Autumn Rains

The Autumn Rains…

Be glad, O people of Zion,

rejoice in the Lord your God,

for He has given you

The autumn rains in righteousness.

He sends abundant showers,

Both autumn and spring rains.

Joel 2:23

My favorite season has always been Autumn…

            

              Growing up in Minnesota…

 

Autumn was always a pleasant change…

        from the humidity and heat of the summer…

            to the grander and splendor of the burst of color…

                    the warmth of the oranges, reds, and gold’s…

                                    to the crispness of the air.

I love everything about the season. 

the time to reflect….

            to ponder the seasons before…

                   a time to reflect on…

                          the season that lay before me….

                                   the idea of change….

                                         is refreshing and renewing.                      

I so love the array of colors that the autumn leaves bring…

 

And once again, I have been meditating on…

 

The beauty of the Lord…

          how He is revealed in His creation…

And I ponder on the fact that after a hot summer…
       or even one of those Indian Summer days that California is so famous for…

The Lord brings the cool rains…
      the refreshing rains…
             the renewing rains…

He sends abundant showers to water our souls.
            souls that are weary and tired…
                  souls that are always in need of His touch…

Our life is so like the seasons…
    Sometimes we have mini trials…
             in the midst of an abundant season…

yet,  sometimes we go through hard seasons,
      with trials and heartache…
             where we feel the drought…     the lacking…    the wilderness…

and then…
       He will bring the cool rains…
                 the refreshing rains…  

                  to renew us…  to remind us of His presence…

What ever season you are in… 

Remember that the Father above will always come….
    with His abundant showers…
            to cover you with His unfailing love…. 

May you rest in His presence….  
     in His autumn rains of righteousness.

Things I am thankful for this week:

autumn rains of righteousness…
His continued showers of refreshing
tea, tea and more tea for a cold laden mama
time to work on some friendship issues with the girlies
friends that are willing to work through girlie issues
daddy that loves and sacrifices for his children
missionaries that give of themselves for the gospel
ones that have given their lives for others
watching the girlies play so well together
sons!!!
chatty neighbors
time to catch up with missionary daughter
focus
lessons learned
lessons to be learned
waiting, waiting, waiting
trusting, trusting, trusting during the waiting
mama that calls regularly to check in
being able to sleep in to help renew a sickly mama
giving son’s initiative to move forward
continued grace

Being showered with His rains...
  

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Herbal Teas

I few years back my hubby was laid off after 22 years of working for a small business… that just wasn’t making it anymore.  During the 3 months of his lay off I was trying to find natural ways to keep us healthy, since it was the cold and flu season and we did not have insurance at the time…

I started researching about herbs and their medical uses and I found this awesome site:

    Bulk Herb Store

One of my favorite parts of this website is the Herbal Resource aid page, here is an insert from that page:

Below are a number of conditions which have been successfully treated with herbs. Many of the herbs listed can be combined for internal and/or external use as a tincture (extract), tea, glycerite, or any other method you choose. This information was solely gathered using the books we offer.

I have not tried making the tinctures yet, but this year I am going to.

I have made many of the teas over the last few years and I have love drinking them and have felt that many of them have helped with the healing process.
 
There is a list of different illnesses and aliments in alphabetical order. When you click on the aliment you want to research it will give you a list of books that they used for their research and a list herbs and their uses.

I have been “fighting” a cold since the past week…
    So, right now I am drinking a tea mix I made from herbs for flu and colds:

Flu / Colds

Related Herbs

Garlic - Minced, Organic

Cloves - whole, organic

Fennel seed - whole, organic

Garlic - powder, organic

Echinacea Purpurea root - cut, organic

Ginger root - cut, organic

Catnip Herb - Cut, organic

Echinacea Purpurea herb - cut, organic

Wormwood herb - cut, organic

Cinnamon sticks - whole, organic

Chamomile flowers - whole, organic

Rosemary Leaf - whole, organic

Cinnamon Powder, Organic

Chamomile flowers - powder, organic

                                               
here is one of the above herbs:

Herbs: Cloves - whole, organic

0.5 lb. ($15.00)
Quantity:

Common Name: Clove
Latin Name: Syzygium aromaticum
Origin: Sri Lanka

Clove is a perfect breath freshener because it kills the bacteria that causes odor and leaves the mouth clean tasting and smelling. Its main component, eugenol, is a powerful multifaceted phytochemical that anesthetizes, kills intestinal parasites, bacteria and fungi, fights free radical oxidation, and thins the blood. Clove relieves pain, increases blood circulation, aids digestion, and is antiseptic and antimicrobial. Clove has been used to treat toothaches, earaches, colds, flu, backaches, bronchitis, dysentery, muscle aches, nausea and vomiting. Apply directly to a toothache or cold sore.
This site is a wealth of information and Shoshanna has quite of few videos she has made that aide in your desire to use herbs.

Their catalog is wonderful and a book in itself.
    If you sign up for their emails, they will send you coupons to save on different items. 



I make my tea blends in the Ingenui teapot.
I bought mine at: Adagio.com. This teapot is one of the greatest inventions for making loose tea and teas from herbs.

I have the following books on herbs, that I love:
   
 The Complete Family Guide to Natural Home Remedies


The How to Herb Book

 Nourishing Traditions is more of a cookbook.            

linking to:

Here’s to a healthy season ahead,


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Weekly Wrap Up - Week 8

We worked on our regular weekly items such as spelling, narraction, penmanship, math, reading and language arts.

For our Unit Study work this week we continued working on our South America Unit.

You haven’t really travelled until you’ve taken on South America.

Thirteen countries strong, the continent is home to astounding natural and cultural wonders, including the snowcapped peaks of the Andes, thousands of kilometres of magnificent white-sand beaches, captivating colonial towns and indigenous villages, and the Amazon rainforest – home to more plant and animal species than anywhere else on earth.

Read more: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/south-america#ixzz2AYTIT8a7

The brightly colored buildings were one of the things the girls really enjoyed seeing pictures of from South America.

  We finish our YWAM book on Jim Elliot and completed our Notebooking page for him. We were all taken by the story of the 5 missionaries that lost their lives to reach the Acua people of Equador. I shared about these missionaries at Co-op and all the students there were also very interested.  I had ordered the Torchlighers DVD from Netflix and it came in on Friday while we were at our monthly co-op.  We watched it that evening, it was a great wrap up to our missionary unit on Jim Elliot.  Torchlighers has teacher/student activity sheets that you can download from this site: http://www.torchlighters.org/index.php/resources/guides/

They are a great go along for this DVD Series. We will be completing some of the actvity sheets next week as we review and wrap up our unit on South America.

  We tried letting our butterfly go...

But it did not seem to want to leave...                 

So we decided to put it back in it's container and try again on another day.

We finished out week our by making Fall cupcakes:

My unique son, who is a Junior in High School, made a video of a devotion he was posting to the devotion YWAM site that his 24/7 team had.  He thought it would be great to have daily/weekly devotions like they had during their summer program.  The director of 24/7 told him to go for it. So, he is organizing that.  I am going to make a course out of it for school credit... lifestyle of learinging at it's best.  I will make a detail post on how I do this in the next few weeks.   The video is just a test for his actual devotion he filmed.  I will include that in the post to come...

That is our wrap up.

Check out some other families at the following links:




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Youth Nights – Bake Off

I recently started serving with our churches youth ministry.  Since I have the majority of my kiddos either serving or attending the youth, I felt it was the best place for me to put my energy. 

 

This past week we had a bake off competition. It was so fun to participate in.

With the help of  we came up with these entries:

My golden girl entered “Owl Wishes” – she won the exceptional cuteness award.

my angel girl entered  “I have my eye on you pops” – she won the Here’s looking at you award. her pops were inspired by her oldest brothers attempt to make cake pops that looked like eyes.- they did not turn out :( 

  My unique son entered “One of those ice cream pie things” – He won the most controversial award for an item that was not baked.

  I entered Doggie Casserole  - I won the doggie most filling award.

My rock star son entered “Goulish Delight” – He won the grand prize for the Edge 2012 Bake Off  - His trophy was a rolling pin.

We all enjoyed the many entries of sugar treats.  One of the other mom’s that helps with youth also brought “real” food, we both felt with all the sugar we were going to need some balance…

Things I am thankful for this week:

an awesome youth group with wonderful, dedicated leadership
opportunity to serve along side of my kiddos
oldest – giving son’s faithfulness and steadiness
seeing this son thrive and love serving as intern for our church
family fun night
serving at family fun night
seeing my kids serve whole heartedly
watching my little one enjoy life
youth leadership catalyst meeting
being able to hear youths hearts
50 cent can of chili
seeing need to trust even more

Enjoying serving my King~
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Weekly Wrap Up – Week 7

This week we were able to get back into more of our routine with my special son back on his morning schedule.

We finished reading our book on South America.

We filled out our Continent Reports from Erica’s Expedition Earth Unit Study.

We finished ready our book on birds.  

  We completed our animal classification form.

We also finished reading this months Magic Tree House book,

Afternoon on the Amazon. The girls are really enjoying this series.

One of the highlights for the week was the Bird Scavenger Hunt we went on.  I printed off the bird fact cards and we taped them around the kitchen and hallway.  The girls had to go around and find the cards to answer the questions on their answer sheets.  This was a fun way to review and add some interesting facts to our unit on birds.

Our caterpillar that we found at the library spun it’s cocoon last week. Today it hatched into a butterfly.  We will be completing a mini unit on metamorphism next week.    

Those where some of the highlights of our week.  We had a good, full week. 

Linking up with:

Wrapping it up~

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Chicken Spaghetti

Another awesome and easy recipe from Pinterest…. 
… gotta love    if you do not know what it is you can check out what I have on my boards here:  My Pinterest

This recipe was really good.  I had to make mine without the sour cream, cause a certain son, who shall remain nameless (my rock star son) used ours to make dip this past week…   
It was still good without the sour cream but next time I am definitely making to with it.   This was so easy to make!!!!

  Chicken Spaghetti

Ingredients:

• 8 ounces angel hair pasta
  
• 2 cups chopped, grilled chicken or 1 large can of chicken
  
• 1 can cream of mushroom soup
  
• 1 can cream of chicken soup
  
• 1 10-ounce can Rotel diced tomatoes and green chiles, undrained
  
• 8 ounces sour cream
  
• Sprinkling of Parmesan or Mexican-blend cheese
  

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Boil pasta as package directs and drain. Mix all other ingredients (except cheese), add to cooked pasta and put in a 9" x 13" baking dish. Cover with foil and bake 30 minutes or until hot and bubbly.

Sprinkle with your choice of cheese and return to oven to melt.

Enjoy~
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Weekly Wrap up - Week 6

This past weekend hubby and I went to Chico to visit our missionary daughter and attend our friends, Jenna & Sam’s wedding.  

Our beautiful Brittaney was in the wedding, as Jenna is one of her friends, she meet while attending her DTS (discipleship training) last year. 

It was a perfect day for the wedding and a very special celebration of their love.

   


I was able to spend Monday morning in Brittaney’s classroom with her.  What a joy to see her in action with her 5 adorable students.  She is an excellent teacher and her children adore her. I think they enjoyed having a visitor for the morning. 



We came home later Monday so our school week did not start until Tuesday. We are starting our new unit on SOUTH AMERICA.  Some of the books we are reading this week are:

  

We are reading one of the Magic Tree House books each month as a reader for our Biome Series.  This month we will be studying the Rain Forest.
We are reading the YWAM Biography on Jim Elliot.  I am really excited about reading this one.  When I was a newer Christian, the church we were attending had a musical presentation of the the life of the 5 missionaries that lost their lives among the Auca Indians in Ecuador.  The presentation was called “At Any Cost” and it was so moving and pierced my heart for missions way back then.

Wednesday, we celebrated a birthday…  
We had a special birthday party for our special boy, the girls made a sign for him - the “O” is a paw print (Blue’s Clues has beenone of his favorite shows since he was 3)…

We had party hats, and streamers…
Played pin the face on the pumpkin…
  even had prices for the game
Had goodie bags and cupcakes with Toy Story candies on the top. (another of Jonathan’s favorite characters)

The rest of the week we worked on getting back into the swing of things and plugging away at our new unit.     
      
Linking up with:

Wrapping it up~
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