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On the Topic of Dignity and Privacy – Our Kids’

February 9, 2015 By Laura 3 Comments

I know you’ll hardy be able to even fathom this, but I was not an easy kid to raise.  No, it’s true. Not from the time I was little, all the way through my teens and early 20’s.  My mother even had a nickname for me: ‘Mouth’.  And no, she wasn’t likening me to Steven Tyler or Mick Jagger.  She was referring to my frequent fresh-backtalkin’.  My mouth seemed to have a mind of it’s own, and it was pretty sharp, blunt and quick-witted! Or I thought so, anyway. My mother; well, she wasn’t so impressed.

I wasn’t clueless about the stresses my parents were under all of those years. They suddenly found themselves raising 5 complex kids, had great financial struggles, and were dealing with a host of other issues including health, extended family matters, and the frustration of trying to make dreams come true, for us all, out of nothing.

Knowing all of that at the time, I clearly was not clueless. I was simply….selfish.  Too wrapped up in me, myself, and I, to make their role as parents any easier.  Instead, I made it all so much worse.  I honestly, don’t even know what I would do with me, if I was my parent. (Although in her moments of sheer frustration, my mother did vocalize her wish upon me, a time or two, that I might have a kid just like me, someday.) I can only imagine the frustration and hurt I must have built up in my parents, on some days. My mother in particular, since my father worked so many hours, and my mother was the one there, trying to raise us the best she could. I was enough to handle on my own; never mind that there were 4 other kids being raised, besides me.

How did she manage? Where did she turn to vent, when she had ‘had it up to here’! ( I can still see her today, referring with her hand to that level juuuust over her own head. ).  I know she had some good friends (who also had kids) who she had over, who she had coffee with, and she was always shoo-ing us back outside because they were ‘talking’. Or, sometimes, I’d see the curly cord from that horrid green colored phone on our 70’s wall-papered kitchen wall, snaked through the crack in the doorway to the pantry, where she was talking to someone. Maybe even crying.  [Read more…]

Filed Under: Faith, Into the Light; The Series, Life In General, Parenting, The Big Picture Tagged With: building-up-our-children, dignity, do-unto-others, facebook, Faith, golden-rule, internet-privacy, kids-privacy, kids-self-worth, love, matthew-7-12, parent-support, Parenting, privacy, protecting-our-childrens-privacy, social-media-self-control

A Simple Buttons and Love-Themed Craft Project

January 26, 2015 By Laura 1 Comment

I have promised myself that this year, I will spend even more time in the space in which I get so very much enjoyment and fulfillment in; my art studio. And so this past Sunday, that’s just what I did for myself! In anticipating our home mantels decor, for the month of February, I wanted to create something love-themed, in celebration St. Valentine’s Day, of course.  I chose to do a simple buttons craft project. I have a certain kind of love-thing, for buttons!  Do you, too? [Read more…]

Filed Under: Crafts & Creations, Holiday Crafts, Seasonal Crafts and Creations, Tutorial, WINTER Crafts and Creations Tagged With: button-crafts, crafts, heart shaped crafts, heart-crafts, simple-crafts, Valentine-crafts, Valentine's Day Crafts

Thoughts on a Happy New Year!

January 1, 2015 By Laura 1 Comment


HAPPY NEW YEAR, EVERYONE!!
Or we certainly hope and pray so! Right?

Come the end of every calendar year, we all wish each other a Happy New Year!. Naturally, that truly is our wish for each other, and in fact, ourselves. And damn if it doesn’t feel good, to have that fresh new calendar year ahead of us! A clean slate. A new start, with new hope. 12 months, when all kinds of wonderful things, have the potential to happen!

But the fact is, we all know that life, is just not happy ALL of the time. And it certainly does not come about, with just hopes and wishes.

If we’re human, and I can only assume anyone reading this is, the truth of the matter is that no one ever has a 100% happy year. One free of very difficult unexpected events, failures, losses and rough days that just seem to go all wrong with the little things. Things that can sometimes just pile up and break us down. No, no one has ever had a year free of all of those things. Chances are, not a soul will have one this year, either! And I just feel it on my heart to share my thoughts with you all, a little bit, about that today. Not because I want to bring anyone down, to kick off your new year! Perhaps, so no one is overly disappointed when day 3, or any other brand new day of the new year, seems to go all wrong. ๐Ÿ˜‰   But, more-so, my intention is to bring you some great hope and comfort about the matter!  In my own rambling kind of way, of course.

I’ve just been thinking, how people seem to be hardwired, to [Read more…]

Filed Under: Faith, Faith/ Catholic, Into the Light; The Series, The Big Picture Tagged With: 1-Corinthians-6:19-20, happiness, happy-new-year, joy, Revelation-21:4, thoughts-on-a-new-year

Vanilla and Wild Orange Sugar Scrub | Free Tags

December 10, 2014 By Laura Leave a Comment

I don’t know about you, but I just love my personal care routines!  It’s a bit of ‘me-time’ that I embrace and look forward to each day.  I choose to take my daily showers before a little reading time and bed every night, and it works out perfect for me. Because by the end of the day, I could not appreciate it and enjoy it any more than I do! I am usually exhausted by that time, both physically and mentally, and maybe even a little chilled to the bone, if I’ve been out and about in the freezing-cold temps that winter offers up around here. So that hot shower, and using my awesome smelling and soothing natural personal-care recipes, feels nothing less than a treat for me!

One of those recipes, is this sugar scrub, I am going to share with you today.  You can learn how easy it is to mix some up for yourself, or as gifts!  And just because I love you all, I also am sharing the tags I designed for the scrub.  We gave tagged jars of this this as Christmas gifts last year, and they were a very big hit!


Now, I call it a recipe, but I don’t really have measurements for you. I just wing it.  But please don’t let that scare you one bit, because:

1. I promise you, you can wing it, too!  And…
2. You can’t even do it wrong!

So if those two bits of info don’t encourage you….I don’t know; you may be hopeless!  And I can’t help you.
But be courageous!  And try making some of this wonderful scrub for yourself, or someone you love.  Because it’s really quite simple.


ALL YOU NEED:

Glass Containers with Sealing Lids (for shower storage)
Raw Sugar
Pure Vanilla Extract
*Grapeseed Oil
(*Or any natural carrier oil such as:
I prefer Grapeseed oil because if it’s benefits to the skin, and it’s rapid absorption rate.)
Wild Orange Essential Oil

WHERE THEY CAN BE PURCHASED:

Raw Sugar –  Supermarket
Pure Vanilla Extract  –  Supermarket
Grapeseed Oil  –  Your local Health Food Store,  Amazon or Rose Mountain Herbs
* Wild Orange Essential Oil –
* If you want Wild Orange essential oil and don’t have anywhere to get it, you can email me at TheRichardHome@aol.com, and I can direct you where to purchase some.



Note: We use our Wild Orange essential oil for all kinds of other things, besides in our scrub. We diffuse it (it’s *amazing* with Peppermint), we add a drop or 2 to our water, maybe to whatever we are baking, in our chocolate cake frosting, in our greek yogurt, in our homemade non-toxic house cleaners, in our air freshener spray, and to make our awesome Wild Orange Lip Balms.  It’s a scent/properties that really lifts your spirits.

So for storing your sugar scrub, you can use any kind of glass containers, depending on the size batch(es) you want to make. But since they will likely be stored in the shower, or taken into the shower anyway, I highly recommend a container that has some kind of lid that seals tight, to keep water out while not in use. Consider: canning jars, jam jars, spice jars, etc.

 

TO MAKE THE SUGAR SCRUB

 TO START:  All you are going to be doing here, is combining and mixing the ingredients.  So work in an adequate sized bowl. You are welcome to mix with your hands, with a large metal spoon, or use the help your Kitchen Aid.  It really doesn’t matter. You just want to mix well as you work.

ADD the RAW SUGAR, in the amount that would fill the container(s) you are filling. A good tip would be to simply fill the container with the raw sugar first, and then dump it into your mixing bowls. Then you’ll have exactly enough!  The benefit of the sugar is for exfoliation, but it also gives a nice scratch for itchy skin.
Option:  If you’d like a sugar that is less course, using regular brown sugar works nicely as well.

SECOND, ADD the GRAPESEED OIL: How much is really an ‘eyeballed’ kind of thing. To help you gauge how much, remember that you want enough in there to see some saturation within the sugar, because the oil definitely holds some of the benefits of the scrub, to the skin.  It’s moisturizing and soothing. Also, adding enough oil will help hold the sugar together more-so, to be able to scoop out and use it effectively, as opposed to loose sugar that is too dry. You just want a wet sugar consistency, to be able to handle with your hands. So those are your guidelines and line of thinking, when figuring out how much oil to add.

NEXT, ADD some PURE VANILLA EXTRACT: Just add a drop here and there over the surface of the sugar/oil mixture in your bowl.  There are no therapeutic benefits to the vanilla except for the scent and nice coloring that results from it.

LAST, ADD DROPS of WILD ORANGE ESSENTIAL OIL:  This is the best part!  Wild Orange Essential Oil does have therapeutic benefits; it reduces stress and anxiety, and yet is uplifting to the mind and body!  Again, add as many drops to acquire the level of scent you are wanting, also determined by the amount of sugar you are working with.

Smell to test!  Does it smell awesome to you? It’s the combination of the vanilla and orange scent, that makes this scrub so amazing to the senses, so add a little more of this or that, and keep mixing, until it seems just right to you!

 Our scrubs worked very well, in this style of jars, because it locks tight.
Want tags like ours?
Here you go!  You can visit our DropBox and download them right from there!
The sheet shown below is only a low resolution sample, for you to see what your sheet of labels will look like.


Also you need to do is cut on the lines to get your individual labels, and use a round circle cutter or punch, to make them into circles. Then we used a wider scalloped punch on some brown paper, to attach and embellish the tag more, using sticky tabs.  Use a paper punch to make a hole for your string. We tied them on with jute string, because I love that organic natural feel to it. But any ribbon or string will do!

It can be a beautiful and thoughtful gift, that someone will love you for! But be sure to make some for yourself. Because no doubt, it will feel like a treat to you, too. And no doubt, you deserve it!
<3


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Filed Under: Crafts & Creations, DIY (Do-It-Yourself) Project, Essential Oils, Free Printable/Downloadable Tagged With: essential-oil-recipes, homemade-gifts, spa-gifts, sugar-scrub, sugar-scrub-recipe, wild-orange-essential-oil-recipes

Flock Photography Fun! | Chickens

November 16, 2014 By Laura 3 Comments

Hello, Friends! Welcome.
We’ll have something more….helpful, for you later this week.  But we thought we’d start your week off light, and just share some recent photos I’ve taken of our rooster and hens. A little flock photography fun, if you will! Thought you might enjoy them.

There are many, so please let them all load, before scrolling!

 

Sweet ‘Kingston’, our Buff Orpington. She’s Michael’s baby.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Our Chickens, Photography & Lettering, The Homestead Tagged With: australorp-chicken, buff-orpington-chicken, chicken-photography, chicken-rooster-photogrphy, chickens, flock-photography, hens, photography, red-star-chicken, rooster, silver-laced-wyandotte-chicken, Welsummer-rooster, white-plymouth-rock-chicken, young-chickens

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