Truly Blessed

Sorry for the sideways picture- I forgot to edit before I saved!



Here are some updated pictures of my store cupboard. I still haven't painted it or put doors on it, but this is what those massive shelves were meant for. The open bottom holds 20 food-grade buckets. These buckets house the wheat, rye, barley, oats, corn, lentils, splitpeas, pintos, and any other large amount of dry goods I come across. The next shelf up is for my baking essentials. I have a canisters for some of the things below (rice, oats, beans) so that I don't have to dig out a bucket every time, as well as canisters for flour, palm shortening, turbinado sugar, corn startch, and others. This is also where I keep my scale.



The third shelf is for canned goods like tomatoes, tuna, and salmon, that are bought by the case. I have my popcorn here, cases of Lundberg wild rice mix, thin cakes, and currently some of my mini clocks, while the hutch that houses them is moved! ;) The top shelf holds jars, both full and empty, coffee, tea, oil, vinegar, paper plates, and extra zip-lock bags. Yesterday was co-op day, and when we got all the items put away, I noticed how nice and full the store cupboard looked. What a blessing to have such abundance. It is a testament to Adonai's lovingkindness.



And you might be wondering how I took these pictures with a broken camera.....my darling helps out other farmers when they want to go on vacation or need surgery. We always wished there were people like that when we were milking. As it was, my dad had to take off work to milk for us so we could have a 2 day honeymoon. My husband is a very understanding person, and doesn't always get paid in cash. We know what cash flow can be like between milk checks and having to buy feed, pay the vet, etc. He is gracious to accept whatever they offer, which is sometimes gifts they have received themselves like gift cards. We have been paid in grocery store certificates and Wal-Mart cards many a time. And he lovingly passed the blessing on to me this time and told me to go ahead and get my birthday present (early) of a new camera. I felt horribly guilty, which is something I have trouble with when I know how tight the money is and how hard he works. He told me not to scrimp, as there were problems using the old camera because it was so cheap (no zoom and often trouble attaching it to the computer). I was very deliberate in what I wanted. Multi-purpose is always great, so I wanted one with the video option. I also wanted the kind that you can watch on the screen as you zoom in so that I didn't have to either scratch my glasses trying to look through the view box or take my glasses off and not know what I was looking at! I also wanted a color other than silver, because the 'regular' camera is silver, and it was always confusing to the kids when I would ask them to bring me the digital camera. What I found was this one. I really liked the idea of a pink camera, but did not want to be selfish and force my husband to also use a pink camera, so I opted for the blue. This camera also has a memory card that slides right into the front of my printer, so I don't have to install any camera software and fight with it to run properly! We found it on sale, and with a discount, got it for LESS than the first digital camera that wasn't nearly as good.

And to add to the blessing pile, Yahweh sent us an unexpected check so we were able to fix the AC in the house. Our house is a ranch with no basement or attic, so there is nowhere for the heat to go. The AC stopped working last year, but we just didn't have the money to fix it, so we suffered. One night last summer we went to bed at 10:00 PM and it was 98* in the hallway. No kidding! We also noticed the asthmatic kids had a harder time without it, not only because hot humid air is harder to breath, but because the windows were open when we mowed grass, sending the pollen inside. My darling finally said we needed to find out, and if it was too much we should at least get a window unit for the girls' room. It turned out to be just a bad thermostat, so we were suffering for nothing because that was a very cheap fix. That meant we had the money to buy my darling some jeans and work boots, which he desperately needed, and the kids all got new underwear. Our G-d is an AWESOME G-d!