Matthew 6:25,33

25 Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes?

33 But seek first the kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

This verse is easy to quote when someone else has lost their job, had a pay cut or faced more month than money…but perspective changes when it’s personal.

Our one income is looking at a pay cut. Since we are out of debt except for our house, this isn’t as big a deal for us as some, but it’s still a handy thing to worry about.

 I like this verse promise. It tells us what to do first: look up…pray…thank God for what you do have and then walk on.  Do what you can do– remember your four walls and don’t be afraid to get your hands dirty.

Life might take your stuff and your money, but don’t let it take the best part of you ~ your spirit. Get up, look up and walk on.

Just talking to myself.

Simply,

Sis

To everything there is a season, 

and a time to every purpose under heaven:

 a time to be born, and a time to die;

 a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted.

   Ecclesiastes 3:1-2

Hello and howdy good friends and neighbors. If you stumbled upon this blog looking for moonshine instead of moon signs, my apologies—no snorts here, but we do have some hillbilly banjo music and other woodsy things to offer, fell free to stay.

Where was I? Oh yeah, sitting on my butt in my chair by the window dreaming of gardening, heirloom seeds and other nonsense. I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m just plain old weird and old fashion (the kids have come to the same—and they’re okay with that. God bless ‘em). People used to say that my dad was born 100 years too late. That is sooo true and friends, I’m just a stone’s throw away from being just like him.

Being a cowboy, dad used to do things by the moon. He would cut the calves by the moon, wean the calves by the moon and try to persuade my mother to plant by the moon.  Sphnicker sphnicker. Guys, if you have ever tried to persuade a woman to do anything without it being her idea, it’s futile. Most of the time dad wasn’t around for planting anyway…oh darn… and mom planted what she wanted, when she wanted.  This would cause my dad to cuss under his breath (or above it) when things didn’t grow right—in his eyes anyway. In the end, we ate well on what we grew.

So does it matter? Prolly not. I’m just weird and want to plant by moon signs. So I researched the Foxfire books (really cool books that recorded interviews of pioneers on how they did things—anything from log cabin building to gardening to snake handling) and by golly those folks may not have had any teeth, but they planted by the signs and phases. Teeth are optional anyway, right?

Let’s see what the Granny Cabe says “Take taters; plant them on the dark of the moon or the old of the moon—that’s the last quarter.  …don’t plant the flowers…And if you kill a hog on the growing of the moon, the meat’s all puffy…” Thank you, Granny.

And the “experts” further explain…

New moon (dark) plant above ground crops that produce seeds outside the fruit.

Waxing–first two quarters (increased light) annuals that produce above ground, but seeds form inside the fruit–tomatoes etc….

Waning–last two quarters (decreased light) plant root crops like beets, carrots, onions, potatoes blah blah—transplant perennials because of happy root growth.

Full moon=big fat round and light—time to rest or dig in the dirt and then rest.

This dude explains it well… http://www.gardeningbythemoon.com/phases.html and sells calendars. Will I buy one? No, I’m cheap, but if you feel froggy and rich hop in and get one. Or go here and get something similar for free http://www.almanac.com/.

One other thing… Do I believe in astrology, the study of the stars? Yes. Worship of the starts, tarot cards, horoscopes, fortune telling and other pure hogwash…NO. I believe Genesis 1:14 when it says: Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years.

Simply,

Sis

Every time I turn on the television I hear how the sky is falling and how I should be buying gold and heirloom seeds. Well, I agree with part of that–the part about the seeds.

According to Dave Ramsey, gold is a lousy investment because of its lousy track record. He believes if you are in debt you should sell your gold and take the money and pay toward your debt, sounds fair.

Glenn Beck agrees with Dave—kinda. He has said gold is a lousy investment and he and other wealth holders are buying gold as insurance. In short, he is trying to protect his wealth and hedge against inflation, sounds fair.

Whatever—you make up your own mind about gold. I think there’s gold in them there seeds—heirloom seeds and that is where I’m investing a small sum of my money.

Heirloom seeds are the seeds our grandparents used in their gardens. They are non-hybrid open-pollinated seeds. The kind of seeds you can keep every year, saving money and ensuring a food source for years to come.

Hybrid seeds you can’t keep every year. Hybrid seeds are a cross of other breeds and their seeds are totally worthless.

So what? So, Chicken Little, if the sky did fall and if the US economy did collapse ask yourself this: What do you want in your cellar? Seeds that can reproduce themselves or seeds that can’t. This is a no brainer for me.

There are a lot of fly-by-night companies popping up everywhere selling heirloom seeds and seed vaults. Be very careful who you buy from. Google the name of the company for reviews before you buy.  I would hate to see you end up with fool’s gold, from someone trying to make their first million. And don’t forget to get a garden plan together before you order.

Happy Gardening!

Sis

are better left alone. Yes sir, this is one of my favorite verses ever. It’s so real life and funny. Today I feel yucky. I hate flu. I hate it when the kids are sick and I am too. I just want to go to bed and be left alone. No surprise the Bible has a verse for that.

Proverbs 21:9

Better to live on a corner of the roof 
than share a house with a quarrelsome wife.

In other words…run, Ben.

Blessings!

Sis

When it was all said and done I purged keeping the good, tossing the bad and putting the rest into the recycle bin of life–to be repurposed for something great, unexpected and wonderful later.

What’s next? More recipes of simple food, money saving tips, insights on faith, gardening gushes and other total nonsense.

Stay tuned.

Sis

In case you’re wondering where we would get a child that looks like her, you have to go all the way to Romania –I guess or Kansas City to Kansas City Strings (a place that deals in adoptions of this kind). After buying her we found there isn’t a car seat big enough to fit her, in fact we have to lay down the back seat and leave the boys home if we want to take her anywhere, but the joy she’s brought me has been great. In the bluegrass world she is known as an upright bass, bass fiddle, or dog house bass, and  sings a simple bass line of bomb-bomb, bomb-bomb, bomb-bomb in whatever key you want to play in. I changed her strings from a heavy steel to a silky, nylon-type that is easier on the fingers. Ben now likes to talk about my silky G-string, and the possibility of rubbing our G-strings together to make beautiful music. I haven’t found instructions for this in my learn to play the bass videos, but I’m still looking.

Anyway.

I got her in July and two or seven days after getting it he drug me to a novice slow jam. Because “you can’t get better unless you play with others”. So there I was playing trying to play well with others while sweating like I hadn’t paid the bills. I had to give Pumkin’ a bath when I got home–but a few months later it’s getting better.

So while the rest of the world is carving punkins, I’m plunkin’ on mine.

I hope your fall is being filled with new adventures.

Simply,

Sis

I’m always looking for a good deal, on anything –really. Folks–lookin’ is the key word there. Remember that. Some days I’m not lookin’ but, I get one anyway.

When I was a kid I wasn’t look-ing for a cheap lesson but found one while playing Dukes of Hazard with my brothers.  It was a hot day in the fall, the wind was blowing out of the south and we decided it was a perfect day to shoot flaming arrows into an old farmstead. Of course, Jay Bo and I (Daisy) were putting out the fires while Luke was firing off fiery gasoline soaked arrows…

(We’ll stop there. My Mom is a good mom. She always promoted the use of our imagination, but didn’t hover over us–which allowed us to make some mistakes and learn from them. So yes she knew where we were. She just didn’t know about the fiery darts. In my now humble opinion that falls nicely under ‘your imagination’ unless your my kid. Okay–onward.)

…Of course we burned that building-rich farmstead, a pile of tires and a cedar wind break to the ground in a hurry. I mean totally slicked it. Then the real nightmare began, we had to tell our parents. Yeah, the fireman chewing my butt was scary, but I knew he couldn’t hold a candle to the wrath of my Dad.

Thankfully, he didn’t come home until late and after hearing the story from Mom… he decided he didn’t need to wake us up, or whip our tails to insure our understanding of our poor choices. I guess he figured laying in bed and waiting was bad enough. He was right. He simply said, “sounds like a cheap lesson to me.” (Pretty sure he wasn’t looking for a cheap lesson that day, either, but he got one anyway.) 

I told you that story to tell you this one.

Ben and I were watching Glenn Beck the other day when the kids asked to shoot off their remaining firecrackers. We said that would be fine, light them and run, be safe, blah blah. Two hours later… I was fixin’ to fry some chicken, W was doing homework and Deputy Barney was talking. (He starts every sentence with and then.) Sponge Bob said this, Patrick did that and there’s the smoke from our firework…

It was then I came back to reality–as they hadn’t been outside for a good 45 minutes. It was then I realized our only great shade tree, an ash, was on fire and smoking out of every hole. What followed was a bunch of drama: hose gettin’, Dad gettin’, much water, some chopping, some what da @#$% were you guys thinking, a couple light bulb moments and two hours later the fire is out.

It’s always funny how kids process things. W couldn’t do his homework for being remorseful of his choices. I tried to to console him by saying, “Look at the bright side, now you have a Dukes of Hazard story for your kids.” He smiled and said, “Yeah, but we didn’t have to call the fire trucks.” See things are looking up.

Barney on the other hand, is a horse of a different color. He puffed up and bragged about how he saved the day. “I can’t believe I saved the day … can you believe I saved the day … I’m a super hero … I saved the day.”

After a few minutes of this, I had to bring him back to reality and explain, he ruined the day before he saved it.

I wasn’t shopping for a great deal on a lesson that day, but found one anyway.

Simply,

Sis

(Thanks to BlogHer Pic App for this photo)

The 8/28 Restoring Honor rally brought well over 300,000 people from around the world to Washington D. C. to well–restore honor. (Some people are puzzled by all of this and have mistakenly call it a political rally. It’s been a long time–maybe never since honor was synonymous with politicians. I think our founding fathers were true leaders, andwould have been highly offended to be called politicians.)  The rally focused on faith, hope and charity encouraging people to become their best self. The idea being the person who are their best self–can govern themselves just as the founding fathers had hoped.

The above picture was not taken from another website, it was sent to me by my friend, Marlin. Marlin had made the hard choice to give up his tickets to the 8/28– restoring honor rally on The Mall in Washington, D.C., to the guy who took his family and took this picture. The man who took this picture got to The Mall early on the morning of the rally– 7:30 a.m. and this was as close as he could get to the stage. This was as close as he could get because there were too many ‘God fearin’ neighborly folks’ in the way.  A great day for America.

(another thanks to BlogHer Pic App for this photo)

More of this is just what Washington needs–a bunch of God fearin’ neighborly folks in the way. Wouldn’t it be cool if there were so many God fearin’ neighborly folks in Washington that the politicians would be voted out and leave the running of the this country to God fearing neighborly folks. Just so we’re clear, the United States Constitution calls God fearin’ neighborly folks– We the people. To be even more clear … that is us–me and you.

We are in an age in America where we are losing freedoms daily to power-hungry politicians who thinking we are too dumb to govern ourselves. I think this rally is evidence that there are plenty of great, God fearin’ neighborly folk in America who love their country and aren’t ready for a handful of pompous, power-grabbing politicians to take our freedoms. Take heart and know, Neighbors, we’ve got them surrounded and ONE person can make a difference–your vote counts. Keep up the great work, America.

Simply,

Sis

Thanks for your concern. See ya when the leaves turn.

Sis

Crap on a stick! I just realize at 38 I’m grown up. I’ve gone from being carefree and silly all the time to mostly serious, thoughtful and (dare I say it?) almost responsible. Ugh. My evil twin, SINthia, calls it straight-up boring. Carefree rip anyway… She gets everything she wants. Which is where my current, recurrent issues are coming from. Just once I would like to throw a fit and get my way. Dave Ramsey says there is a grocery store kid inside everyone of us.

If I could feed that child within I would say this: I want new furniture. Waaahhh. Not the kind on sale, the expensive kind, with faux leather that’s soft and downy and recliners on each end and a whole room to match. *SINthia on the floor–thrashing about shrieking* I don’t want another piece-a hand-me-down, craigslist crap. Early garage sale is NOT a decorating style. They call it vintage cause it’s old…not she-she. Shabby sheek is just another way of saying ‘my husband won’t give me the freakin’ credit card or the keys to the damn-it emergency fund“.

(As my boys watch in wide-eyed wonder I would continue banging my head against the floor screaming…)

There’s a TV. I wanna TV. I ate all my peas, now give me my TV. I’m tired of that ten-year-old albatross in our living room. I’m sick to death of stomping across the living room to tell the kids for the fourth time to clean their rooms, messing up the TV because of a loose internal connection, then jumping up and down in front of it until the ding dong dang damn it thing stops buzzing and hissing like a giant cockroach…If I had a high def skinny TV I could do my workout DVDs better. Waaaah.

Sniff. Okay. Sniff. I’m done.

Please tell me this sounds familiar. You know what’s even worse? I’ve brainwashed Ben into buying all this Dave Ramsey stuff is a good idea. He now thinks saving money is sexy. He just asked the other day if had enough money to write a check for a new (angels singing) TV and furniture?

Yes.

Where is it?

In the emergency fund.

Oh, so we can’t touch it?

Not unless it’s a true emergency. (Car explodes, natural disaster strikes, someone dies, etc..) Or if we both agree…(Eve dangling the apple…)

Get behind me, Satan, is what he was thinking. Sounds like we need to make an envelope for TV and furniture, is what he said.

*Gah*

I wanted to holler, “Run! Run! As fast as you can, before you get sucked into being a responsible grown-up. Turning 21 was fun, the rest is overrated. Please, run. I’ll martyr myself. Take SINthia with you. Don’t look back, damn it run.”

But alas, the fox had already eaten the gingerbread man and in this story Adam didn’t eat the apple. I was left with the faint smell of bedtime, a hand-me-down fairy tale and a grown up for a soul mate. Shite!

With the child within– without, I went over to our money envelopes and with a sigh, wrote TV/Furniture on one and said to anyone who would listen, “Some days it sucks being a grown up.”

What does your child within want need. A new truck? iPad? A new gun? Banjo? A vacation? What’s your poison? Here’s your chance to whine, you best take it. Thanks for listening.

Simply,

Sis