the Monument lands, and the bulls were already branched out and HUGE! Wish we'd gotten some pictures, but I don't have the telephoto lens that I would have needed!

Where does the time go?

I really haven't forgotten about blogging - truly! Many, many times I have come here to write, but... well, I look at the time of night, sigh and then turn off the computer and head to bed. You see, I'm usually a night owl, staying up late, getting up late. I've been convicted of my slovenly habits, and I'm really working on turning over a new leaf! So now, I go to bed when my husband goes to bed, and I get up early, and I don't sit down and waste time at the computer during the day. A lot more gets done around here, and we all like the results of a cleaner house, yummy meals, fewer weeds in the garden and flower beds, and more reading time!

I'm still working on when in the world I will have time to post regularly, but that's the hope. Usually I take so long between posts that I have either so much to say or something more like a book to relate, so the posts take forever to write and then it's so draining and time consuming that I then don't feel able to post again right away and the cycle continues.

The goal: shorter, more frequent posts.

A thought for the day (or maybe every day): Our job as parents is to be obedient to the Lord, disciplining and discipling our children. The really tough part about all that is the part where we leave the results up to God, and we stay on our knees for those precious ones of ours that the Lord has entrusted to us. It's not my job to change my child's heart - that's Christ's job. I have to be faithful to the call on my life, the convictions of my heart fueled by God's Holy Scriptures and the Holy Spirit. It humbles me to know that all I do, even the really important stuff, cannot save my child from hell - only Jesus can do that! That leaves me with a hearty "amen" when I read what Paul has to say in 1 Thessalonians 5:17 "Pray without ceasing"! Though I find that the key to peace about all situations is found in the two verses surrounding this one.

"16 Rejoice always; 17 pray without ceasing; 18 in everything give thanks; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

VACATION!

So, Friday, just after noon we'll hit the road on our mini vacation and spend the weekend with dearest of friends! Now all I have to do is get some sleep, take care of my morning responsibilities, and get home in time to be off! Of course, it would be nice if both boys miraculously got well over night! Mikael is pretty much over his cold, but Nathanael is still fighting his. We're heading for the resort pool tomorrow, but we might just visit the local museum and play some games and let them spend Saturday in the pool. Anyway, we'll see you all at the end of the weekend. Too bad we won't be sunburned to boot!

About our vision for Church

Just wanted to share what we have come to see as the point of church, and since the elders and deacons of Household had already expressed it perfectly, I'll let them say it again for you all here:

"HOFCC was planted initially in August of 1998 in the home of Gregg Harris, an internationally recognized author and advocate of Christian home schooling and family restoration.

The new local church has been an attempt to institute several reforms of structure and doctrinal emphasis. From the very beginning, HOFCC has been age-integrated as a matter of principle. We choose to equip parents to train and include their own children in our church services rather than relieve them of their responsibilities by means of age-segregated youth programs. We do not offer a Sunday School, Youth Group or Children's Church service. Instead, we maintain a family inclusive and family uniting culture that draws everyone of all ages into worship, Bible study and partnership in advancing the Gospel together. If we hope to see families serving God together as a team, they must be equipped together as a team. That is what a Christian family household is— a team of believers living and serving God together.

The results of our efforts have been very encouraging. When families are willing to endure the transition back to a simpler and more Biblical way of gathering, they see a dramatic improvement in their children's love for God and His church. Men are drawn back into their Biblical roles as leaders of their own households and wives are restored to their Biblical roles as the helpers and companions of their own husbands. Sound doctrine is restored to its place as the treasure of the entire family and church planting missions become the natural result of healthy spiritual and numerical growth.

— the Elders & Deacons of HOFCC "

Hope this helps you see a bit of where we are in this journey of faith.

Homeschooling in all ways!

Just a couple pictures of the boys buried in their free-reading books. Both are munching apples as a snack and doing what they're usually doing:


Nathanael: soaking up every last ounce of heat he can get from the wood stove!

Mikael: Semi-contorted in some weird position that the rest of us aren't ever able to duplicate! Yes, he's sitting on his bottom (on a stuffed, squishy soccer ball) on the floor, holding his book open with his foot, eating his apple and reading happily away. He was so absorbed that he didn't even know I took the picture!

It's so much fun to school at home! Not typical classroom stuff, that's for sure!

Yes, I'm still alive!

Just wanted to say that we're all still alive and well. Rethinking this whole blog thing though, so I might actually be writing a bit more... who knows!

Big things happening in our life, though. Maybe I can share soon!