Wednesday, December 28, 2011

First of all, Happy Birthday to my beautiful daughter, Nina!   Love you, Neener Beaner!!
Spent yesterday feeling pretty darn yucky.  It's frustrating because I had great plans to catch up on some things.  But that's okay.  I'm better today.  Not 100%, but at least I can get some things done.

In the spirit of always thinking a season ahead, I made some Valentine soap scented with rose/geranium.  Some are heartshaped and some are slices.  Haven't taken a pic of them yet. 

I also made some tealights for our Etsy shop and for the website.
Here are the Valentine Tealights

 And these are the spring and summer tealights.  They are so much fun to make.  AND Melisa found a ton of tealights at a very good price!!

Well, back to work for me.  Have a great day everyone!!

 

Word of the day:
The Holy Innocents, martyrs - Feast
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 2:13-18.

When they had departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. Herod is going to search for the child to destroy him."
Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt.
He stayed there until the death of Herod, that what the Lord had said through the prophet might be fulfilled, "Out of Egypt I called my son."
When Herod realized that he had been deceived by the magi, he became furious. He ordered the massacre of all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had ascertained from the magi.
Then was fulfilled what had been said through Jeremiah the prophet:
A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamentation; Rachel weeping for her children, and she would not be consoled, since they were no more.

Friday, July 4, 2008

Happy 4th of July all! Sorry about there being no blog entry yesterday. We are still in the process of switching our ISP. I think we have it solved now.

On the lowcarb front:
I am having some serious struggles with staying on plan. I'm not sure exactly what the problem is. There isn't really anything off plan that I really want to eat, but for some reason I am struggling. I don't know if this is a cyclical issue or not. There are times that you just have to keep on keepin' on, and dismantle the critical mind which is trying to sabatog the plan.

On the home front:
No big plans today. Just kickin' back - no routines. I've been puttering. We have a wedding to go to on Saturday and DH asked for a special basket for the couple. So I've been finishing up some personalized Christmas stockings for Dan and Tina, made a farm grubby, and added some odds and ends of special items. I love putting together our primitive gift baskets and the recipients are always thrilled with the unique gifts.




Word of the day:
Matthew 9:9-13
As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax booth; and he said to him, "Follow me." And he got up and followed him. And as he sat at dinner in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came and were sitting with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?" But when he heard this, he said, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners."

Reflections from the cornfield:
One has to wonder exactly who the "sick" are in this passage. The tax collectors and the sinners recognize their need for Jesus, while the Pharisees do not. It seems to me that all of the judgementalism is coming from people whose eyes are blinded by logs, if you get my drift. If ever there were people in need of being told to "get a life" it would be the Pharisees. I find it interesting that the "righteous" Pharisees address the disciples rather than going straight to the source. But, let's be sure, before we criticize that Pharisees, that our own behavior is in order. I would think that little task would keep us fairly busy - too busy to be judging other people.

God bless America!
God bless the troops!

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

On the lowcarb front:
Jamie(Cleochatra) wrote in her Lighter Side of Lowcarb blog about the honeymoon of lowcarbing. Of course that "diet honeymoon" isn't just limited to lowcarb, but the point is that unless we make a lifelong committment to whatever plan we choose, we are going to be continually frustrated in our efforts to get where we want to go.

One of the frequent criticisms of the Atkins lifestyle (and it really should be a lifestyle) is this.
"As soon as you go off it, you'll gain that weight right back." Duh! Can you name me one diet that works when you're not on it?

In today's Word of the day we hear about false prophets. The lowcarb community has a false prophet. Her name is Heidi Diaz and her creed is lowfat, lowcarb, very low calories. I think we've all seen the fruit of that particular prophet's teaching. False prophets succeed because they read people very well and they know how to manipulate them. Thank goodness Kimkins is now being exposed for what it is. And the fruits of Heidi Diaz's proselytizing? Loss of hair, weakness, heart palpitations, thyroid issues, and a whole host of other nasty side effects.

I was pleased to get on the scale this morning and see that the downward movement is continuing. I got on the treadmill at 9:30 and did an interval mix of cardio and weights.

Here are my stats for this morning:
Time: 30 minutes
Average heart rate: 120
Maximum heat rate: 159
Calories burned: 213
I am down 2 pounds from last Wednesday

Not eating at night is a very good thing. Last night's "stay out of the kitchen" project was a batch of Crisp Green Apple jar candles. Of course, I have to test a candle from each batch so the house smells yummy. It's not a tart green apple smell, but more of a sweet tangy scent.

Visited Jamie's blog at the Examiner this morning and found a great recipe for mozzarella sticks using crushed pork rinds. That's one I plan to try this week.

Do any of you do Mypoints? Here's an interesting email I received this morning - I went to the website to collect my 5 points. Here's what I found:

CalTrap is a safe and effective food additive that when sprinkled on your food effectively reduces the amount of calories your body absorbs. The CalTrap program includes a easy to use shaker, 30 on-the-go packets and a handy lifestyle planner.

Reduces caloric absorption of the food you eat
Will not change the taste or texture of the food
Doesn't have the unpleasant side effects associated with fat blockers
Uses an advanced patent pending technologyto deliver amazing results

CalTrap's active ingredient, the Konjac Root is a 100% natural fiber, long recognized for its amazing health benefits and known to be a safe and powerful diet food in its native Japan.The scientists at the American Weight Loss Institute have developed a patent pending method for encapsulating the fiber from the Konjac root to create the world's first clinically proven food sprinkle that actually reduces the calories in the food it is combined with.
Has virtually zero calories
Is an all-natural fiber that’s Generally Recognized As Safe by the FDA
Is known for its ability to reduce cholesterol & blood sugar levels
Because CalTrap is natural and does not work like common fat blockers, it has no harmful side effects and does not cause embarrassing secretions. In fact taking CalTrap is just like switching to a high fiber diet.

Comments anyone?

I visited Jimmy Moore's blog yesterday where he shared some sad news about his brother's declining health. Please, everyone, take a minute today to pray for Kevin and those who love him.

Word of the day:
Matthew 7:15-20
Jesus told the crowds, "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will know them by their fruits."

Reflections from the cornfield:
You know, we can probably all name some pretty famous false prophets. Hitler comes to mind imediately, along with Jim Jones and a few others. I once did a paper on Hitler and some of his tactics were pretty remarkable. He viewed himself as another Messiah. He once wanted to project his image on the side of a mountain, but his advisors talked him out of it saying that it was a bit over the top. For a false prophet to succeed, he or she must have an audience. Hitler's audience consisted of a depressed country looking for new hope. When people have lost hope, they are at their most vulnerable. Hitler did most of his proselytizing to an audience who was hungry and tired. Contrast this to Jesus, who fed the people to whom he preached. Hitler preached hate, Jesus preached love. Thorns and thistles vs. Grapes and figs - God gave us a choice when we were created. Choose wisely.




God bless the troops!

Thursday, May 29, 2008

On the home front:

The temps today are up a little from yesterday. The other night we had to put all of our plants in the garage because there were frost and freeze warnings out. Such is life in Michigan. Tonight, DH declares, we will plant our plants. It's probably a good time for me to take the Christmas garlands off of the front porch. (They have been home to a litter of baby kittens - honest) Also, the Christmas wreath should probably find its way to the burning barrel.

Speaking of burning, as some of you may know, our barn burned down on March 26th. I blogged about it in another blog and then switched hosts and lost the post.







The start











It gets scary here

















We are getting ready to re-build. We will be putting up a tool shed. It's sad that a century old piece of history had to burn. The red barn is the icon of the American farm and the farm family. These old barns and the farm family are quickly disappearing. It's sad to see. This country was built on the principles of hard work and strong families. Progress can sure be a two edged sword.




On the business front:
I am anxiously awaiting summer vacation so I can get my workroom/dungeon in some kind of order. We are going to be featuring the electric heart-shaped grubbies for the wedding season.












I love the electric grubbies. I am one of those people who has a habit of forgetting to blow out candles. It is something I am working on, this forgetting thing that seems to have crept up on me. I have a small blueberry grubby in the bedroom and a small cinnamon one in the living room. Mmmmmmm.












On the Flylady front:
I didn't get any zone work done last night, but I DID get a lot of junk cleaned out of the refrigerator. I hadn't intended to do that last night, but I needed room for some stuff I had prepared and nowhere to put it because precious room was being taken up by stuff that had outlived its right to be there. In typical fashion I thought I had to do the entire fridge if I was going to do any of it. It's that "all or nothing" thing that I am working to overcome. So instead of not cleaning any of the fridge, I now have a half-cleaned fridge. For me it's all about breaking things down into small chunks. I focus much better on small chunks than on the whole big picture. It's the same thing with decluttering the body - which leads me to my next section -

On the lowcarb front:
To continue the "small chunk" theory - I am focusing only on the next five pounds. I actually have yet to hit the first 5 pound segment. I'm trying to decide what my reward will be.