Truly Scrumptious Yogurt

Yogurt is extremely good for you, but have you ever read the labels of most little pre-flavored, pre-sweetened single-serving containers? How much extra sugar and other stuff actually goes in there? Not only that, but wouldn't it be more cost-efficient to buy it in larger quantities?

Since I don't have a source of affordable raw milk to make my own yogurt, I've become a fan of Dannon's All Natural Plain kind. I can't exactly buy it in bulk, but I get the 2 lb tubs for about $2.09 each. That is inexpensive compared to the fancy smancy "organic" brands. But here's the impressive part:

Ingredients: Cultured Grade A Milk.

Or, as their container says, "No Artificial Anything." Until I can make my own, I think this is the best I can get.

A delicious way to sweeten and eat plain yogurt

1. Spoon plain yogurt into a small bowl, preferably of the charming or simple sort.

2. Add a spoon of raspberry preserves (my very favorite berry!), a spoon of brown sugar, or a drizzle of chocolate syrup. Or all three. You could also be creative and add nuts, other fruits, cookie crumbs, etc.

3. Eat with relish! (No, of course not the pickle kind. Though, you never know...) You might want to stir yours first, but I think it's more exciting for each bite to contain a different ratio of creamy tartness, brown sugar delight, and raspberry bliss. If you don't think raspberries are blissful, I'm very sorry for you. ;)

4. Repeat whenever needed. Feed it to your family for dessert! Offer it to visiting friends who already know you're a bit unconventional!

WARNING!! Even if eating plain yogurt seems way too tart at first, a few bowls of this might have you craving the stuff. I even like it plain now... though, raspberries are at one of the pinnacles of scrumptiousness. Oh, did I mention I love raspberries?

(I'm shocked to see that, until now, I have had no labels for "food" posts! I think I've blogged about food before, though...maybe that was when I didn't do labels? Anyway, if I get into a habit of taking good pictures, I'll definitely do more food posts. I know I enjoy looking at such things on other blogs! Few things are more picturesque and inspiring than photos of mouth-watering yummies, and words can only say so much alone.)

The Source of Radiance

Those who look on Him are radiant,
And their faces shall never be ashamed.
~Psalm 34:5~

This is what I want - to radiate Christ's glory and beauty and holiness. To reflect joyfully what is all from Him, as the moon mirrors the sun's light, as a lonely person beams with delight at sight of an old and beloved friend. But of course, so much greater is our joy from God!

~~~

As my dear Daddy noticed, I'm attempting again to post daily. Let's see how long I can keep it up, shall we?

My tendency is to spend way too much time reading other blogs, so if I need to vacate myself from the blog world altogether, this may be short-lived. I've felt an uncomfortable conviction lately that I need to redeem my time, that I've been piddling too much of it away. So I'm praying about what that will look like and mustering courage to make some changes.

Now, I know pictures make blogs way more exciting, but one constructive habit at a time is hard enough to form, so I can't promise regular pics. What else might you my readers like to see in my posts? Descriptions of the garden's progress? What we have for dinner? Quotes on a particular subject? Book/movie/music reviews? Theological quandries? Rants on the culture? Stories from my childhood?

Have a redemptive Thursday, do hard things, look to the Lord and be radiant!

Giving to Caesar

I'm glad that understanding and filing your taxes perfectly is not a condition to get to heaven or we should be in desperate straits! I did them as accurately and thoughtfully as I could. But the instructions had me rather bewildered and bewuthered last night.

I do not believe that, by necessity, any amount of taxes the government decides to make up is right. Authorities can overstep their God-given boundaries! When they do, it is the duty of good citizens to speak up. But I think a look at history calls us to wisdom in how we do so. Remember the caution of our Nation's founders. They took every possible pain to get justice without bloodshed. I pray our tax system can be reformed, but it will never happen in the angry way of the French Revolutionists.

And Jesus said to them, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." And they were amazed at Him. Mark 12:17

They were amazed because Jesus not only answered the question, but went after their hearts of hypocrisy. Taxes are important in that we are to obey the authorities God has placed over us, but of greater importance is our duty to the Highest Authority.

What is God's tax? All I have I owe to him, and yet His grace is a free gift! My place in heaven is secure forever because of Christ. Now, He invites me to give all I have to Him for my greater joy!

Today, am I giving God what is His?

Mysterious Characters

Surrounded by the aura of candlelight, two figures poured diligently over manuscripts of wisdom and adventure.


"He's one of them Rangers. Dangerous folk they are, wanderin' the Wild. What 'is right name is I've never 'eard, but around 'ere, 'es known as Strider... Or was it Bob?"


Greetings from Lady Rael and Sir Robert! Won't you join us in our literary journey? There's plenty of tea to refresh you before you must travel on!

Money and Thoughts From the Kitchen

Nope, I haven't started a entrepreneurial baking business. Though, I very much like that idea. One of these day I'd love to have a bakery and tea shop. Oh, with a vintage bookstore in the adjoining room, and a garden and chickens out back, and quaint little living quarters upstairs. With my own eccentric writing nook in a window overlooking mountains.

Yep, I'm rather an unrealistic romantic when I get started on my "One day"s. :-)

But at the moment I'm quite pleased with my current situation. What I meant by my title is that I've been sitting in our cluttered but pleasant kitchen, typing away for my new writing job.

For those who don't know, I recently accepted a part-time job writing for our church. At the moment, I'm helping turn a study on biblical relationships (which is currently in note-form, PowerPoint, and audio recordings) into a book. I confess the idea intimidated me at first, but really, all I'm doing is soaking up this great biblical teaching and helping get it into the clearest and easiest form to pass on to more people. How exciting is that?

A huge reason this job is a blessing is that I can do most of it at home! I've committed to working 10 hours a week, which doesn't sound like much. But it's more than I had thought! Of course I like writing, but I also find it easier to flutter around doing house jobs, making fresh bread, even doing dishes, than sitting myself down to write.

My piddling distractions are becoming painfully bothersome. I may have to fast from reading fictional and blogs, painful as it would be. Would I survive, do you think? ;)

In other news, we had a glorious weekend. I was able to meditate on the deep sorrow and endless joy of Christ's death and resurrection, and read a lot of John. We visited my dear "college family" on the farm Friday night, and Saturday morning went to mow my grandparents' loooong driveway. That night we drove back home, though we had to take shelter at a Sonic during a rain-and-hail storm. Sunday after church we had lunch with my other grandparents, and then a quiet evening in our own cozy house.

The kitchen is quiet now, and my espresso is beginning to wear off. Plenty to do tomorrow, as always! If I ever thought my life at home after college would be dull, how very wrong I was! How did the Proverbs 31 lady do it all?

Sacrifice

While reading the Boundless blog, a link in today's post made me weep.

It happened 2,000 years ago. The innocent Lamb of God died in my place. I plan to read the account in at least one of the Gospels today. I just read Isaiah 53 this morning. But some things must be seen to feel their weight and horror.

Passover Sacrifice

Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

~Isaiah 53:4,5

A brief list of today's doings

Today, Rael did the following:

-made bread, cinnamon rolls, chicken stock, and chicken salad
-ran an errand for Zach and retrieved Whit from MCA
-washed lot dishes
-tinkered on the piano a tad (which is more than she usually does)
-discussed the myth of preditory pricing, and how the government owes people green bubble gum
-inspected seedlings sprouting outside
-dumped compost
-anticipated the P&P-watching night
-listened to Mossflower
-washed more dishes
-laughed in pity when The Old Clunker (my old laptop which needs a better name) died on her twice in three minutes
-read a few promising parts of my novel
-laughed when the Mother brought home left-over food consisting largely of...chicken salad
-amused herself by lazily posting a list instead of a well-crafted series of sentences and paragraphs
-had so much fun writing in third person, she decided to leave before the Gollum-speech catches up to her, precious

The Widow's Might

Here's the opening of another recent independent Christian film. This won Best of Festival at the San Antonio Independent Christian Film Fest, and is simply a great movie. Quality stuff this is, excellent in many ways. It's unique, honest, and hilarious. Family-focused, God-honoring. And most of the characters actually play themselves, which strikes me as simply refreshing. :-D


Preview from John Moore on Vimeo

Pendragon; Sword of His Father - Reflections

Sierra, you asked what I thought of the Pendragon film, so I think I'll devote a whole post to it!

It was with great excitement back in December that I unwrapped the cellophane from the movie and finally began to watch it with my family! Procrastinator that I am, I've been meaning ever since then to do a review. For now, this is not really a proper review - it is, rather, some recollected thoughts.

What an ambitious film! An epic, historical story like this usually takes millions of dollars to make, and Pendragon; Sword of His Father was done on a fraction of that (about $80,000, I think) These folks (two families of cousins and some friends) raised lots of the money, and did a great job with what they had. While the production qualities still had room for improvement, the story was well-thought-out and biblical, and I was caught up in it, only jarred now and then by little things.


Things I liked:

Costumes - They did a great job on these! The weapons in the mass-battles looked a bit fake, but decent knowing some of them were made from cardboard!

Sets -Much of it is outdoors, and of course God's creation is beautiful. ;) But the other sets were well-done. Marvelous details. I love the distant shots of the fortress of Arfon!

Plot - I was surprised by the challenges presented to the characters, especially near the end, which went so much deeper than most action flicks these days! Hard questions were asked, which, in different forms, Christians still struggle with today.

The last sword fight between two main characters - Effects during that were amazing, and the choreography looked much better than some of the slower ones earlier on.


Things that bugged me a little:

Accents - Only a few characters tried to have anything near a British accent, and that only occasionally. I know, it would be hard to get so many volunteers to work up good accents, but I wish they tried. Loving accents as I do. ;)

Some of the acting was very well done, some needed a little work. Cadeyrn and Brotus were probably my favorite, as far as convincing me they were truly the characters.

Other odd little things here and there, which I don't remember at the moment, still announced that this was a low-budget film. Probably one of these is the large-scale battles, though the stockade battle was pretty well-done. They handles the violence tactfully (this is not LotR), but the scale just didn't seem quite big enough...


Conclusion

So, if you don't mind some production flaws in independent films, and if you have a good imagination, and if you love to get caught up in historic epics made by and about Christians with vision doing hard things for the Lord - you'll probably enjoy this one. I liked it, and look forward to what Burns Family Study will produce next!

Sierra, I think you'd like it. :-)





Spoilers Ahead!!!!!


A funny side note. There's a moment when Artos emerges from burning rubble, after two intense fights, miraculously alive but wounded (at least his arm and side are bloody, and he would have to have some burns too). The second time I watched the film, with some good friends of my family, Cate mentioned in laughing frustration that, in that scene, Winneveria seems more interested in hugging Artos than in tending to his wounds. Perhaps it's a bit understandable, because he seems fairly alive. But later that night (we were being crazy and stayed up too late) while watching another very good film (beginning with the initials TOoD), we noted this phenomenon reoccur in almost the exact same way! A young man is wounded in a desperate sword fight, and afterwards the young lady stands by and lets him declare his love for her instead of hurrying to staunch his wounds.

Hmm. If a godly young gentleman were about to propose to me, but was also badly hurt, what would I do? Hopefully I'd help him, and he wouldn't lose his nerve to ask later. Hopefully...

(Edited March 12 :-) Thanks, Channah, for the correction!)

Gearing Up To Write

After babysitting several times a week for a little over a month, on top of all the family stuff and ministry and activities I'm doing, I think things are finally slowing down a bit.

Time to dive back into fiddling with stories. Muhahaha!

My most recent manuscript, which I finished in rough-draft form in November, is currently being edited by my youngest brother for a school project. So I think my first story to attack in my spare time is Melod's Song.

Melod's Song is about a young orphan boy with a great sense of humor, a cheery outlook on life, and an overwhelming store of corny jokes and off-key ballads. His ambition is to be a famous bard and entertainer, but his quieter, deeper hope is for home and family. Fleeing the evil Shamen, he accidently finds himself in a hidden stronghold called Stormyrock, where dwells a community of friendly, seemingly-harmless, book-loving outlaws of all ages and types. Melod feels this might be his new home. But on the wild coast, more dangers loom than the perilous cliffs. Melod must dig out the mysteries behind Stormyrock, discover who doesn't want him there, and find his place before more lives than his own are distroyed.

How was that? I'm still working on writing gripping and accurate summaries. ;-)

It's strange work, trying to edit and re-write and smooth out one's own novel. Ideally, re-reading it all through should be the first step, but it's very hard not to get distracted and start re-writing the first chapter. For the fifth time. And things like flow and pacing are tricky little critters to pin down, examine, and fix. But I'll have a go at it, and see if I can't fill in some narrative holes and smooth out inconsistencies.

Too bad the scones are nearly gone! I ought to try my hand at biscotti. That would go well with tea and writing.

Scribbled Thoughts by Light of the Tree

My older brother, Sam, is flying in tonight. Little-big brother and mother dear just left for the airport to pick him up. I would have liked to go, but I must stay here and be ready to be another brother's ride from work. But Sam will be here for somewhere around a glorious week, I think, and I'm looking forward to many quiet cups of tea, good conversations, and watching the new Pendragon film with him.

Our Christmas tree lights are LED, blue-white, and very bright. I like them. I also like our live tree, about 5-feet tall not counting it's potted roots.

Earl Grey and Panattoni bread go wonderfully with black-and-white Robin Hood episodes.

This is turning into a thankful post. Why ever not?

Our cat, Bella, was meowing very insistently to be petted, and proceeded to be quite lovey, without a bit of her usual propensity to lovingly bite.

Oh, and books! How could I forget?

There's Dickens, for starters. I just finished Great Expectations yesterday, and though I still liked Bleak House better, any Dickens novel is bound to be brimming with hilarious, lovable, ridiculous, and despicable characters, not to mention such writing and wisdom!

Though tempted to go straight into A Tale of Two Cities next (on Muglin's recommendation), upon studying my bookshelves my eye landed on Five Children and It. I read somewhere recently that Lewis or someone else I admire was fond of its authoress. I love a good children's book, so into its pages I fell. What a treasure! A bit of slight language is all I've seen wrong with it so far. The sparse, naratorial style of children's experiences reminds me much of Lewis, with plenty of common sense tucked into the tale of five siblings and their encounters with the sand fairy. Hilarious, charming!

And whilst my dear mother finished a project, I found it a perfect opportunity to read aloud to us both from Lorna Doone. Now there's a good book! A whole post, or series of posts, ought rightfully to be dedicated to this epitome of the manly virtues. It doesn't take us many pages to grow heartily attached to the refreshing, honest, young English farmer, and I for one want my boys (if I am so blessed with them) to grow up to be very much like John Ridd. But the merits of the story go far beyond even that of its main rough-but-humble character. Adventure, romance, and humor of some sort leaps from every page. We've been eating this one up.

Aside from devouring good stories, I have been so blessed to have brothers come home, and to be able to help cook for them, and fix their coffee (almost regularly) in the mornings, and to be able to drive to the duck pond with Little Big Brother in an attempt to catch "wee beasties" in a jar of water for his observation under the microscope. One a quiet day, I never imagined how much noise scores of lively ducks could make only by thapping the water with their feet!

About time now to get the Next-youngest Brother from work now. Littlest just called, and said the airport is crowded. I'm thankful the Lord of all Mercies is watching over all the travelers this

night.

(Added Later) Because I hate posting without a picture, and I'm woefully inept at keeping batteries in a camera and said camera handy along with necessary card reader and all such accouterments... here's another lovely old painting from my computer files. Isn't it pretty? To tie it into this post, I'll add my long hair to my thankful list. Mine may be just a hair shorter (ha ha, that was painfully lame) and sometimes wavier, but as often as I've been bemoaning it's sameness, I should just be nicer to it and thankful it can grow this long. :-)

Frozen Fingers

This morning I drove out to some friends' house (who have been out of town) to feed their animals, and was greeted by freezing temperature and a cold wind. I hurried to feed the goat, sheep, chickens, chicks, and dog, having to break the ice in their water containers, and hauling water from the house because of the frozen pipes outside. I often long for a farm and critters of my own... but I seem to forget about this side of chores. I felt like whining like a little kid about my stiff and throbbing fingers, they hurt so badly from the cold! My fingers still ache, twelve hours later.

Over the past few years, I've noticed something strange. I love this season, this month of December, but I find myself wishing the day itself would not come. It's always disappointing. Christ is born, yes, for which I rejoice! But the pain remains. The waiting is what tears my heart, and draws me to a glorious hope, fulfilled in part, but still waiting. "Rejoice, rejoice, Immanuel has come to thee, O Israel!" If Christmas is a time of hope, we still wait for something not yet here, and we will keep waiting after the presents are opened and forgotten.

It seems fitting to celebrate our hope in the cold and dying year.

Lately I've felt keenly my failings, my sin, my stubborn refusal to grow and mature. Like the silly guinea, shrieking, running against the chicken wire and the corner of the barn as if it could sqeeze through a hole two inches wide. As if it were a camel desperate to fit through that needle's eye. Foolish and rebellious enough to think everything's against it.

Left to myself, I run the wrong way constantly, going from one wrong extreme to the other, driving myself into desperation and constant worry. Fear drives out hope, hope for the husband and family of my own I long for, hope to have the character of a noble, wise, godly woman, hope to make a difference for eternity in at least one life. Left to myself, I wander off into mindless distractions. Left to myself, I am alone and dying

But now, in the cold darkening nights, remember! In the shock of cold, in the bitter pain of frozen fingers, remember! In the selfishness and grasping around me, which creeps into my heart and leaves only loneliness, remember! Remember that into the humblest of families, in the lowest of places, the God of the universe came down as Man. The Word came in humility to whisper in my ear, "You are not alone."

My Maker knows, and sees. And He did not leave me to freeze into stone forever. The change is started, and the pain only proclaims it. His death rescued me from Hell, His life rescues me even now from my sinful flesh. He left, but will come again. And with that final coming, neither fingers nor heart will ever freeze again.

~

Look up, you whose eyes are fixed on this earth, you who are captivated by the events and changes on the surface of this earth. Look up, you who turned away from heaven to this ground because you had become disillusioned. Look up, you whose eyes are laden with tears, you who mourn the loss all that the earth has snatched away. Look up, you who cannot lift your eyes because you are so laden with guilt.
 

“Look up, your redemption is drawing near.”

Something different than you see daily, something more important, something infinitely greater and more powerful is taking place. Become aware of it, be on your guard, wait a short while longer, wait and something new will overtake you! God will come, Jesus will take possession of you and you will be a redeemed people!

Lift up your heads, you army of the afflicted, the humbled, the discouraged, you defeated army with bowed heads. The battle is not lost, the victory is yours—take courage, be strong! There is no room here for shaking your heads and doubting, because Christ is coming.

~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer ~

Saving by Organizing

"Instead of thinking of staying at home as a prison sentence, think of it as another job to help save you money, reduce family stress and add more family comfort."

This quote is from the article The Cost of Clutter, which I came across through the LAF website. I'm still working to be better organized, and this is very motivating. It explains many of the practical ways I count staying at home as a job. An interesting read!

What Am I Up To?

Isn't this a painting by John Everett Millais lovely? I personally love seeing autumn leaves on the ground. I don't get tired of them until, oh, maybe February or March.

For those of you who might be new to my blog (dare I hope I might be attracting new readers, with my pitiful irregularity of postings?), and just 'cause for others, I thought I'd do an update on what I'm doing with my life these days.

I consider my main job to be helping my wonderful mom, artist and homemaker, who is single and teaches Latin at a small Classical Christian school. She's done more than her share of housework raising and teaching me and my five brothers over the years. Now I'm glad to be able to help out with the endless dishes, laundry, cleaning, cooking, errands, and keeping house for her and my three brothers still at home. With two brothers still not driving, I also get to take them to school, work, and church and sports stuff. I have so many hats which I'm still learning to juggle, and sometimes it turns into a humerous mess! But what better practice for being a patient wife and mother of a big family someday! ;)

As to cleaning, I should mention I don't do this nearly as much as I should - mainly enough to keep things in somewhat decent order. So I'm not in too much danger of being like Mrs. Joe (see previous post) just yet, except in attitude, as when I just cleaned the bathroom mirror to find it covered with with water splatters! Tell me, reader, if you have ever cleaned a bathroom mirror or metallic faucet, do you not sigh just a little to see the shine covered with spots?

Once a week I help out with a Bible memorization program for kids at our church, called AWANA, and have enjoyed getting to know my group of third-grade girls this year. After the Christmas break, I'll be helping with a Good News Club, which involves sharing the gospel, Bible stories, missionary stories, and songs at a public school after classes once a week. I'm excited about that!

Aside from reading and writing, I've been doing all sorts of fun and crazy things, like learning how to make a kilt when my bagpiping brother needed one (those things are tricky to make, but so expensive to buy!), sewing tea cozies, making my family cheesecake just because, and helping my youngest brother compose a limerick about Spam for his teacher. :-)

I never know what I'll be called on to do next with such an artistic mother and creative, off-the-path brothers!

The Wrong Sort of Clean

I've just started reading Great Expectations (after a disappointing disguised-as-fantasy-but-actually-a-"Christian"-romance book, which I stopped halfway through). This will be the second longish book of Dickens for me to read which is not for a class. I like it already, though it does start out drearily. Poor little Pip. He's an orphan, and his older sister and husband are bringing him up, though she's not the motherly sort at all. She's a good example of what I do not want to be like, either as a housekeeper, sister, or mother. She says some very mean things to poor Pip, but here's a quote I found convicting regarding housekeeping:

"Mrs. Joe was a very clean housekeeper, but had an exquisite art of making her cleanliness more uncomfortable and unacceptable than dirt itself. Cleanliness is next to Godliness, and some people do the same by their religion."

~Charles Dickens~

Great Expectations

I must remember that the very purpose of cleaning house is for the comfort and blessing of those around me. Sometimes I forget. And my life lived to God should also be a blessed and joyful thing, as inviting as a welcoming house which, though best kept clean (or godly), must firstly be filled with love.