It's Been A Busy Week And The Sabbath Is Upon Us...

The Kalimba is beautiful. More beautiful than this picture shows. I took this late last night in dim lighting. I will do a blog post about the Kalimba soon with beautiful pictures.

Do you ever feel rushed? I have felt this way for at least two weeks or more. I think it's because we have so much to do before Winter sets in. It was 11 degrees this morning. I'm sure that it was colder before the sun came up, but that was the first time I looked at the thermometer. 

I turned on my pot of tea from the day before and I checked the solar input and knew right away from the reading that I had better clear the panels, so I put on my snow boots and grabbed the broom. I cleared the snow from the solar panels that accumulated overnight. I also swept a spot for the dog to do her business and swept off the door mat. I looked over at the chickens to see if they had ventured out yet. They had not. They were not ready to be fed. Too cold. 

My tea was boiling away when I came back into the house. I poured it into my Yeti and added a bit of sugar. I sat down to start my morning studies while drinking my hot tea. I had just closed my last devotional when the news from the bedroom came, "The dog is up"... 

I took the dog outside. She was not happy that it was so cold and promptly wanted back under the covers after being outside for a nanosecond. I tried putting her in her own bed, but she wanted nothing to do with that business. She ended up back in our bed in the warm spot that she had just left moments before. 

It is still quiet in the house, so I picked up the new Kalimba and played Amazing Grace on it. I am learning how to play the Kalimba. It was a gift for Mr. Smith, but he isn't that into it, so I decided to keep it and learn to play it myself. It has a beautiful sound. Kind of a mixture of instruments. The harp, bells, chimes, piano, guitar and flute, maybe? In just a few days I have learned to play simple songs and even added my own spin by adding chords. Did I tell you that I don't read music? I mean I know the basics and even understand it, but I have only ever been able to sing and play instruments by ear.

Tummies will start rumbling soon. I think I will make oatmeal. Simple enough and it only takes about 12 minutes from start to finish. I took a couple of freezer meals out of the freezer last night to have over the weekend. Spaghetti with meatballs and black bean chili are on the menu. I also thawed out a couple of chicken breasts to make into something. We are completely out of bread. I need to bake some, but I think I will just bake cornbread and biscuits. We have tortillas too. 

My mind is firing on all cylinders now. Food, check! Let's see, the house needs cleaning before the Sabbath, we need to actually work to make money and things need to be shipped. Okay, I boiled everything down into simple tasks and it's time to get started. I know that sounds easy, but there are two of us with possibly two different ideas on what the day looks like. Make room for additional challenges and added goals, check!

We hung our Winter window coverings this week too. Goodbye constant wonderful views. I don't like having window treatments on the windows when it is so beautiful and private outside, but wintertime is brutal and it is necessary. The good thing is that they allow natural light to come in, so our plants can  thrive and so can we.

Things To Be Happy About:

Homemade biscuits with maple syrup and corned beef hash

Learning to play the Kalimba

The end of the week

Finding split chicken breast in the store, again.

Sunshine

Looking forward...

Looking back...

Bogs snow boots

Natural light

Quiet time

Flour sifters

Footstools

When the heat kicks on...

When the heat kicks off...

It is time for me to end this blog post for today...

Shabbat Shalom,

Mrs. Smith