Partnering with God in a bountiful harvest!

This summer my wonderful hubby (with a little help from me) shovelled about 35 truck loads of extremely wet 6 year old cow manure into a prepared raised bed garden ~ all for ME!

Preparing the ground, removing sod, so that hopefully no grass grows up and also more moisture can come up and down through the dirt.

Our little dog was after a Marmot...he almost dug to China!

The filling begins after the logs were placed around.

Can you see the beads of sweat?  My hubby tilled the whole thing with a tiller we found at the "Share Shed"

It was so moist, it was tough work.

Looked like a swimming pool of dirt...very deep and lush!

Girls removing rocks...they were more than happy to help when the quad was around!

At first I wasn't sure how much would grow as it was the middle of June when it all got planted...but WOW...God blessed with abundance!

Summer savory, herbs, onions...

The calendula flowers I thought were almost dead...definately are thriving.  I've picked and dried a big ziploc bag full already.  Trying my hand at making some lotion later on.

Sugar snap peas...yum yum

My very own Cabbage Patch kid! 

Now that is one big cauliflower!  Made some soup today, super yummy and froze the rest of it.

Picked about 1/4 of the row of Summer Savory, bunched it up to hang and dry.

I am wondering how I'm going to "do up" all this wonderful produce as my freezer is small and almost full already!  God is so good to grow this all for me!

Thiessen Travelling Times

The Low down on how we do our travelling ~ the Thiessen way!

With most travel, the main expense is fuelling our van for the trip...I cashed in some Airmiles for Shell gas certificates $180 worth, let's see how we did.
Grand total from 100 Mile House, to Calgary and Waterton, back to Calgary and up to 100 Mile House
$232.09 with 3/4 of a tank.  $232.09-$180 in certificates makes $52.09 out of pocket.
I had saved up $120 from homeschool funding for the activity parks, and another $80 from selling some baking and some Mary Kay.

Stopped in Kamloops to hit the Thrift Stores and have a little picnic.  Went to a local Superstore/Extra Foods and picked up $44.19 of groceries and used $40 in points from our PC Mastercard program.  Total was $4.19!  Feeding the marmots some of our lettuce was free entertainment.

Bought some great camping dishes (though they charged us double, it was still cheap and went to the Salvation Army) Total $6.95 for a back scratcher for Ruth and these cute dishes!

Next expense would be lodging for one night at Crazy Creek (Noah's Ark was full and small and crowded) $22.40 for us to camp the night and get rained out.

Having cereal in the dark was great fun!

Being rained out lead to an unexpected expense of eating breakfast at a local truck stop ~
$54.19 later and full tummies.

Headed to the ENCHANTED FOREST and paid the $47 to get in.  Worth it for the nostalgia and fun in the drizzling rain.  Fed the ducks for another 50 cents, Mei's favourite part when they ate out of her hand.

Stopped at one of our favourite places on earth (that we have seen) called FIN CREEK and had a quick picnic, wrote our names in the clay and skipped rocks...

Gregg thought I wrote "thiessen YO"

Stayed night with some great relatives, left some chocolate chips and icing sugar there, so that kinda counts as lodging expense?  $15 approx.

Bought water for drinking $3.

Off to Waterton National Park (Peace Park with US/Canada) and paid the 4 day pass of $58.80 for entry.  Went to the Ole' Lick 'n' Nibble Ice cream parlour for Foothills creamery ice cream $15.

Paid $84 for our family to camp and eat for the long weekend ~ costs were divided up and wow!  We had purchased $100 of fruit on the way up for it and were reimbursed and had a great time.  Came home somehow with the leftover Smore food ~ graham wafers, marshmallows and chocolate.

Back to Calgary to Gregg's parents place, free lodging in the basement.  Spread the girls out on the floor and enjoy!

Heritage Village in Calgary was the next big stop ~ really wish we would've gone here more last year because a family year pass is almost the same as what we paid for one visit.  We had 2- 50% off coupons and paid $98 for unlimited rides too.

Bought baby cones for the girls and some candy sticks $3.50.

Travelling home now, stopped in Salmon Arm to buy fruit at Pedro's Fruit Stand.  Spent $125.41 for 2 boxes of peaches and 1 box of cherries plus some eating fruit like banana's, nectarines and plums.
Discovered they also had Foothills Creamery Ice Cream...oh my, the big debate!
History here:  We found a winning lottery ticket worth $10 in a truck we bought and resold.  I cashed it in Calgary and let the girls decide what they wanted to do with their $2 share.  MAC DONALD's was calling by Salmon Arm.  Ok, so we sped over to MacD's and 4 of us were having a cheap burger and Ruth was waiting for icecream.  Spent $10.25 at MacD's and we all got a burger and 1 order of fries to share.  STILL, Ice cream was calling.  Searched the van for loose change...AH HA!  Girls shared 2 ice cream cones, then Daddy tasted Kate's and so we shared a cone.  The kiddy cone was a 2 scooper for $2!  So $6 later, we were happy and on our way again!

Tradition is that you wave until you can no longer see those that are departing.  L added his "BYE" to that as well, I think the whole neighbourhood knew we were leaving :)

Purchased some bulk food on the way home to stock up our bare pantry at home, but that doesn't count as a travelling expense, so I won't include it.  Really nice to be able to get some cheaper groceries than at home where a lot of things are priced double.  yikes.

SO, there you have it!  Thiessen Travelling Times on a budget and lots of fun!
Total cost of trip   $666.87.  Minus fuel gift certificates, saved up money, lottery ticket $370
Total holiday cost out of pocket $296.87  ~  WOW.

God is still so funny ~ and still so good!

My oh my!

Today is a great day!  So many things in life are uncontrollable, and that is what it is ~ we are little people on a huge planet, made for God's companions.  Lots of aspects of my life right now and unpredictable.  I have been trying to relax and enjoy how God works and to leave everything in His hands.  I have been feeling the emptiness of not being able to "serve" God in other areas besides my family/home.  I have just returned from another 2.5 days helping in the kitchen at a local Bible camp for kids.  OH the joys of constant busyness and making litres of whipped cream, dozens of cookies and muffins and hundreds of pancakes!  I enjoyed little visits with people of all ages and walks of life.  So many foster children volunteering on the "work crew" and doing an absolute awesome job (even though some had never cut a watermelon before!).  Life is good.  I feel good helping others.  It was great and I know my Mom will enjoy helping in August.

AND today ~ my list is very very long.
1.  Figure out why our internet is hardly ever working.  On the phone for 1.5 hours with 2 different technicans and have a diagnosis.  It is our wireless router.  Now I can pay bills, surf and such is a time friendly manner again!  YEAH!  I also learned how to empty  my browser history and temporary files.  GOOD.
2. Phone BC Health again and ask about premium assistance and if we will be getting a retro-payment.  WE ARE!  It will be enough to cover our basic expenses for 1 month!  YEAH YEAH
3. Figure out how we are going to make it to our big family reunion this July...#2 has really come in handy to solve that! Also received Shell gas coupons in the mail that I had redeemed Air Miles points for.  That helps with gas.  ALSO received some samples in the mail...deorderant, body wash, shampoo/conditioner, etc all in little containers!  Perfect for camping!  HA HA.  GOD loves to make me laugh!
4. Someone that owes us a fair chunk of money phoned today and hopefully the money will show up soon (or at least some of it).  I can always hope and pray for that.  That is really needed right now.

So today my girls and I will be searching on line (with a speedy connection) for fun things to do between us and our reunion that I can use up $120 of homeschool money for.  We're thinking my childhood dream "Enchanted Forest" or the Zoo, Heritage Site or Callaway Park.  It will depend which one has some coupons available on line.  VERY EXCITING!  So even though we're not knowing where the next day's bread is coming from, we will be able to take some time with our girls this summer and attend the reunion and maybe even do something fun.  God is so good.  So today God I'm smiling and laughing at your sense of humor and being encouraged by your loving care of your little ones.

God is so funny ~ and good!

So, well, me and my man have a bit of a daily routine going to and from work.  We stop at "Share Sheds" along the way.  I should take a picture of one.  In BC, almost every dump yard has one.  It is a shed where anyone can put their "someone may still use this" type items.  So we try to stop on the way home from work each day, check it out.  Not quite like dump running in Oak Lake, but it will suffice.
In my last post I was at wits end with growing children and clothes that fit and timelines in which to fill their lists of needs with little or no money involved.

So yesterday we popped by a share shed and Gregg plunked a garbage bag of clothes into the trunk for further inspection on the way home.

WHAT A FIND!

Mei now has
 A. Speedo swimsuit (her's split)
B. little brown sweatpant shorts
C. Swim shirt (Roxy)

Kate will have:
2 more pairs of pants (hopefully)
1 nice Nike sport bra
a couple shirts

Jo know owns
LU LU LEMON sweats!   Oh my!  They are the bomb!  SOOOO comfy and nice and wonderful.  I feel so rich!  Maybe I'll post a picture of those later.
Also some hiking type/sport type shirts, sweats, pants AND the pair of Penguin Flannel PJ's I wanted this past Christmas!

So, Christmas came in July for us and I am feeling so happy about how God laughs and says "here you go, stop worrying, I've got you!"  So we laughed.  And gave thanks for a God with a sense of humor and even one that threw in the pengiun pj's for kicks.