This Week In My Home: To Every Thing...Turn Turn Turn

In my home this week...

… I had a flood of memories hit me after reconnecting with my schoolmate.  She placed me on our graduating class closed Facebook page and I went in and introduced myself since my maiden name refuses to show up.  A number of people tagged me which was nice.  What was unexpected was the sudden reliving of what was likely one of the harder and lonelier phases of my life.  I am unsure how much had to do with my circumstances at home and my overall depression during those years.  To be sure that time of life led me to choose to marry whom I did and enter still another very long and unhappy and lonely phase of life.

This Week In My Home: Light Ahead

In my home this week...

...there is light up ahead of us.  I feel it more than I can see it.  That same sense of something changing that comes just before I see the actual break of light on the horizon in the wee hours of the morning is surrounding me just now.  In the meantime...we push on  knowing that change is ahead of us.  How do I sense this?  For one thing, the sale is complete on the land which freed Sam to push ahead with home improvements now that he officially owns the house they have been renovating.  Mama is moved.  Katie is settling in.  John is managing the extra hours.  I have adjusted my attitude...for the most part.  There's a certain peace about other situations that we've been involved in as well.  The storm isn't over.  We got hit last week with a new lot of things but there's a slight clearing of the sky that just says, this too shall soon pass.  Something's changing...and thank you Lord!

Coffee Chat: Early Morning Chatter

Good morning!  It's early....Tiptoe on in and I'll pour you a cup of coffee.  There's toast and local honey.  Let's be quiet and speak softly...the boys are still asleep.  I shouldn't want them to awaken before their usual hour which is quite early enough.

I had hoped to talk earlier this week and indeed even began a long post but it seemed to just drag on and on and I deleted the whole thing and decided a fresh start was in order.  There are an awful lot of fresh starts going on around me at present, some more pleasant than others and I confess to feeling much in need of one myself, but it has yet to be my turn.

Spicy Apple Cake - I FOUND IT!

While sorting though Mama's cookbooks the other day I came across a Family Circle magazine cookbook that looked familiar.  I brought it home with me and flipped through it and found that Apple Cake recipe I've been trying to find for the past 30 years.  I am so stoked to have this recipe once more!  In the hopes that I shall never again lose it I am sharing here and on the recipe blog.  I haven't made it yet, but will try it soon.  I only hope that it's as good to me now as it was 35 years ago when I last made it!!

Spicy Apple Cake
Bake 325F for 1 hour 10 minutes.  Makes one 10-in tube cake

Giving Up the Guilt: Food for Thought

This week I started a course from Chabad.org called Faith and Food....I read the supplementary articles first because I've yet had time to listen to the actual video but I loved this bit of writing by one author:

This Week In My Home: Pushing On

In my home this week, I...

....found my attitude wanted less adjusting than in weeks past but still some adjustment was needed all the same.

Things have not been easy. We are all working hard, all pulling together hard and all taking the punches as they continue to come.  The news this week was not any better than that of the last two weeks have been but we just kept right on doing what we could.   Our new mantra in the house is, "That's not my battle to fight just now..." when there's nothing else we can possibly do to help a situation or to face it differently.   It might sound a bit Scarlett O'Hara, putting off until tomorrow what we might worry over today but the truth is that it's the most practical thing we can do at present.  We can't control anything except our own reaction and fears and worries...and so that is just what we do.

Make Mine A Farmhouse

As we drove over to the mountain Friday, I enjoyed myself looking at the homes along the roadways we took.  There were ranch homes, Mobile homes, and Victorian homes, cottages, shanties, shacks and brick Tudor.  Antebellum, Federal and Georgian...But the homes that made my heart go pitter patter were always farmhouse homes.   There's an awful lot of 'farmhouse' this and that right now and I realize it sounds like I'm just another trend follower but when I say farmhouse, I don't mean the modern trend. I mean 'farmhouse' in the way that I knew farmhouses growing up.

This Week In My Home: In the Midst of Storms

In my home this week...

...we'd meant to go to the beach this week and we'd looked forward to it mightily but one thing after another hit us as a family last week.  Saturday morning, after a horrid sleepless Sabath night, John and I sat down and said  to each other, "Perhaps we should cancel..."  Truthfully I can't tell you who suggested it first, but we were both in agreement that we'd each already had that thought.  

In My Home This Week: A Change of Perspective

In my home this week, I...

...have taken a lot of time out for thought.  I do not know just how long this season is meant to be but I suspect it shall be as long as God means it to last...That said between the pull and tug of Mama's needs and attempts to make problems where none should be, children with woes and worries, grandchildren who have been ill all week,  John's job issues, our beloved pastor's sudden resignation and our home situation, I'm about worn down.  I'm suddenly reminded of a psychology teacher's words.  As we grown up students discussed various issues openly in class, he said "They tell me God never gives you more than you can handle but there are times I have had to say, 'Lord my cart is  over full.'"  lol  I can so identify!!