Who needs a gym when you have a Joshua?

Big brothers are so much fun!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christ-a-must from our family!

A Tidy Pantry

My wonderful family helped me clean out, paint, and restock one of my food storage areas. It's full of pressure canned meals I have prepared recently. My goal is to clean out and reorganize our kitchen next. I hope to reduce pots and pans by at least 1/4. Then it's on to reorganizing the larger pantry. 

What do you keep your thermostat set on?

We were asked. Here's our answer:

We don't have a thermostat.

We have a wood stove and grow our own trees for heat.... and save a small fortune every year. When we're cold, we add more wood. When it's too hot, we stop feeding the wood stove.

Wood warms us twice, and we get the benefits of a gym membership for free when we cut, load, unload, split, and stack it!

It takes a team minded family to keep the wood in the house, keep the wood stove going, remove the ashes regularly, and keeping the fire fed. Big tasks like this build a sense of "togetherness" as a family.

We've been doing this as a family for 20+ years and have many wonderful memories from it. No one takes for granted what it takes to heat our home.

This method has been a big blessing to our family, and we are thankful for the Lord's provision of health and property to grow our own "heat."

It's that time of year

 Christmas wrapping paper tubes aren't what they use to be, 

but we try not to let anything go to waste!

Walmart Grocery Pick Up Experience

I had Joshua pick up a Walmart grocery order this morning. I was disappointed to see they substituted pints for all four orders of quart sized canning jars. Even though it caused me an immediate problem, I decided to suck it up.

I sent Walmart a polite note explaining how and why that substitution does not work for home food preservers. They called us to apologize right away and agreed it was a poor substitution.

Then, they refunded me the $36 for the pint jars and told me to keep them as a gift for their error.

I remain a happy customer!

Now poor Joshua is back out hunting down the quart jars I need.

If you are new to trying Walmart Grocery, please use this link. It will give you $10 off, and I will get $10 off too. Thank you!

To date, ALL of our pick up experiences have been extremely positive. I hope more stores follow their model.

Chicken Curry Soup: AKA Bethany's Favorite

Several asked so I figured I'd put it here. "It's on the blog." is much quicker than me finding it again and copy and pasting. 

Remember, I make mine in a HUGE US NAVY stainless steel pot I snatched up in a thrift store for $10. I was in the store a long time with family, and it became heavy, but I didn't put it down. Nope. I knew it's worth in my kitchen. I felt like I had been mining for gold and come up with a fist sized nugget! In the next store, I found an thick, extra long, stainless steel ladle that fit it! I was grinning from ear to ear. God loves Wendy and sends her good gifts to care for her family! 

I make around 35+ quarts at a time, but some is eaten right away. The rest goes into pint jars. 

I don't measure. I go by how it tastes and the ratio of meat to veggies and broth. My recipe will change with what ingredients I have. 

I use chopped onions, celery, potatoes, carrots, chicken, my homemade chicken stock, and salt, pepper, my own mix of curry powder, extra turmeric, and garlic to taste. 

Everyone in my family loves it and asks me to make it, but Bethany is the one who won't let me forget about it. 

Turmeric has anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, and anti-viral properties making it a good choice for cold and flu season. 

Adding pepper helps the body take up more of the medicinal properties.

“God presses Israel just like we press the olives,”

“God presses Israel just like we press the olives,” Rabbi Weiss said. “It appears the olive is destroyed, but what is actually happening is the bitterness is being removed and the oil, the sweetness, is being saved and purified to send light into the world.” Click the link and scroll down the page for image of children pressing olives.

This is good to remember when we face difficulties in the Christian life. 

Romans 5:3-6 Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.

Philippians 1:6 And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.

A good pocket chainsaw

This pocket chainsaw cut through this 1.5" gum sapling in less than a minute. It is sharp, the handles are comfortable and strong, and it folds compactly in it's pouch. It came with a fires starter too. We love it and will be adding more to our camping gear.

"Coolest toolbox I've ever seen"

Amanda rounded the corner where Clint works and thought to herself, "Now, THAT is the coolest toolbox I've ever seen!" 

Then she looked closer and realized it was her daddy's!
She sent me the picture to show me the additions Clint has made since the last time I saw it.

I bought him more stickers for it for Christmas.

Still At It

Bethany's favorite soup Chicken Curry Soup

In the past several weeks, I have been canning hundreds of pints and quarts in an attempt to clean out our big freezers for upcoming sales that I want to take advantage of in my ongoing effort to cut food costs. 

I have more jars to fill. My saying is "Empty jars are idle investments."

We eat very well and are able to share food with others. I do it on less than most families of four spend. I am thankful for the knowledge and good health that allows me to do it.

I wake up early, start the recipe which always includes fresh vegetables that need to be prepared. Then I prepare the jars and lids, fill the jars, wipe the rims, and put the lids and rings on them. It takes until late at night to finish processing. After processing, the jars are washed, dried, labeled, and put into storage. I am at it so much; I imagine I'm hearing the "chff chff chff" of the cooker while I am awake and asleep. 

It's deeply satisfying and rewarding work to have healthy cost effective meals on the shelf ready to heat and serve.

God blessed me for my hard work in a way that made me smile big. He sent us three free hams and a free turkey this week! 

If you've been waiting for me to reply to an email or phone call, it might be a while. I'm doing great, but I am busy and will be for a while. My love to all of you who call me "Wendy, Mrs. A., Mama Asbell, or Wendy Darlin'."