Making my Home a Haven ~Peace and Patience

Aaron's picture of our yard which is certainly showing the season!

 Today and yesterday were pretty busy! We got a fair amount done but it felt like the working on our home was slipping a bit- but that is life and I just had to work at reminding myself that it isn't just what our house looks like that makes a haven but even more how the people that are in the home act. I know that and I would guess you know that but I still have to remind myself that again and again.

 I do think keeping my home clean and beautiful is important too but that is second place the my attitude and the attitudes of the others in our family.

  Yesterday's theme was Peace. We did have a good discussion on peace, read a verse and sang some songs about Peace. Here is one of my favorites:

Some of my other activities of the day were making bread. We have been going through bread pretty fast anymore (We go through all food quite a lot faster than we used too- I think our kids are growing!) so I decided to triple instead of double the batch. I made 5 loaves but we did share some with some friends.

I also cleaned Our bedroom, bathroom, office area and family room. None of them were cluttered so they are pretty easy ones to clean. :-) Mainly I dusted and vacuumed. I decided it would be fun to bring some fall leaves into the family room so Mara kindly got some for me. That was our adding of beautfy for the day.

  "Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not be troubled, nor let it be fearful." John 14:27

  Today's theme was patience. I had ample opportunity to practice patience today too! Sometimes I did okay and sometimes I didn't.

  First off my wedding flowers (for a wedding this weekend) which were supposed to come in the night or early this morning didn't show up until after nine. Normally I would actually appreciate that but today we had places to be at 10 (and I was hoping to go someplace beforehand but that didn't happen) and I needed to clean the flowers before we went. That did allow for us to talk about patience though. :-)

  Where we were going today was on a homeschool field trip. We went to the Woolen Mills here in town where they make neat wool garments, sweaters, pillows and quilt batting.

 We had a very nice tour guide that showed us around all over and told us a lot of interesting history too as this place started business in 1920.  I loved seeing all the things made from wool in nice traditional colors. I am learning to love natural products more and more and seeking to use less of things like plastic and polyester so I really enjoy seeing all the neat natural garments. (They did also make synthetic sweaters -and they don't make wool ones, so I wasn't as fond of them.)

Down in the basement there was a pile of wool that the kids had tons of fun playing with. We moms were quick to stop them at first but the tour guide said it needed to be pulled apart and so they would be helping him to mess with it. So the kids thought that was great fun.

 As far as housecleaning today I was only able to do basically maintenance things like dish washing, sweeping, vacuuming, etc but the girls really went to work in their room, sorting through things and getting things boxed up to get rid of. It shows a ton of improvement! I was so thank-ful that they were able to get that done.


 This evening I went out to the garden to see if I could find some onions we had missed earlier to use in our supper, I also wanted to get carrots. I had fun discovering a little cabbage, some little sprouts of broccoli and 3 onions! It was just a delight to find things out there that I didn't realize were still growing.

 I was able to make a yummy stir fry for supper using our garden vegetables.

It was a warm day and so we ate our supper outside on the deck. This may be one of the last times that will work.

Games were on the agenda for the evening as is our normal Thursday routine (though in the summer we play baseball on Thursday and then Tuesday night becomes our family night). We have chosen to set aside one evening a week that we always try to do some family activity. That has been a very good thing for making our Home a Haven in this busy world.

As far as a little beauty for this day.... These Hydrangeas are only here temporarily I got them for a wedding but we will still enjoy there beauty while they are here and we work with them. I do feel very blessed to be able to make a little extra money working with such a beautiful part of God's creation.

 And a verse on patience:

"The Lord's bond-servant must not be quarrelsome , but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged," 2 Timothy 2:24