Homesteader wanna be

Cute Children and pets pictures

My Mom sends me some cute e-mails.  I love these one and had to share with you all.

Who is walking who?

I look like you or is it you look like me?

Ah, can I keep him?  (the dog is asking):

Um mom, why am I wearing clothes and his is not??

Look Mom at what I learned :

Just one little bite that's all:

Are you sure they taste like chicken??

Are you sure they are in here???

That's all for now, Blessings,Mj

7-2-09 Up-date

Kristi was board earlier today and decided to play wii.  She played monopoly with Hope!  Hope is our soon to be 10 year old golden medical alert service dog.  We train the dog to all kinds of stuff some funny and silly but this is too much!

Titus is doing great in his service dog training.  We took him out for the first time to go shopping and he was wonderful.  If we stopped and looked or spoke to someone he would lay down with out being told to.  I thought it was odd, so I kept testing him.  I would walk and stop not look at him he would just lay down .  That is amazing for a six month old puppy to do on his first outing in stores.  I wonder if Kristi is going to teach Titus to play monopoly??

We start training them as soon as they are born.  Also having good parents helps too.  It took me two years to find his parents, to find the lines I was looking for.  Now we need one more female golden.  We might get one from Alex's breeder.

Blessings, Mj

Kristi and Mya's new adventure in pictures

Okay, Janet is in trouble she let Kristi and Mya run free on the mountain.  Worse yet with a camera .  Here are some pictures of the adventure.

1. Is Kristi finding out there are more than one of her:

2. Mya discover pine cones, do pine nuts come from pine cones??:

3. Is Kristi playing cars (she is the car)

4. Maybe I will be a better car sitting down??

5. Better yet I will play speed bump!! Did I send Kristi with her insuance card???

6. Mya discovers a cow and gives it a kiss !!

7. Milk comes from here ???? I know the poor thing , will she ever get over the shock???

8. Then they made friends with the locals:

JANET!!!!, we do not let the girls play speed bump in the middle of the Road!!! /.    We need to let the girls out of the house once in a while.  Poor Mya was so lost as to where milk comes from!! And did not know what a pine cone was!!!   Poor Kristi she thought there was more than one of her!!  Look at the locals nails on that local, see how long they are?? They could hurt the girls!!

Sorry but I had to write and show the pictures , they are so cute.  I will show more latter.

Blessings Mj

The fridge is coming home!

Your heavenly Father knows your needs. He will always give you all you need from day to day. ~ Luke 12:30-31

Us old ???

Janet and Mya went home today, .  But while Janet was here we had some fun shopping.   We went bra shopping and clothes shopping. The best part was no kids!!!  Just us two.  It was so fun and nice. 

We had one lady laughing so hard she had tears running down her face.  It was because Janet was telling her how much we have in common.  We are born 6 weeks apart, Janet is the older one.  Our atm pin numbers are the same( we did not set it up that way). Janet broke her leg 12-27-93, I broke my leg 12-27-07, the same leg, the same way(slipped walking), same surgery , but my leg has more hardware. There are so many other things that are the same too.

So anyway, we are out shopping Janet is looking at some shirts and I said no those look like something grandmas would wear.  Janet says you are a grandma!!!! Thanks Jan, I did not feel like one until she said that!!!!  It was then out shopping we both saw that we are getting older and saw our age.  We are going to be 40 years old this fall.   Where did the time go??  The past 25 years just flew by and we got older.

Then Janet made a few good points. 1. is we survived with out cell phones, the kids just don't believe that.   2. is we lived with out texting!! , if we had it back then we would have to learn how to spell better.  3. is that we lived with out computers to help us with our school work, there was no spell check , there was the "look it up in the dictionary", if we knew how to spell it we would not need to look up.

Blessings Mj

We made our own family fun- under $10

Bad Fridge, a loaner & no water in sink faucet

Bad News:
My fridge never cooled down low enough to put my food back in it after the repairman left yesterday. At 9:30 pm last nite it was still registering 60 degrees in my fridge.  Unbelievable. So another nite of buying ice and filling coolers in my kitchen.
Good News:
The appliance store came and picked up my fridge today. I refrained from kicking it. Just. Thankfully they brought me a loaner fridge until mine is fixed. The loaner fridge is a lot like a loaner car- just enough to get you by until yours is fixed. I am praying it gets fixed quickly we have 35 people coming over here for the 4^th of July . . . . .
It runs which is all that is necessary at this point.
I was able to cram everything into it, which is also good.
Mr. Steady’s brother is coming over tonite to begin the cement work on the foundation on the backside of the house.
It’s about 10 degrees cooler today also.
This all does much for my frame of mind and state of being.
Last night, when the water in the upstairs sink came out as barely a trickle, I just went to bed and cried and cried. I felt completely undone.
I was exhausted physically and mentally.
Mr. Steady held me and reminded me that everything is fixable; that we’ll be okay.
I am taking things one day at a time.
I can’t do any more than that.
This is yet another reminder that I cannot but God can and sometimes it means just sitting back and being still.
God be with me.

Mini-disasters and where my help comes from

My help comes from the LORD,
who made heaven and earth.
Psalm 121:2

Oh, Lord do I need your help.
It seems like so many things are going ba-zonkers and not much of anything is going right.
Including my perspective.
The new fridge won’t stay cold and the freezer above it is suppose to be frost-free but has 2 inches of snow. I am now using 2 coolers again after 2 gallons of milk were spoiled plus other foodie items of not near as much importance.
I painted an entire room earlier this week. Our soon-to-be schoolroom.
Then I found out that I used latex paint over oil-based paint.
It nicks and peels and it’s awful.
Just plain awful.
I look at the whole room and I know I don’t have it in me to scrape and strip all that paint off of every surface. I’m just going to have to live with it. Every little nick and mark and scrape.
The schoolroom also has an outside door that we have never used because its broken. Mr. Steady got a new free door and decided to start working on replacing the old one.
This required him to take off the bottom two pieces of siding on the house which led him to find carpenter ants and rotting wood. Not good.
He found this out on Saturday and since then 2 green tarps have been nailed up to the backside of the house while he figures out what to do.
After having consulted a few good remodeling guys who advocate “do it yourself”, he has decided to remove the rotted wood, spray for the ants and fill it all in with concrete. One of his brothers is coming over to help with this tomorrow nite.
Last night as he was knocking out some of the rotted board he found the telephone line that we now know wraps all the way around the house to the other side- except that he found it by accident when he pulled it out and split it with the hammer claw. So we had no phone.
I found this out after bringing the kiddos home from a cousin’s VBS, at 9 pm. He wanted me to place a call on my cell phone.
Bad news- I had let the minutes just about run out on my phone because we had been discussing buying a new one since the phone barely holds a charge anymore.
And so I went over to the neighbor’s to get online and order more minutes feeling like I was carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders.
Did I mention that its been in the mid-90s the past few days and with all the extra work Mr. Steady has been unable to take the time to put in the air conditioner and its too big a job for me to do myself?
Recap: no air, it’s hot, fridge not working right, coolers in my kitchen, it’s hot, rotting boards on the house with a partially ripped out door, a newly painted room where the new paint is peeling, it’s hot and did I mention we don’t have the air conditioner in?
My attitude about all of this has been “borderline” at best. When I’ve been asked how I’m doing, I really want to reply, “I’m hot and I’m cranky and there are coolers in my kitchen again.” So far I’ve only actually said it once to my mom and once to my husband.
It is all getting to Mr. Steady too. Last nite when I broached the subject of putting in the air conditioner he snapped at me. Something which he never hardly-if-ever does. He shook his head and simply said, “I’m sorry. I’m overwhelmed.”
Me too.
I know the Lord is near. I know He is aware of what we are facing and how we are feeling. He knows the bottom line to our finances, or sanity and so much more. I want to ask, “Why?” but quickly on the heels of that comes, “Why not?”
In all honesty, mine are just a bit of little nuisance-y problems stacked in a pile all at once. They aren’t “major”. They aren’t catastrophes or even mini-disasters (okay, the whole oil to latex paint thing could be considered a mini-disaster).
I do not doubt that His grace is sufficient for me and that His mercies never fail.
I’ve failed.
I’ve failed to worry and fret not.
I’ve failed to remain calm.
I’ve failed to trust Him completely no matter what.
But no more.
I may whine a bit, because I do and it’s still hot.
But I will press on. I will tackle what I can with God’s help and let the rest slide.
Priorities.
Scraping, sanding and painting are not priorities when it’s 88 degrees in the house and so humid. They are also not priorities when there are other things in your itty bitty budget and buying more paint isn’t one of them- instead you find you need a lot of cement.
Cement= fixed back wall of house. Much bigger priority.
Even bigger than getting the air conditioner put in.
I have failed to prioritize these last few days.
I am reminded of the importance of committing my day to the Lord when I wake up and ask Him to help me prioritize my day.
I am reminded of where my help comes from.

My help comes from the LORD.

Old stories # 2

My mom has been so full of neat stories lately that I decided to share them.  I will post them in numeral order as she tells me, unless they have to do with what is going on in life like this one. 

As you all know my best friend Janet was coming out and is out. I have had her daughter Mya (niece/daughter too) for almost a month.  Well, when Janet arrived here she brought Molly their little Yorkie who is 1 year old.   Janet took Kristi and Mya to Big Bear for a few days so we are Molly sitting (help us).   Shayna and I went out to lunch today.  Before we left we put Molly in her cloth kennel that Janet keeps her in at times.  When we got home from our nice mom and daughter lunch "The  dear sweet little Molly" was running around. She chewed her way out of her kennel!!  Best of all she was kind enough to leave us a  gift !!   Mom called just then and asked why I was laughing and yelling at the dog???  So I tell her, she laughs, thanks again mom. Don't you just love mom's at times.  I have one free to good home at times,   So mom tells me a story about their Yorkie when she was a teenager.................................

My mom was 16 or 17 years old and my grandma and Bubba (grandpa, her parents) send her to pick up their Yorkie from the groomer.  The dog was about 3 years old.   My mom said this dog was stuck on hyper mode!   So she get there and picks up the dog it is breathing funny when she puts it in the car.  As she walks to the other side to get in the car the dog just drops dead!!!   Mom is like okay what do I do?? She calls her dad my Bubba at  the friends house. The woman  who answered says your mom is right here, Mom goes NO my dad PLEASE!   So Bubba get on the line and asks what is wrong??  Dads they just know don't they.   So she tells him , he says call uncle Ted to go with her to the pound.  Mom call's uncle ted and he does not want to see or touch the dead dog (What a Manly Man).   He tells mom to put into a box and cover it up so he wont see it.  She gets ready to take the dead dog to the pound and Bubba calls back and says grandma she wants the collar.  

My threat to Janet was easier.  Molly keeps rolling her DANG red ball under the sofa and barks until you get it out.  I told Janet I am going to put Molly under the sofa with her DANG red ball!!!   .  Molly has red ball problems, she needs help.

Ready to hang the DANG red ball from the ceiling fan, Mj

Dropping in with bits of news

Life is very busy here at the Yellow Townie Farmhouse.
We started some big projects this weekend which got even bigger when Mr. Steady went to replace a door and found rotted boards . . . . .
Anyhoo- that's why I've been so scarce. Hope to get in a couple of posts this week inbetween projects.
Wait until I show you what we've been up to . . . . . .
In Other News:
Father's Day was wonderful. The kiddos gave Mr. Steady an ice cream maker plus the fixings and I made him a special book (courtesy of Shutterfly.com) full of pictures of him and the kiddos with notes about all the things we love about him.
I am glad I write my menu plans in pencil. The menu plan for last week and this week are "works in progress" as the projects have messed with the cooking and now the heat messes with the cooking too. Tonight we are having BLT's and then heading off to Mr. Steady's softball game (ice cream at Nana and PawPaw's later).
My sister-in-love and her kiddos have invited my kiddos to their VBS this week and we said yes. This is proving to be more trouble than I thought to follow thru with. It runs from 5:30 to 8:30 pm. It's about a 30 minute drive. This means my kids either eat dinner @ 4:30 pm or 9 pm. Yesterday they had early supper but then wanted a big snack when they got home later.
Tonight we won't be going as it is Mr. Steady's game nite but . . . . . there's Wed. and Thurs. still and what will we do about supper?
I'm thinking nachos or ham sandwiches and then perhaps a snack in the car after we pick them up- like trail mix or a quick bread.
So- life is busy and home repairs are in the works and it's hotter than hot and and on and on and on.
One thing remains the same:
God is good.
All
The
Time.