Palindrome Day

Today is Palindrome Day:  January 2, 2010, or, written as the palindrome…

01022010

Just a fun little tidbit.

Health Care Reform

Don’t even get me started on how wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong the “Health Reform” bill is, on so many levels, not the least of which is how it strips personal freedoms for seeking any sort of alternative health care.  The whole thing makes me want to scream.  I finally found an article that succinctly summarizes two of the major flaws of the bill: finances and the constitution. The True Intent of Health “Reform”.

Following

Sooooooooo, it’s been a long time since I last blogged – too long.  It has been so long, in fact, that I forgot my password to get *in* to my account so that I could blog.  Thankfully there are fail safes for people like me.  Actually, I have been blogging all along, only it’s never made it out of my head and into cyberspace.

As usually happens with the passage of time, much has changed.  Much has also stayed the same, but some of the “bigger” things in our lives have definitely changed.  The biggest of these things is that we sold our property up here in North Idaho, and with it let go of a dream we’ve had for a very long time.  It was a very difficult and emotional decision, but we felt it was what the Lord was leading us to do.  Perhaps I’ll write about what led to our decision, as a way for us to remember.  For now I can say I believe that the death of a dream can be the beginning of a path that leads to a better reality.

We also moved – again.  This makes 15 homes for our family since Mr. King and I have been married, which is now 17.5 years.  That’s a lot of moving.  I learned and was able to articulate two very important things about myself with this last move.  1) I do *not* like moving!  2) I love following the Lord *more* than I don’t like moving!  I know that to some of our family and friends it appears that we’re flighty, or never satisfied, or can’t stick with a decision.  But what goes on behind closed doors is prayerful submission for what we should do next.  As the Lord is weaving together the tapestry of our lives, He never wastes a thread.  And so I know that even though I would have preferred to be in our “forever” home on this earth many years ago, He has a purpose and a plan for bringing us through move after move after move.

It is my earnest desire to know the Lord and be know by Him, every day, in all I do.  Being led by the Holy Spirit through prayer and submission often doesn’t make rational sense.  But His ways are higher than my ways.  So I trust Him and yield my life to Him regardless of the circumstances.  Some days, some minutes, it’s easier than others.  I want to be counted as one of the sons of God, so I must follow where He leads.

For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.  Romans 8:14

Where He Leads Me, I Will Follow by E.W. Blandy

I can hear my Saviour calling,
I can hear my Saviour calling,
I can hear my Saviour calling,
“Take thy cross and follow, follow me”.

Chorus:
Where He leads me I will follow -
I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.

I’ll go with Him thru the garden,
I’ll go with Him thru the garden,
I’ll go with Him thru the garden,
I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.

Chorus:
Where He leads me I will follow -
I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.

I’ll go with Him thru the judgment,
I’ll go with Him thru the judgment,
I’ll go with Him thru the judgment,
I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.

Chorus:
Where He leads me I will follow -
I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.

He will give me grace and glory,
He will give me grace and glory,
He will give me grace and glory,
And go with me, with me all the way.

Chorus:
Where He leads me I will follow -
I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.

Buying in Bulk

I’m not a fan of grocery shopping.  I’m not really a fan of shopping in general.  I’d rather stay at home than go out and have to deal with crowds and lines and seeing all sorts of things some marketer thinks I need.  There is the rare occasion when shopping is enjoyable for me; like when time is not of the essence, or when my list of to-do’s is not growing ever longer in the back of my mind.

Grocery shopping is particularly bothersome to me because I read. every. label.  Even if I bought the same item last week, I read the label again.  I do this because manufacturers are constantly changing the ingredients in their products.  Most of the time they do it to make more profit.  That was one of the reasons pop began being made with high fructose corn syrup.  It’s cheaper than sugar.  Sometimes ingredients change because of availability, and sometimes it’s because of taste.  Whatever the case, I feel it is my responsibility to know what I am putting into the bodies of the people in my home with the food that I serve them.  I cannot afford to be lazy in this.  The health of the people I love the most is at stake.

The fact that I read all the labels means that a trip to the grocery store takes me twice as long as it used to.  Time I could use to grade papers or fold laundry or play in a Wii bowling championship game.  And the more prepared foods that I purchase, the longer it takes.  A can of soup has maaaaannnnnny ingredients.  A bag of garbanzo beans has one.

Saving time from reading ingredient lists is only one of the reasons our family has been buying in bulk for many years.  There is a significant cost savings when you buy in bulk.  The price per pound goes down considerably.  For example, where I buy wheat berries 5# is $3.80 for organic hard red wheat, 25# is $15.55 and 50# is $29.75.  That breaks down to $0.76, $0.622, and $0.595 per pound respectively.  I save $0.165 on every pound of wheat.  On just 5# of wheat I save $0.825 and on 50# I save $8.25.  Multiply that out over how much wheat I use and on many different products and I end up saving a bunch of money by buying in bulk.

The secret to buying in bulk is to buy what your family will use.  If you save $8.00 on a 50# bag of wheat but you never use it, then you have not saved anything.  You’ve wasted almost $30.00.  That’s never a good plan, but especially not now with the uncertainty in our economy.  Which is another reason why we buy in bulk.  Have you been watching the prices of food lately?  I save money by buying whatever food I can in advance.  I get to eat at yesterday’s or last month’s or last year’s prices.  Last year I watched as wheat prices went from $0.40 per pound to almost $0.90 at my local health food store back in Colorado.  Quinoa went from around $30.00 for a 25# bag to over $50.00.  Some of the prices have eased off a bit, but I’m still spending more money today for the same stuff than I did even just 6 months ago.

Another reason for buying in bulk is simply the convenience.  If you have things on hand, you don’t need to run to the store.  If you don’t need to run to the store, your chance of spending on impulse purchases is non-existent.  Having items on hand makes preparation so much easier too.  Not to mention the fact that it’s pretty much a necessity when you live off grid, 20+ miles from the nearest regular grocery store.

A fully stocked pantry used to be commonplace in homes in this country.  Sadly, modern conveniences have made people rely on the availability of food stuffs at the store instead of in their homes.  When faced with any kind of emergency, how will modern day American people survive?  The loss of a job, a blizzard, a tornado, a glitch in the shipping infrastructure . . . these and many other situations could make normal trips to the grocery store impossible.  FEMA recommends a 3-day supply of food for your family.  I think that amount is laughable, but it is at least a good place to start.  Buying in bulk will help get you there.  I’ll write about what to buy, how much to buy, how to store it all, and how to use bulk items in future posts.

Go to the ant, O sluggard;
   consider her ways, and be wise.
Without having any chief,
   officer, or ruler,
she prepares her bread in summer
   and gathers her food in harvest.
How long will you lie there, O sluggard?
   When will you arise from your sleep?
A little sleep, a little slumber,
   a little folding of the hands to rest,
and poverty will come upon you like a robber,
   and want like an armed man.

Proverbs 6:6-11

My New Favorite Word

♥♥♥ Idahome ♥♥♥

I cannot take credit for the word, however.  It came from my dear friend Pamela’s daughter, Hannah.  Way to go Hannah!  I will now be telling everyone that I live in Idahome.

I Had to Do It

There were so many other things that I needed to spend my time on: grading papers, planning menus, filing papers, folding laundry, cooking dinner, putting laundry away, planning our garden, ordering seeds, baking bread, finding ways to use the eggs.  Clearly, this list could go on and on, and on, and on . . . . But I couldn’t stand it any longer.  I had to do something about it.  It was truly driving me crazy.  All of the children were eager to help me.  So, I rearranged the furniture.  Ahhhhhhhhh, I feel so much better now!

And Mr. King said, “THANK YOU!!!”

The Back Story – Part 2

It was the spring of 1998, before we had moved to Iowa (we moved in December).  Mr. King was scouring through some papers and looking for some information online.  He started telling me what he was learning about.  I did not want to believe what I was hearing him say.  It was too fantastically horrible, there was no way it could be true.  But deep down I knew it was true.  Mr. King had gathered information from several different sources about the economy.

One of the men who was very concerned about the state of the economy in the U.S., and the world for that matter, had a website, booklets, and videos at the time.  I don’t know what his beliefs are today, but the information we got from him back then made a lasting impact on us.  The title of the presentation was called The Bulls, The Bears, and The Beast.  It was the first presentation I had ever seen that so clearly explained what was going on presently and what would be going on in the future of our economy and how it all tied in to Biblical prophecy.  Unfortunately we lent the video to someone who lent it to someone, and we never got it back.

The thing I remember most about the presentation is the picture he drew of how the entire global economy would collapse.  He said it would be like a dragon eating its tail and that prosperity depending on ever increasing debt always leads to financial collapse.  This is as true for nations as it is for families.

We determined to do whatever we could to get out of debt which dove tailed nicely with our desire to move to the country and live a simpler life.  So, we sold our cookie cutter home in Colorado and moved into a rental in Iowa.  It was there that we bought our first wheat berries.  One 50 pound bag of hard red wheat and one 50 pound bag of soft white wheat.  I had no idea really what the difference was or why we needed both, but that’s what the survival/preparation books said.

Unfortunately, I never got to use any of that 100 pounds of wheat.  I was treating it for critters, like the books said I should.  I chose the freezer method where the wheat is placed in the freezer for 72 hours.  Then it is left at room temperature for 30 days before it is put back in the freezer for another 72 hours.  This kills all of the living bugs in the first freezing and all of the eggs that might have hatched but not had time to lay their own eggs in the second freezing.

During the second freezing of the wheat, we had a tornado warning.  We ran to the basement and tried to watch the news on a little portable television.  There were no open outlets, so I unplugged the nearest thing and we watched the weather report.  When everything was clear, we went back upstairs.  It was about a week later, when I went to get some frozen ground meat, that I realized I had unplugged the freezer and had forgotten to plug it back in.  Not only did I lose all of the meat that was in there (which thankfully wasn’t a lot), but I also lost all of my wheat because the meat had thawed and bled all over the wheat berries.  It was totally disgusting.

We still had a lot to learn.  And, oh yes, much more pruning from the Lord . . . . .

The Back Story – Part 1

“You’re moving where!?!?!?!?!?!?” That’s a question we heard a lot after we bought our land in rural northern Idaho.  To some it seemed like a very spontaneous decision, and a weird one at that.  But to us it was nothing short of a miracle and a very direct and specific answer from Yeshua to our years and years of prayers.  But I need to back up a bit in order to paint the whole picture.

Shortly after our first child was born 14.5 years ago, Mr. King, Lady Pragmatic, and I took a trip to visit some of my extended family in Iowa.  We visited my great grandfather’s farm.  It was 100 acres of not great farm land in rural Iowa.  Rolling hills, lots of timber, an old red barn, some other outbuildings, and a dilapidated old house.  A spark was kindled.  We started dreaming about moving to the country and having a simpler, though not necessarily easier, life.  Four years and two more children later, we moved to Iowa with plans of eventually building a new house and moving out to the old family farm.

Y2K and our desire to move to the country were what started our research into living off the land and ALL that is required to do that.  There was so much that we really had no idea about, and still don’t.  There was and is so much to learn.  We subscribed to Countryside Magazine and quickly realized that we were horribly ignorant city folk.  But we were willing to learn!

  One of the first books that we got was The “Have-More” Plan.  It is a fantastic primer by Ed and Carolyn Robinson on most of the steps that need to be taken to move from the city to the country.  It was written in the 1940’s by a family that was tired of their “difficult” life in the city.  

“We faced the fact that we knew absolutely nothing about raising any part of what our family needed to live.  In fact, our utter and absolute dependency on my job was appalling.”

Ummmmmmm, hello!?!?!?!?!  We knew more than a significant part of the population in that we knew that milk comes from cows (or goats or sheep) and not from the store.  Same goes for hamburger – it comes from cows not from the store.  But we knew absolutely nothing about raising our own food.  We had also moved so many times that I was not very skilled in the garden.  What I am skilled in however is research, and I began studying anything I could get my hands on about what living in the country and living off the land would really require.  Mr. King is very skilled in taking my hours of research and netting it out to what is necessary in the near future.  It’s one of the many ways the Lord has used our very opposite personalities to yield great benefits.

“I feel, somehow, that in the years to come the U.S. is going to need all the help it can get toward happiness and peace and security.”  I’m thinking that Mr. Robinson was a prophet!  There is no security in the way that our food is delivered today and in the short supplies of food actually available.  There is no security in the way that the banking systems have run amok and the government just nods and gives them more money.  More people than ever are stressed out and unhappy and worried.

We began to see the writing on the wall for these things 11 years ago and have slowly been making steps toward “a better life” for our family ever since.  It has not been an easy road by any stretch of the imagination, and it has taken us much longer than we had ever planned.  But Yahweh had to do some major pruning on our hearts, our desires, our lives before He could lead us to our Promised Land here on this earth.  I’ll tell you more about that in Part 2.