Up periscope!

 I feel like I've been hiding under the sea for a while! On October 1st I moved to an apartment in Nevis. (Well, across the highway from Nevis.) That's the change I alluded to in my last post (7 weeks ago)! I miss the old trailer on the farm and the grands popping in and out, but this should hopefully be a temporary move. The kids are selling their house and building a larger one, for their growing family, on another part of their property. My trailer needed to be removed in order to do some septic work and prepare the place for sale next spring. They also intend to build me a tiny house/small house to move back into. Anyway, I'm still in the same area within 3 miles of them, so I'm helping to drive kids to sports and close enough to babysit easily, so I'm not out of touch. That helps.

The apartment I'm living in is called The Boathouse Apartments, because it's kind of shaped like a boat. I'm in the bow of the boat. Can you see it? 

My apartment goes just past the two skinny windows on the right. Now I'll work my way around to the left to show you the weird shape of the house. (There are four more apartments to my right, but they're smaller and just standard little apartments.) The two skinny windows are in my bedroom.

Flat wall to the left of the "bow" is the kitchen wall.

The apartment ends just past the two windows on the other side of the wood deck.

This is the backyard as seen through the kitchen sliding doors. The landlord said his insurance doesn't cover kids using the swingset (or the treehouse!) so Adam will remove that and take it to their house. The family who lived here before had three kids and apparently flaunted the rules a bit, ha ha. 

Here are some interior pictures and maybe I'll post a picture of my really bad map of the house. It only gives a basic idea of where the rooms are. The apartment is huge by my standards and I don't even use all the rooms. 

The wonky shape of the living room required a creative arrangement of the furniture. Micah suggested this way of doing it and I like it. The little propane stove in the corner heats the place with the help of the fans from the electric furnace. I was told that was the most economical way to do it. I spend most of  my time in this area. :)

The previous owners squeezed in some little Ikea type cabinets to the left of the fridge and I'm using them just where they are. Many cabinets will not be used. I'm not unpacking anything I don't use daily. This is temporary and maybe I'll get rid of some of the stuff I don't use. Hopefully my next move will be a big downsize! (By temporary I mean a year or so.)

A little room between the kitchen and living room. Notice the windowsill. Probably not going to use this room.

Laundry room off the kitchen.

A little spare room next to the laundry room that you walk through to get to the bathroom. Interior,  no windows. (Weird and wonky, people.) On the map below I call this the kids' art room though it probably won't get used for that.

The last tenants used this for a dining room. I'm using it for storage. The door leads through a little hallway to the bathroom. 

My bedroom at the front of the apartment.

And my wildly inaccurate floor plan.

So, I'm sure that's more info than you wanted, but I thought I'd put it out there anyway! :) It's not feeling like home yet, but I don't want to get too attached anyway. It's older and has more of a lake cabin feel. Heaven is my only real home. Thinking of that helps with the feeling of ennui that hits me sometimes. (Did I spell that correctly? lol) 

I've been fighting some anxiety and depression through all of this upheaval, but it's serving to remind me that God is my only real source of dependence. Keeping my eyes on Him more and more!

In other news, I'm reading a lot and thankful for internet which cheers me and fills the house with human voices. That's important when you live alone. I'm taking a hiatus from the ATC making, so no images of those this time. 

It's about time I checked up on you guys out there. Hope you're all well. 

Shalom and love to all!

Has it been five weeks, already?!?

Looking back over my last two posts it seems like so much has happened this summer! You may not see it, but it strikes me as kind of mind boggling. There are also changes going on behind the scenes that I won't go into in case plans change. Nothing negative, but things tend to go back and forth around here, and I'll wait 'til things firm up before mouthing off about them. Ha ha.

Everyone's still enjoying the pool and that turkey keeps on growing!

You may recall that Micah was raising 100 meat chickens. A few days ago something small (a weasel perhaps?) got into their pen and killed several of them. They were only a week away from going to the butcher so Micah called and the processing place said they could take them the next day, so we loaded them up and off they went. Out of 100 chicks she had 94 left, which isn't a bad outcome. Raising that many chickens is a big undertaking. She headed to Brainerd (about an hour and  a half away) to pick them up today. Success! :)

I made another batch of goat cheese today. This is my third batch and each one has turned out a little different. It seems that using apple cider vinegar produces a harder cheese/larger curds, while lemon juice produces a softer cheese/smaller curds. I didn't add enough salt last time. I think I did okay this time around. 

I'm hoping for a harder batch this time. I like to be able to grate it into my eggs. But it's good either way! Still got some pressing left to do on this batch.

I also made a rhubarb cream cake. I came across rhubarb at the grocery store earlier in the summer and bought a big bunch, which I chopped up and froze. It turned out pretty well. I have enough rhubarb left to make a rhubarb crunch, so that will be next. I shared most of the cream cake with Micah's family, but I saved plenty for myself. I don't need to be eating entire cakes, right? 

Audrey is currently in volleyball and goes 3 hours every weekday! What is this; the Olympics?!? She's the only one in a sport at the moment. Oh, and she won enough ribbons at the county fair with her dog that she's now going to the state competition in Minneapolis next month.

Micah starts online classes tomorrow. She's finishing up her bookkeeping degree (or whatever it's called) that she started years ago. She has two semesters of work to do, and she hopes to do some part-time bookkeeping at some point. So many things! 

I'm still reading D-Day by Stephen Ambrose. It's long, but very interesting and I'm taking breaks. No hurry. I'm also reading a little self-published book called Facing Jerusalem written by a Christian ministry in Israel. My last novel was The Visitation by Frank Peretti. Kind of hair raising in places. I think I'll go back to Christian Regency romances, lol. More relaxing.

Thatcher aka Chuck, has joined the crowd when it's time to go to Grandma's house. See him in the middle? (Della, Hazel, Thatcher, Sully and Audrey) He usually stays home with Mom when they come over, but we're seeing if he can stay out of trouble, ha ha. 

Do you see him? I found this fellow swimming around in the wading pool a while back. He kind of startled me! Cute, eh?

This is a nice basswood tree that grows next to the neighbor's house. Adam pointed out that it hums! We all had to walk under it and see for ourselves. It was so full of honeybees that it really does sound like it's humming. (That was earlier in the summer.)

No ATCs this time! What's the world coming to? I'm scaling back for the present and just waiting for cards to come back in the mail. 

It's a nice day today and I'll probably take a walk a little later when it cools down. I enjoy walking in the evening when the road is shaded by the woods. 

I'm off to read your blogs! Thanks for checking up on me.

Shalom and love! 

Photo dump...

 I'm just going to put in a bunch of photos and then go back and comment and fill in. Don't know how it will turn out, but what's new? Ha ha!

Micah's chickens, ducks and turkey are growing up. She has chickens from last year too, but she got a few more this year. Everyone likes the disintegrating wading pool. Especially the ducks. It's hard to locate a new wading pool this time of year. We'll have to think fast when this one gives up the ghost.

Micah is kept busy taking care of her 100 meat chicks, plus milking goats and caring for miscellaneous horses and chickens. The chickens are free ranging, so eggs are hard to find. Bandit the dog found two yesterday and picked them up without cracking them, so maybe he's an Egg Hound? We'll see if that skill persists! Eventually Adam will get a chicken run made so they will stay in there most of the day, so eggs will be laid in nests. So many building projects! He just finished building the outside pen for the goats. They've also been free ranging. I've made a couple of batches of goat cheese and it's pretty good!

This is Meatloaf the turkey. She's especially friendly and likes to perch on my steps, which would be lovely if she would refrain from leaving gifts for me to clean up. Micah loves her so much. I don't think she'll have to worry come Thanksgiving.

This is Hei Hei. Have you seen Moana? Then you get it. Hei Hei has a deformed beak and foot, but she's a very sweet little chicken and seems to be handling her challenges very well.

The deer are headed west. It must be evening.

I gathered this wild bouquet while returning from a walk. This was the first bee balm I've seen this year.

Do you see the rainbow? It was better in real life. :)

Glorious clouds...

The kids tell us this spider builds her web on the side of the oak tree every night. This is right outside my window. The spider is about the size of a quarter. Right before I took the photo a couple of moths plowed through the bottom part of the web. Shucks. The engineering is awesome. The web is anchored to the ground and to the trunk and branch of the tree.

ATC time!

For this swap the host sent us cards with a word on each one. We had to illustrate the word. I'm pretty straightforward in my thinking.

This swap was called Children with Wings and Words.

An earlier bouquet and some art by Audrey.

An ongoing swap called Cat and a Little Something Extra-3's.

And here are the 2's for the same series.

This swap was, of course, called Ocean Life.

Life has been full of babysitting, walking, watching softball games, reading and other everday activities. It's been a nice summer and I hope you're all doing well.

Oh, my current reading is 7 Women and the Secret to Their Greatness by Eric Metaxas, Faithfully Different by Natasha Crain and D-Day by Stephen Ambrose. 

The grandkids/next-door-neighbors are growing like weeds and are so sprightly and interested in life. They're a constant source of fun and I'm so thankful for them. They keep me from drifting into my natural tendency to be a recluse.

God is good and I'm constantly reminded that we're all totally dependent on Him. My devotional, New Morning Mercies, speaks to this daily. We can do nothing without Him! I hope you're all leaning on God today.

I think I'll go to YouTube and go to the Relaxing Walker channel and take a walk around Jerusalem via video. A favorite thing to do. (Making it a prayer walk is even better!)

Love y'all! Shalom!

I'm ba-ack! :)

 Wow. Summer got busy in a hurry! Lots of babysitting to help Micah and Adam get the older kids to things like 4-H dog training, softball and dance class. Now they discovered that the 4-H dog training schedule conflicts with the actual softball games, and Hazel and Audrey have their games on different nights and some are an hour away. Aargh! I've been praying for wisdom for Micah and Adam and that they figure it all out and maybe just trim back on extracurriculars. But I'm trying to leave that in their hands, since I have no control over their parental decisions. (Update: God stepped in and dog training is now here in our little town instead of an hour away, and is on a different night than their ball practice. Hallelujah! My BP just went down a little, ha ha.) I went to Hazel's games on Monday, but forgot to take my camera! Audrey's team played yesterday (Tuesday) and I didn't go. Too far away and I would be driving in the dark on the way home. I try not to drive at night. Anyway, she'll have some closer games that I can go to. 

There's a batch of chicks, plus a couple of ducklings and a turkey that are still too young to put out to free range, so we're moving them out to the chicken tractor each day. All the kids help, and I've been trying to make sure to help because it's a lot of trips otherwise. Last year's chickens and guineas have the run of the place and, of course, it's hard to find eggs. They're shut in at night, but still do most of their laying on the loose, which makes for lots of egg hunting. We got rid of three of our four roosters because they were chasing kids. :) 

One end of the tractor is covered by a tarp, so it's hard to get a good hot of the birds. :)

There's a turkey and a couple of ducks in there with the chicks. They're just having fun trying a little of this and that.

Pool party...

Micah also acquired a couple of Nigerian dwarf goats which give more milk than I imagined they would. Milking them is an acquired skill with their tiny teats, but Micah is mastering it. I've even made a batch of cheese! I froze part of it and use it mostly in my scrambled eggs. I ordered a cheese press, thinking I'd try that with the next batch. My first batch was crumbly and Micah says it tastes like mozarella. I was thinking with a press it might make more of a solid block. I'm going to experiment a lot. (Update: Micah just called to let me know she's going to pick up another goat...and 2 kids. News is old before I print it!)

Tostito...

and Ruffles.

I've been reading a lot. I won't bore you with all of the titles, but my current non-fiction is Building the Benedict Option by Leah Libresco. The subtitle is "A Guide to Gathering Two or Three Together in His Name". It sounds like it may have some more practical ideas about getting small groups together. I'm also reading Book 3 of a four book series by Lawana Blackwell. I showed pics of the first two books in an earlier post. I see (looking at my list of books read) that I've read 11 books since my last post on April 22. Among these was the three book series by Bodie Thoene called the Elijah Chronicles. More contemporary. Actually, the third book was written in 2020 and mentions Trump being president. It's sort of a historical fictional prophetic thriller that takes place mostly in Israel. Really good. I've been ordering a lot of books from Amazon and on my Kindle lately; not so many thrift books. 

Chuck (aka Thatcher) blew multiple bubbles before I finally captured one. He was glad to do it. He's gotten a lot of mileage out of blowing bubbles lately. 

I've been doing ATCs after a brief respite. A hardly noticeable respite, actually. I'm just going to post whatever I find. Hopefully not too many repeats. When I go so long between posts it's hard to remember what I've done. I've slowed way down on swaps and am mostly doing the round robins, which I don't usually take pics of because they're at various stages of completion. So...

These were for the Falling! swap. We had to make a little envelope and have stuff falling out of it. (Yeah, really!)

A Cat plus a little something extra swap...

The June Weird Holidays swap...

Two new plasticky kitchen gadgets...

A very simple cheese press. (Made in Ukraine!)

And a cute little Keurig. It even matches my dining room curtains! :)

If I don't post often it's partly because I'm getting old and my left hand is getting weak and uncooperative. That makes typing less fun. I know I should get it checked at the doctor. I just hate going to the doctor! I haven't been (except for eyes) since the whole C-word fiasco began. But I really should. I'm thinking of switching to a lady doctor just to make it more comfortable to go. One less excuse for not going. ;)

Anyway, I'll be sailing by to check out blogs soon. The three grand girls will be coming over for a few hours while Micah picks up her goats. She needs the space in the back of her van for two dog crates to transport the goats in, ha ha. That's one of the plusses of getting small goats!

God bless y'all and shalom on you and yours!

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem and may you stay in the palm of God's hand.