In The Refiner's Fire

So, John asked me to help him with picking out hymns for his Ordination Service.  As we were working our way through what is fondly known as the "New Red Hymnal", we came across this:   "All Depends on Our Possessing" Listed under the heading of "Grace". (Evangelical Lutheran Worship #589, if you're interested and have a copy). The combination of the title and the heading gave me the biggest belly laugh I've had in a while.  I guess that's what happens when you have a hymn without a title and you take the first four or so words of the hymn and make that the title.   The entire first line of the hymn reads as follows:  "All depends on our possessing God's free grace and constant blessing."    Whew.  I was worried there for a moment.     What gave you a good laugh today?

We had our CSA's fall Harvest Party this weekend.  At the party, the CSA owner puts out any "leftover" vegetables and fruit that they can't use themselves.  We brought home lots of Brussels sprouts, kohlrabi, and HUGE parsnips.  I'm so excited!   We also picked three more pumpkins, several more tomatoes, chocolate peppers and green beans from the yard.  There were even some more strawberries - enough for us to each get a couple.  They are heirloom variety so they're tiny but flavorful.  I'm really hoping they come back well next year! At the grocery store this week we bought $36.02 worth of groceries ($0.16 in sales tax).  Here's what we purchased (no pictures because we were on the way back out the door after dropping these at home): S&W Black Beans 2 15oz cans @ $0.69 = $1.38 Toilet Cleaner $2.19 Baby Spinach 2 @ B1G1 = $2.99 Apples 4.63lbs @ $1.39/lb = $6.44 Black Plums 2.06lbs @ $1.99/lb = $4.10 Russet Potatoes 2 5...

  How's that for a surprise when I cut open a tomato from our garden this week?   I had to take a photo, since it was so unusual.   Even our children commented on how unusual it was.  It's been another busy week around here.  John starts his new position next week and I'm really excited to start a new routine.  There have been several viruses going around at work and I've been trying to make sure I get enough sleep and exercise and eat well.  So far so good!  I'm hoping it continues! I feel like this week was a week of a lot of doing rather than much of anything else. Our grocery shop last week was quite a bit higher than I would have liked so this week we're hoping to keep it low again.  I feel like we didn't do much this week but I'm not so sure. Here are some of the things we did this week that we "frugal": * Ate one meal at church for the Capital Campaign kickoff and brought home several small bags of left...

Sheep!  I promise that's the last photo I'll share from the Oliver Kelley Farm.  I'm planning on taking some actual photos of things in and around our house this week so, hopefully, I'll have some other photos this next week.  I'm rather astonished that I have only a handful of photos from September - all but two of them from the first day of school.  I'm a bit behind with that, I'm afraid.  The sheep in the above photo are chomping happily on the weeds the children and I picked in the garden there.  If only we had a sheep to feed the weeds at home to!  Or not.  I have zero desire to raise animals (other than a nice puppy at some point) around my home. We spent $47 on groceries this week - I'm a bit irritated about that since my careful planning this summer didn't help.  I totally ran out of laundry detergent this week and we also needed yogurt, something that I've tried to make many times but have failed each time and is rather exp...

I've been super remiss about taking photos in September now, but that's one from the Oliver Kelley Farm we visited Labor Day weekend.  Can you tell the bull's horns go two different directions?  We all thought that was hilarious!   He was very gentle - and was trying to eat clover out of the children's' hands very neatly.  This week felt very busy. I have been discovering that my current schedule doesn't allow much time for prep or grading or any the things that go into making a class run well.  So we've been trying to move things around a bit.  Not sure how we'll get there but we will eventually, I hope!  The children were away for three days on a school trip so John and I had the place to ourselves for a bit.  He was paid for a Pulpit Supply job and decided that he was going to use it to take me out on a real out-of-the-house date.  Those have been so rare the last two years, so I heartily accepted! It was so very quiet ...

Okay, so that's not a food photo, in terms of an actual meal, but it's a food photo since it's part of the kitchen garden at the Oliver Kelley Farm in Elk River, MN.  You can read more about the Oliver Kelley Farm here. We visited there using our Minnesota Historical Society membership and the children love that they get to try everything out. It's a living history farm and truly a great place for a family visit. There's something even for the little ones! Our garden isn't anywhere near that impressive but I'm loving the produce we get.  I'm also very grateful that I don't just have to eat from our garden.  We'd do pretty well with some things and not so good with others.  Tomatoes? Check!  Carrots?  Not so much. It's a mostly normal school week for us this week.  Here's what we're eating: Sunday, September 11:    Breakfast: Smoothies    Lunch: Veggie and Cheese Calzones    Snack: Popcorn ...

Wow - this week has gone both super slow and super fast!   The children and I started school this week, John has been "off" while waiting for his Call to start but doing TONS of stuff around the house, I've been teaching extra Jazzercise classes due to vacations/illness/maternity leave, and then Buddy came down with a massive head cold and had to stay home from school.  I was so glad today was Saturday - at least I *think* it's Saturday!  I feel like I've been trying to figure out what day it is all week!  Starting on a Tuesday threw me for a loop and with Buddy having to stay home one day, it's been a bit confusing! We had a pretty frugal week, all things considered.  John doesn't get a paycheck until October so we're trying very hard to spend as little as possible.  We did make a couple of grocery purchases where we actually ran out of something but other than that we didn't spend much and used several things we already had. Here's w...

    Dinner while camping - hot dogs over the fire!  And the coffee pot is just heating water for washing the dinner dishes.   We also ate a LOT of tomatoes and other fresh garden goodies while camping.  It was all so good!  Grilled cabbage is now a new favorite at our house.  Yum!   This week is back into routine.  I think I'm glad of that!  I like routine and getting back into things is very comforting to me.  We have a the menus planned out except for details through the end of December, which is great for planning ahead and buying groceries.  I *think* we're good for the month except for some milk, eggs and a bit of fruit.  We'll see how that goes.  I'm trying to spend as little as possible on food this month since we have a few weeks before John gets his first paycheck.    We had some meat leftover from camping so we ate those this Sunday and Monday and then into the other things we h...

    So, after getting John's Call on Sunday, we headed out for pre-planned week of vacation at one of Minnesota's beautiful State Parks.  We spent part of Monday down at the beach, the kids and John swam and I waded around, skipping rocks and taking photos.  It rained Tuesday and the water levels were quite high and trails were damp so we limited ourselves to hiking the groomed trails on Wednesday and then did a 7 mile hilly/rocky/rugged hike on Thursday.  The beauty always astounds me!  The weather was too cool to return to the beech but the hikes were plenty.  We had a wonderful week, though now I have a mountain of laundry and a whole bunch of other things that need cleaning before they can be put away until we need them again.    Every year, we take a week and go "camping" at one of the State Parks.  I put camping in quotes because we rent a cabin with a solid roof and actual beds.  It's ...