More Wintertime Fun

I feel so abundantly blessed to get to live the life I do. We live in a beautiful area surrounded by family and friends and many other beautiful people that I haven't even met yet. God provides for us so abundantly and I have work that I truly enjoy. There are opportunities to serve God and use the different talents He has given me and I truly am grateful. 

Here are just a few of the beautiful times from my life lately....

In January a bunch of us from church got together to go skating. It was a fun time! Keren and Lilly stood on the edge and watched. Keren has a baby due in April and didn't think skating would be good right now.

But Martha and I had fun skating.

And Gracie and Heidi (dressed as something... I don't remember what) did.

Ephraim and some of the other younger ones tried pushing a chair to help stand up.

Beatrix found it easier to just ride on the chair while Bella pushed.

Hold on to Dad if you are feeling unsteady!!

Miss Megan!

Aaron enjoyed practicing his hockey skills.

This was an arrangement that I had fun creating recently at the flower shop. The couple that ordered this arrangement for a funeral had requested something very colorful and with some unique flowers and butterflies to go to a young woman's funeral. I guess she had a fun and colorful personality so they wanted something to match that. I love getting to work with flowers all the time and I enjoy the interaction with customers and created just want they want as well.

Two weeks ago Megan and I took a trip to Des Moines, Iowa to visit some friends. The weather was warm down there that weekend (in the 40's) which was so lovely but we also were able to visit the botanical garden there and that was so much fun. It felt like summer or visiting the tropics. I loved seeing all the different plants and just basking in the warmth and sunshine.

I really enjoyed getting to spend time with my friend (from babyhood) Jessica and her husband, James. I am so grateful for good friends. It was so fun to be able to catch up and to visit about spiritual things and share testimonies of how God has been working in our lives. 

We walked around a sculpture garden on that lovely day.

On our way back from Des Moines we stayed with my sister and her family in the cities. It was fun to catch up with them as well. 

This past Wednesday night we had a pancakes supper where the kids did the cooking, decorating, serving and entertaining for the adults. (A couple of other adults worked with me to help that happen). I didn't get any good pictures but it was a fun (and slightly chaotic) evening.

My niece Molly (who is nearly 20) headed up the cooking of the food. I had made pancake mixes ahead of time but they had to mix things up the rest of the way and fry them, fry sausages, prepared beverages, prepare toppings and fruit. 

We also had a decorating and serving group. This is a portion of them. It was an eager and excited group of kids. My voice was gone by the end of the night as I had been giving them instructions all evening. They did a great job and I am proud of them.

These girls were singing a special number. We had a couple of those and some readings.

This weekend my sister Anna and part of her family came up to visit and so our family all got together at my parents. We had a fun time together. 

Mara was tired today so I brought Malcolm out with me. We had a fun time hanging out. Here he was having fun taking care of a baby doll. I guess he is practicing up for being a big brother.

We went on a long walk which we thoroughly enjoyed for the fresh air and fun companionship. We a;sp were wanting to get some exercise and I think we succeeded.

The kids found the train tracks very interesting.

Grandma's Matryoshka dolls were also enjoyed today. The kids and I also had a great game of hide and seek. By the way it is quite fun to hide and listen to them talk about you as they look for you. They decided I was such a good hider because I had grown up in that house and I knew it really well. I had my 2 year old niece hiding with me and she was remarkably quiet. I love that I have lots of nieces and nephews. God made each one of them so different for the others. He is an amazing Creator!

Anyway, that is just a bit of the fun that I have been having lately. Sometimes I struggle with contentedness as my dream for life was/is to be happily married with a husband to serve God with. But that is not God's plan for me right now and that is okay. He absolutely knows what is best for me and He has placed me in a place where I can serve and love on others and be very fulfilled by the relationships that I have with others and with Him. This time of a little more aloneness (it isn't a lot as I am still blessed to have 2 kids at home and I do have a lot going on with others as well) has prompted me to spend more time just visiting with God as I go about my day. That is so wonderful. I wish I would have made that a bigger part of my life a long, long time ago. God is always there listening. He wants to hear from you about everything - every struggle, every excitement, every sorrow and every joy. He wants our praise and He deserves it. We are blessed with things that we can be thankful for every moment of our day. I highly recommend praying through your day and just really sharing it all with Him! 

 

The Fruit of the Spirit is... LOVE

 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,  gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
Galatians 5:22 and 23

The last few years I have really grown in my understanding of the Holy Spirit and his work. Studying the Bible with a goal of understanding the Holy Spirit has really helped me to see Galatians 5:22 and 23 in a different light. My understanding earlier was that love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and  self-control were character traits that I needed to work at having in my life. My understanding of how the Holy Spirit worked in that was pretty foggy. I am struggling to fully explain what I mean but basically I knew that I had received the indwelling of the Holy Spirit because in Acts 2:38 it says "Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." and I had done that. But I treated the Holy Spirit as this "little helper" instead of seeing the power that He had to truly change my life. I still felt like I had to do all the hard work and the Holy Spirit would do little things like prick my conscience when I was doing something that I shouldn't, He might help bring things to memory, He might comfort me with His presence when I was sad but I wasn't looking to Him to radically work in me by His power. To grow in me - like beans grow on a bean plant or apples on a tree - the fruits of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

 It isn't that I believe that after we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit that we don't have to put any effort in on our own, that we just sit back and wait for the fruit of the Spirit to develop in us. But I think we need to be aware of His power to work in us and to let him work. But I guess a full discourse on the Holy Spirit will be for another day. I still have much more studying that I want to do. I would love to hear your thoughts on the work of the Spirit - even if you don't agree with me. :-)

   Meanwhile, lets talk about love.....

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we

have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. Romans 5:1-5

Part of the fruit of the Spirit in our lives is that we will love God and others. We see above that God's love is first poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit. He continues to do that. Agape love (which is what God gives to us) is a sacrificial love. It is a love of choice, not of attraction or obligation. Agape love is unconcerned with self but is concerned with the greatest good of another. Agape love requires faithfulness, commitment and sacrifice without expecting anything in return. 1 Corinthians 13 has a pretty good definition of that love. Here is a portion of that:

"Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 1 Corinthians 13:4-7"

As I read more on what it really means to love others with agape love I admit I had a little feeling of overwhelm because there is not way that I can consistently love others like that on my own. And that is just the point. We cannot! We can only truly love like that by the power of the Holy Spirit. And we will still mess up! We are human and it shows pretty regularly.

"Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love." 1 John 4:7 and 8

Love is an integral part of our walk with God/our life as a Christ follower. God is love so unless we are living in love we are saying that we don't even know God! The love we have for each other is our message to the world -"I am a disciple of Jesus!"

"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:34-35

"For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control." 2 Timothy 1:7

Let's pray that we and others will be strengthened with power through His Spirit so we can abound in love and the other fruits of the Spirit. Can you imagine how beautiful this world could be if all those that profess to follow Jesus Christ would love others with agape love?

"For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith - that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen." Ephesians 3:14-21

December Goals Accomplished

 

In December I shared with you a few different goals that I was working on. It is now almost the end of January but I thought I would share with you how those goals went...

    First off, I had made the goal at the beginning of 2022 to spend time practicing on/learning to play a different instrument each month and then record it and share it on Youtube. Following that as planned lasted maybe 2 months but I did work on different instruments more throughout the year and I put in some heavier practice in on a couple of different instruments but over all I did struggle with this goal. In December I decided I did truly want to see if I could still accomplish it. That was finally completed today. So I went a month over in the goal but I did get it done.

   In my dreams I was going to be super proficient in each of the instruments that I played. That did not happen. I simply didn't have the time (or choose not to sacrifice in other areas in order to make the time) to practice enough to make that happen. So some of these videos I was rather embarrassed to post. But over all (other than sharing my imperfections!) it was a fun goal for me. I had fun with working on each of the instruments. Here is a video of each instrument (with two for violin - actually 3 as it is in the Church musicians concert as well).

Another December goal was to clean out (declutter) 2 spaces each week. That went well. This year I am working to do 3 a week which has been going well this month. Hopefully I can keep up in the busy summertime. It always does feel good to go through things, clean and get rid of things that we don't need.

 Making handmade Christmas gifts was another goal. That went pretty well and was fun. You can see my post that includes the results to that here.

As you can imagine I had a lot of fun with my financial goal. It went well. In the end their was $290 worth of gas stamps so we didn't really have that hard of a challenge. I used that for gas and all of our groceries. I see that I forgot to mention in the first post that I was also giving myself $12 cash to pay for overages when I didn't hit it on the dot exactly (as that would be pretty hard to do and they don't allow you to use a gas stamp card for say 93 cents. It has to be a dollar or more.  I did also use the gas stamps to buy salt for our softener and our softener was having issues that month so we had to buy salt quite a few times. Thankfully it seems to be doing better now.

   This ended up being just a fun challenge for me and Megan got in on the fun some too. I would come home from work and report on what I managed to get for $10 that day. Several times we splurged on truly unnecessary items.  One time she was wanting candy for making a gingerbread house so we went shopping after church on Wednesday night. We went to Menards and used my rebate there to buy a couple of bags of salt for the softener. At Marketplace I gave Megan 10 filled cards of stamps and she was able to get what she wanted with that and meanwhile I got some things that we needed/wanted with another 10. Then I got $10 worth of gas. Then we looked on the back of our receipts and there were coupons to get a free hot chocolate at the gas station next door. So we went and got that. We came home with gas, groceries, candy, salt and hot chocolate in our tummies and we had enjoyed our shopping spree. I think I spent 37 cents in overage that night and Megan spent around 25 cents. 

  Anyway that is the scoop on our December challenges. We had fun, saved money and according to Megan's college classes I improved my brain with playing all the instruments. So life is good!

   

Christmas Time

I hadn't gotten around to sharing pictures from Christmas time yet, I just wanted to record some of the fun and blessings from Christmas time 2022....

The Wednesday night before Christmas we enjoyed a time of singing carols by candlelight. I really enjoy using candles and it is fun and special to do something different from the ordinary. We enjoyed it.

Before the carol sing we had a "Shepherd's Supper": with Lentil stew and other stews, charcuterie boards with bread, crackers, cheese, dates, olives and things like that. It was yummy and fun to do something a little different there too.

  Megan and I had fun (and a few late nights and pushing ourselves too) making handmade gifts for everybody this year. We only do a gift exchange amongst me and the kids (not our whole extended family) so it wasn't quite as big of a project as it could have been.

  The first thing that we made was a bunch of candy. Our friends the Kleinsassers (or the females in the family anyway) came over one day and we worked together at it. We made peanut butter pretzel truffles (which were very yummy!), Christmas Crack, Rootbeer cream cheese candies, Eggnog truffles and Turtles. We made far more candy than we needed and I am working to take off some extra pounds that landed on my body now. :-) We did give candy away to people outside our family so that was a good thing!!

I had fun make these little forest friend magnets for Malcolm to play with.

I made this teddy bear/rice heating pack for him as well.

Megan bought an unpainted set of nesting dolls and painted it for him. It is super cute but the best picture I have is this one where they are on his and Aaron's laps and you can't see any of the fun details.

Malcolm didn't mind getting up early for exchanging presents before breakfast and church. He loves reading books now so Megan was reading him one at like 6:30 in the morning.

Megan had made cute little personal pies for all of us which we enjoyed at breakfast along with our traditional Vanocka braid, sausage, eggs and hot chocolate.

Thomas and Mara camped at a rendezvous this past summer and hope to go again. Thomas had borrowed a shirt to wear last year so I made him one of his own. Megan knit him a wool hat.

I didn't get any good pictures of Jonathan. I knit him a black hat for a present which he said he liked but he didn't try on because his hair was already in place for church. I also made some flavored syrups for coffee or other things for him, Thomas, Aaron and Megan. Megan made cookie dough (to be frozen and then cooked) for Jonathan.

 I made a harvesting Apron for Mara. It has a really big and adjustable pocket on it for gathering produce. I also made her a miniature journal necklace. Megan knit her a neat bag which she filled with cookie dough and other treats.

I knit this vest for Megan. 

I made (with help from Megan-in cutting out squares and my friend Amy -in sewing) this quilt for Aaron. Megan made him a wool green beret.

Megan made me this beautiful scarf.

Others gave very nice gifts as well but those were the handmade ones. Compared to many our Christmases I am sure are very simple. I am thankful for that. I like it that way. 

  One highlight of the time for me was all of us working together to make supper on Christmas Eve. We made hamburgers (with homemade buns), fried potatoes, onion rings, deep fried pickles and jalapeños and milk shakes. It was just fun to have all of my kids here and work together to make a yummy supper. After supper we played games and then everybody stayed here overnight. Having all my kids here together is such a blessing. I treasure it when it happens.

  One Sunday after church my parents and my brother Luke and his family joined us for lunch and that was fun too. Holidays are fun in that they prompt us to get together with family a little more and that is wonderful.

 

My Experience Hosting With AirBnB

    On April 16th of 2022 I listed our basement as a private room space on AirBnB. I wrote all about that in this post in May. I thought it would be fun to give you a little update on how it has gone.

    First of all with this whole experience I just feel like God has blessed us over and over and over again. I have heard stories of bad experiences hosting (guests that trash the place, guests that are hard to deal with and people holding parties at your place or having to deal with things like guests having their car broken into while they are at your place) but we have not. We have had 2 guests out of the 49 stays in 2022 that weren't completely positive about the whole experience of staying with us. One was unhappy about driving on a gravel road to get here, He couldn't find the fridge (nor did he ask me anything while he was here because I would have been happy to show it to him), there was a spider on the ceiling and our footsteps upstairs were loud. But still he left our place neat and tidy and wasn't a bother while he was here I just would have appreciated more communication while he was here so that I could have resolved issues as best I could rather than him giving us a low rating. But it doesn't really matter. Plenty of guests have given us a high rating so it balances out. The other unhappy guest arrived late and found our dog's bark scary (which does make sense and I am glad he pointed it out to me so that I don't leave Kitchi out when people are arriving) and he didn't like our patriotic stairway - I don't mind that he pointed that out in the review either as if people don't like that sort of thing it is fine if they don't book with us. Even though they weren't completely happy they still were respectful of our space and we didn't have any issues having them here.

   

   Financial blessings: Hosting with AirBnB out of our home like we do is not a get rich quick scheme but it has been a true blessing financially. We made just $4 shy of $6,000 in 2022 from AirBnB (and they take out all the fees that are needed above that amount). So I got nearly $6,000 deposited in my bank account. They usually put it in a day or two after the guest arrives. 2023 looks like it will be even more financially lucrative as I will, Lord willing, be doing it for the whole year. I already have over $4,000 worth of trips booked or already stayed with me and that is with nearly the whole summer and fall still open for bookings. I didn't know if this would be a year round venture but it seems to be. December was way lighter with only 4 guests but January is back to being fairly busy again. This earnings is made from using a space that our family used very little anyway.

   The blessing of opening your home to others: The Bible speaks of the need for Christians to be hospitable. And that word for hospitality has to do with treating Strangers like friends. Though when I do it for money it doesn't seem quite the same as simply inviting strangers in but I do still find it to be a blessing. I am not quite sure just how to explain the joy I experience from trusting mankind enough to let them come in and use my home, to have access to much of my stuff (though not all of our stuff nor all of our home as we did put up the door pictures below to block guests from our main living area). It is just another area where I have learned to be a little more vulnerable and open and when you find that others are kind back when you choose to be open and kind there is something so very beautiful about that.

  The majority of our guests have been from Minnesota but we have had guests from all over. We had a lady from Germany stay with us for a couple of days and I had a lovely long visit with her. It was so neat to visit together of the beauty of truly trusting strangers as she has done by staying in all sorts of shared spaces as she traveled across the USA.  A couple from out East was super friendly and thoroughly loved on Kitchi while they were here. Kitchi has been a favorite with many (though not all as I mentioned above) when they are here. One lady from Kansas had evidently read reviews about him (many mention the sweet dog) and she was so excited to get here and play with him. They brought him a frisbee as a gift and spent a fair amount of time playing with him.

   I do want to give you the whole picture in this post because all though I have absolutely loved having guests come and go the kids have merely tolerated it. It is not something that they enjoy. They understand that it is something we need to do financially but they try to avoid meeting any guests. The blue doors have been a very good thing for their sake. When we close the doors they feel comfortable to act as normal in our space and they try to stay out of the shared space if they think that the guests might be coming and going. 

 How does it actually work? I made a listing on the AirBnB site which over all is quite easy to do. Their site is pretty easy to navigate and they have instructions about everything. There are also people you can contact if you need help. I got some bookings in about a week and then less than a week later I was hosting. I have it set (You can choose setting according to your comfort level) so that if someone is verified as a real person (they have to submit some documentation) and they have a 5 star rating from their stays at other places then they can book automatically as long as the dates have not been booked by anyone else and I have not blocked them (I block dates that are busy and I don't want to have guests or when I am out of town  or we are having company that needs to stay in that area). When someone has booked a stay I get a text, an e-mail and it shows up on the AirBnB host site. If people don't fit the qualifications that I set up they can send a request to book. Or they can do that if they hope to get some dates that currently look unavailable. Then I have to go on the site and either approve or decline their stay. I do some communicating with the guests before they arrive to let them know who to check in and such and I will give them contact info for me and ask if they have any questions. That generally does not take that much time. I have a general instructional letter that I have in a document on my computer and I just copy and paste it.  Before they come I made sure the bed(s) are made and that it is neat and clean. It usually takes me 1 to 2 hours between guests to change sheets, clean the bathroom, clean floors and sanitize things. I also change the lock code on the door that they use. They are able to come and go as they like and generally we don't visit a lot. I do try to meet them if at all possible and let them know that I am available should they have any questions. I do have coffee and tea available down in the AirBnB and have occasionally set out fruit, granola bars or some other snack but usually I don't have it and no one has complained. Most stays take less than 2 hours for me to clean, communicate and do anything else needed for their stay.

Do you have any interest in hosting? I know it is not for everyone but if you are looking to earn some extra money and you have some extra space it could work for you. I personally have found it to be a very fun and easy way to make some extra money. The work is fairly minimal. Most things can be done when you have time and you can make it work around another job. If you are interested in doing it I would love it if you would sign up by following this link for AirBnB. If you sign up and host a stay within 90 days (of signing up) you will get a little bonus payment and I also will earn some money. 
 

Lovely Wintertime

Temps are supposed to get below zero tonight and that is fairly normal for January in Northern Minnesota. It can be cold but it is oh so beautiful and invigorating too. I truly love it here. Even when the wind feels a little nippy and my eyelashes get frosty - I love living here. 

 I thought I would share a few of our winter doings so far this season....

The top picture is of Malcolm and Thomas - biking in the snow. People heavily discourage me from doing that after my tumble last winter but I guess it is okay for Malcolm when he has his Daddy's help.

Several weeks ago my parents brought their wood splitter and my brother Peter and Niece Jatan over for a Saturday morning. Thomas, Malcolm and Jonathan also came and they along with Aaron, Megan and I worked on doing up a nice amount of wood for us and some for my mother-in-law, Sharyl too. What a blessing that was! We love having our cozy fires and wood is needed for that.

Mom and Dad make a pretty good team! They have been working that way for over 50 years now.

We got two loads like this for us. Yay!!

I am not sure how much this guy did to help but he sure is cute!

He, Megan and Jaten were the stacking team.

A couple of weeks ago I invited my friend Amy over to hang out with me on a Saturday when the kids were busy doing other things. We enjoyed breakfast (Aaron was here for that) and then a lovely walk in the woods followed by sewing on a quilt together.

The woods were lovely but even more lovely is friendship. I am so blessed.

We have gotten quite a lot of snow this year and we have really been able to enjoy the winter wonderland look!

The next day after church and lunch Aaron and I decided to do some back country downhill skiing. Aaron had checked out this area the week before with Megan.
There was a trail from the road that we were able to follow to get to the hill. 

Once we went down the hill of course we had to take our skis off and climb back up. It was fabulous exercise.

It was around 2 degrees that day but the sun was shining, I dressed warmly and with all the exercise I got so hot!

Kitchi is always happy to be a part of things.

Aaron is a great skier and sometimes seems like he has endless energy.

A few days later I got this picture of Megan when we were out on a walk. It was pretty chilly that day (below zero I am pretty sure) so she wore a trench coat over her snowsuit. I guess there is a book out (which I have heard is a good one) called "There's No Such Thing as Bad Weather" (by a Scandinavian Mom) that then also says that there is just bad clothing. I generally agree. If you dress for the weather you can truly enjoy time outside in all kinds of temps.

My goal is to get outside and get some exercise of some sort at least 5 times a week. I think it is really good for you - mentally and physically. 

How is your winter going? Are you enjoying it? What sorts of things do you do outside in the winter time?