Fiber Balls

Did you ever, all of a sudden, get a craving or an urge for something? A few weeks ago, out of the blue, I thought about these things called "fiber balls". My sis and I used to make them alot when we were younger. Since my hubby is not a fan of peanut butter, which is probably a good thing since it is a weakness of mine, it's been a while since I made them. I put off making them because I knew they would either have to be given away or they would sit in the fridge calling my name. I would've been on my own to finish them off. Not a good thing, trust me! Not that they're really bad for you and they probably are a much better choice than say, peanut butter eggs which are screaming my name these days. They are the best at Easter.

It came to me that maybe if I got my husband to "help" me make them, he would like them! Isn't that what they say about kids? If they help to make it, it's likely that they will try it! Not that my husband is a kid or anything, but it might work. And guess what? It did! It worked! He loved them. He helped me roll them all out and then tried them and declared that they would make a wonderful addition to his lunch! SCORE!

Sooo, I have been making them every now and then. It's such a win-win. I absolutely love them, and hubby does too! Plus, they are chock full of fiber which is good for you, and in my opinion healthier than cookies. They are also easy to make and fun for kids to help with.

Start out mixing 1 cup honey with 1 cup peanut butter. Sticky, sticky.

In a separate bowl, combine 3 c. oatmeal, 1 c. choc. chips (I use mini), 3/4 c. bran, (I use oat), 1/4 tsp. salt. 1 c. cocunut and 1 c. raisins.
Mix it all together and roll into balls about the size of a walnut. This gets very sticky and your hands will kinda glump together after a while.

YUMMO!

They are best kept in the refrigerator or freezer.

Enjoy!

Fiber Balls:

1 cup honey

1 cup peanut butter

3 cups oatmeal

1 cup choc. chips

1/2-1 cup bran (I use 1 cup of oat bran)

1/4 tsp. salt

1 cup coconut

1 cup nuts or raisins

Mix honey and peanut butter together, then stir in remaining ingredients. Shape into balls and freeze or refrigerate.

'Nother Auction Find

Remember a few days ago when I ended up at an auction instead of buying pansies? By the way every time I think of pansies now I think of Madagascar and the little lemur thing calling the other animals pansies. "They are just a bunch of pansies" .. Said in a very lemurish voice. Random, I know. Moving on...

At then end of one of the rows and rows of treasures, sat this pile of cupboard doors.

They didn't seem like the thing to buy, but as the auctioneer was begging someone, anyone, to start bidding, my hand went up. Before I knew it, for $1 this pile was now mine. My mind was spinning, trying to think of what to do with them. I love reading blogs about how people redo things, and I knew the latest thing on a lot of blogs is making chalkboards. These would make wonderful chalkboards I thought and so I set out to do just that. Since the cupboard fronts were already lite, I didn't primer them. Using leftover paint from our house remodel, I painted the edges, then after it dried, I sanded the edges and corners to look aged.

Then I covered the inside part with 3 coats of chalkboard paint. This was my first time woking with chalkboard paint and next time I will take my time more. It was hard to get close to the edge without going up the edge a little! I have a few things in mind to try next time! Here's the finished product.

There are about 15 more boards waiting on me in our garage. My goal is to have them all done and then sell them at the GMS yard sale! I plan on doing some different colors and also adding some corkboard to half of the bigger ones, turnng it the other way so that the bulletin board would be on the top half and the chalkboard on the bottom half and then maybe adding some key hooks on the bottom to make it a "message center".

For $1.00, I think I got a pretty good deal!

Old Becomes New!

Yesterday the most random thing happened to me! I was feeling all springy and decided to go and buy some pansies to brighten things up around here. Pansies are one of the first flowers you can plant in the spring and they survive the sometimes coldish weather when winter wants to hang on. Anyway, on the way to the greenhouse I noticed all kinds of cars and trucks at the Farmersville auction. They have a sale there every Tuesday, but I totally forgot about it. I turned in on a whim and ended up spending the rest of the day there! Gone were thoughts of pansies and what I should be doing at home (housecleaning). Instead I was surrounded by bargains! Granted, some of the stuff didn't look like it was worth much, but I knew that with a little TLC and some creative ideas, old things could take on a whole new purpose! Sooooo, I stood outside, followed the little golfcart around, and bid on many things and got a few things. Things are a little tight for us right now so I didn't want to spend a lot of money. I spent about $11.oo and got lots of goodies. Here is one of them.

This whole bundle of old red fenceposts were sold along with a tattered planter for $5.00. The plant stand probably should be thrown away, but I thought of something I could do with it so for now it stays. OK, I keep getting sidetracked! Back to the boards. Since I have such a crafty hubby I thought I'd buy them and see if he could make me a frame with them. I have an old picture of my mom that I blew up to a 16x20 size and have been looking for a frame. "Rufus Hoover" wanted me to spend $40.00 for one but I decided no! I took my bundle of fenceposts home and when my hubby came home from work, I showed him my finds and asked him if he would make me a frame with the boards. Of course he agreed. Meanwhile I thought that a fence would be a neat thing to add to our flower beds or have to deco with. My hubby cut the back boards for me and then turned me loose with a staple gun!

Here's the fence

And then this afternoon, I finally got my pansies. For now the "fence" is on our little porch but may be moved into flower beds this summer!

I didn't get pictures during the process because we were to busy hard at work! I think this frame is far better than any "Rufus Hoover" could make. Definitely cheaper!

Needless to say, I'll be going back to the auction and seeing what else I can find! Oh, and wait till you see what I come up with for my other bargains of the day!!!

Foot Detox

A few weeks ago I had a consultation at a nutritional center. A few friends had recommended that I go. Basicaly I wanted to go and see if they could see anything in my body that may have caused my miscarriages. They tested my urine, saliva, and drinking water. After doing a few small tests on me, I had a consult with an RN there. She asked me lots of questions about my health history. Things like, have I been exposed to mold, microwaved plastics, and all kinds of other questions. Then I had a consult with the nutritionalist. He said that because of the things they found in my urine and saliva, he thinks that I may have a blockage in my liver. Other than that, he said I appear very healthy. Soooo he prescribed some natural detox stuff for my liver. According to him, I should only have to be on this about a month and then we could "try again".

While I was there I was reading some literature they had on various other services they offer. One thing that caught my attention was the foot detox thing that they do. I thought "Hmmmm, this looks fascinating...maybe I'll try it". After I found out that the first visit was free, I decided I would definitely try it!

You basically soak your feet for an hour in water. There is a little electrode box in the water. The electrodes draw toxins out of your body through the pores on your feet.

This is how things looked at the start of the soak

This is 30 minutes into the soak

And......... brace yourselves.....this is at the end of the hour soak!!

Ewwww!!!! YUCK! NaStY! I'm sure there are a few other adjectives that would fit here! The water at the end was black and looked kinda like algae. There were black flecks all over the water and on my feet. My pores were black too. I was horrified. There was a paper explaining all of the different ways people's feet have looked and explaining what was probably wrong. The blackish greenish look mine had was from toxins in the liver. Pretty much what they had said! The black flecks were from "heavy metals". Still not sure what this all means, but hope to learn more.

I know this method of treatment is somewhat controversial, but it felt "right" to me. The people I worked with were all Christian people and explained everything very clearly to me.

I would love to hear your opinions and experiences with doing things "naturally"!

Cultures

Culture has always been something that intrigued me. The study of people and how they live is so fascinating to me. In America we are surrounded by various cultures and people groups, and yet, here in Lancaster County, it's sometimes hard to look beyond our own culture!

Brad's brother is dating a girl who is originally from Kenya, Africa. She stays at our house when she comes to see her lover boy! We love having her stay here and it is fun for me to see Brad get to know his brother in a new way. They weren't very close growing up, but lately it seems they have more to connect on! She wanted to make us a traditional Kenyan meal. Of course, I was delighted at the thought and love trying anything new. Saturday I was busy helping my sister get her new house ready and it was so nice to come home to dinner ready!


Joy fixed a delicious feast of a type of beef, a sweet rice, something made with little green wumpa beans and a tortilla type thing. It had the look of a tortilla but had a totally different texture. I should have asked her to spell out the names of the things that she made because I can't remember what it was called!


And then on Sunday night we experienced a totally different culture! AMISH! My parents were Amish until I was 2 years old. My mom is an amazing cook and loves having people over. My parents were always open to having various groups of people in our home.

My brother works as a chef in a coffee house in Lancaster. He makes amazing food! We all stop in to see him at work and sample his cooking! Somehow my mom found out that a lot of the kids working in there had never really had "Amish" cooking so she offered to have them over for a meal. They were of course eager to take her up on her offer and after planning and trying to get a night together that worked for most of his friends we had it on Sunday night. Of course I "HAD" to be there to help mom serve everything! : )


One of the main dishes Amish are known for is "Roosht". It's kinda like a stuffing with the meat already in it. So soo yummy! She also served mashed potatoes, cooked celery, noodles with brown butter, homemade bread with peanut butter shmear, and snitz pies for dessert. Nobody went away hungry!

It's funny how a culture is known by it's food. Italians and pasta, Mexicans and Tortillas, Amish and Roosht!!!

Snow storm Number 1

Our corner of the world has been blessed with lovely snowfalls this year. I can remember the blizzard of 1993 and 1996, but I think this tops it all. This time though, I live on a street in the "city" instead of way back in the woods. Ok, ok it's not a city, but with the firehall only 2 doors down and a school across the street from us, we didn't really get to feel "snowed in". The snow started falling Friday night and by Saturday we had over a foot of snow. We measured about 14 inches. It was absolutely beautiful. There is something about snow covering everything around, and slowing things down, that is so beautiful.

On Saturday morning, my hubby plowed the driveway and kept piling the snow at one spot. His plan was to build an igloo! It turned into more of a cave dug into the snow. He went into work for a few hours on Saturday morning to help clear snow at jobs and when he came home, we worked on it for a while. He made it soo cozy! It was about 7 feet wide and 9 feet long. We spread out a sleeping bag on the bottom and that kept some of the moisture from coming up through. Then we piled a bunch of blankets on that. Brad had dug a shelf out on either end so we set our lantern and flashlight on them. We got it finished around dark and decided maybe we would try sleeping out there. It was actually pretty warm inside, if you stayed away from the door! After being out there for about an hour we decided our bed would be more comfy so we went inside to sleep. I was sure I would "feel" drips all night from melting snow!

On Sunday we went back out with

hot chocolate and sticky buns and our favorite game...checkers.

We both enjoy playing checkers. There was a game in the cottage we stayed in for part one of our honeymoon and for some reason, we just started playing. Then on our way down to Tennessee for part 2 of our honeymoon, we stopped at a Cracker Barrel for breakfast and bought a checker rug. Now it is our game of choice. Perfect for 2 people.

The igloo is now covered in another foot or 2 of snow. We thought of adding on and expanding it, but decided not to. It was fun while it lasted though!

The Empty Crib

7 months ago, my husband and I thought we would be parents by now. I was due with our first child on February 2. We were so excited, and spent those first few weeks dreaming of how things would be. Tomorrow is February 2. The day I was supposed to become a mother. Yet, in our "spare room", there sits an empty crib.

Today as I sat on the bed, staring at the crib, I let the tears fall. Tears of loss and grief. Tears of shattered dreams. Tears of what could have been. The loss we experienced was repeated a few months later when I lost our second baby. After the second loss, I felt numb. I felt an anger I had never felt before. It scared me. All of my life I had been taught that God is good and everything he does is good. Yet, how can a good God, think it is in my best interest to have us experience not one, but 2 miscarriages? It didn't make any sense to me and is something I still struggle with.

We buried our Baby Grace in our flower bed. A few months later we buried her sister Faith there too. Faith was named by her daddy. I didn't want anything to do with naming this child and it was even hard for me to acknowledge that it happened. Had I been able to erase the physical pain and the endless flow of bright red blood that told me it was over, I would've chosen to ignore the fact that I had even been pregnant again. Time does bring healing in a way, and yet, the pain is so real. Especially now.

Yesterday, my husband held me as I cried out my grief. I told him that for the first time since my 2nd miscarriage, I feel at peace. Peace in knowing that God is in control and will grant us the desires of our heart in HIS time. My Sunday School class is studying the book "Lies Women Believe". Yesterday was a breakthrough for me in realizing the lie I have believed that God is NOT good. Here is an excerpt that I've been clinging too. "We want God to fix all of our problems. God says instead, "I have a purpose for your problems. I want to use your problems to change and to reveal My grace and power to the world. That is the Truth and the Truth WILL set you free."

So yes, there is an empty crib in my house, but I choose to rest in God's plan for it and for My life.