Just In Case You Wondered....

WE'RE ALIVE!!!!!

I know it has been far too long since we've done a blog post! But I do have good reasons, if you'd like to hear some excuses:

#1. A market-garden leaves pinched time for blogging
#2. Blogger has been acting up--I had a post all set with pictures and everything, but it posted it funny and I had to take it off. It wouldn't work no matter what! :P
#3. Nasty little voles are eating our potatoes
#4. It's been rather hot--very counter-productive to inspiration. :D

So that's my sorry little apology. Let's be friends now, okay? ;) Wow! So I realized that it's been a long time since we've posted about ourselves. So you all must be wondering, "What on earth have they been up to? Rachel never even posted the second part of her farm blog posts, and no hair tutorials have come up." Or else you've ceased wondering about us and have taken us off your sidebar. Please put us back. We're sorry. ;)
*ANY*way. I first off wanted to share the very exciting news with you that we have launched the website for Taste and See Family Farm! It all feels so official and tidy now! Thanks Matthew and Uncle David! :) Go check it out! It's really cool! :) *Exciting!*
I won't go into details right now, but as far as our day-to-day life goes, we've been rather "Nose to the grindstone" on account of the garden popping and having deadlines for co-ops and farmers markets and everything else! :) Extremely busy--I'd appreciate your prayers for Mama, because as tired as we are at the end of the day, she's ten times more so since she's eight months pregnant! We are trying to spare her the heaviest work, but she's still working harder than most women at this point in their pregnancies! Baby will have a good work ethic from the start, I guess! :D I talked about our schedule a little bit in the Large Family Logistics post awhile back...

But enough about the garden. At nearly 10 p.m. we've all payed our dues for the day! Benji and I were harvesting a huge laundry basket full of potatoes for the market today and were dismayed to find we had to throw out 30 of the hugest ones because voles had gotten to them. I think it's time for an outside cat--what say you? :P

On a lighter note, Gracie said something really funny the other day:
I was in the other room and heard her calling me.

*Grace*: "Raaachel!"
*Me*: "Yeah?"
*Grace*: "Guess who I'm gonna marry--him!" *points to a picture of Michael W. Smith on a flier*
*Me*: "Why would you want to marry him?"
*Grace, with a charming smile*: "Because he's handsome and he doesn't smell like tuna-fish."

Randomness is hilarious. Especially when it comes from a 4 year-old. :D
Also, my graduation is set for July 16th and I am informed I have to give a speech.
Me....and a speech...
Me...in front of 200+ people.....
*dies of embarassment* So could ya'll pray for peace of mind for me? I think I'll faint. I'm planning on it. And Abigail promises she'll drag me over the the rain barrel and dunk me in to revive me, and then I can go on and read my speech anyway. What a good friend. ;)
So.....hope this caught you guys up on everything going on! Have a great night! :) <3 ~Rachel

P.S. Blogger is still acting up and won't let me upload pictures! Or let me off of italic after I've pushed it... >:[ Anybody have any advice on this? :/

Anti-Complacency- Living Life To the Hilt

"The complacency of fools destroys them." Prov. 1:32

A few weeks ago I was stuck a bit in a rut of complacency. I had stopped trying to grow in hard areas because I was "better than most". I had become comfortable in where I was, and complacent in the way I was living. I was doing fabulous things compared to the world's standards, but I knew it was not my personal best. Then I read Alex and Brett Harris' Do Hard Things and the Lord convicted me of my complacency. Actually, His hand was in it from the very beginning, because I won that book in a blog giveaway. Never believe "luck" has anything to do with anything. :) Here is a particular passage of the book that struck home hard:

"Complacency is a blight that saps energy, dulls attitudes, and causes a drain on the brain. The first symptom is satisfaction with things as they are. The second is rejection of things as they might be. "Good enough" becomes today's watchword and tomorrow's standard.
Complacency makes people fear the unknown, mistrust the untried, and abhor the new. Like water, complacent people follow the easiest course--downhill. They draw false strength from looking back. "

I don't mind telling you that I was drawing false strength from looking back. And it *was* effecting my life. I found my attitude going on a downhill course when it was time to "do hard things". I stopped trying for my best, and fell into the next consequence of complacency: Self-pity.
I glued my eyes to the other side of the fence and feasted on the sight of the green grass over there, while neglecting to see all the blessings the Lord has given me.
Over these past few weeks the Lord has been helping me, guiding me, and giving me strength to keep my attitude in check, and do the hard things that need doing. This does include running Taste and See Family Farm--a daunting task at times.
It's amazing how the hard things become more attractive when we are no longer viewing them through complacency-fogged lenses.
Below is my newest "Anti-Complacency Manifesto", as I call it. :)

"Wherever you are, be all there. Live to the hilt every situation you believe to be the will of God."
-Jim Eliot

It's not always easy going, but I am determined, with God's help, to live to the hilt every situation He puts in front of me. It's the only way to do it. :) And here comes the funny part of this rambling post....(yes, I have been keeping track of the polls and finding "humorous posts" has the lead ;)

Living life to the hilt is a picture of sword-fighting, is it not? I thought so.

And um....when you've stabbed something to the hilt of your sword, generally that means you have run it through, bled it's life's blood....in effect killed it....right?

Mmhmm.

I went out to the garden today in the most content frame of mind with that wonderful quote ringing through my thoughts like a beam of golden hope for my day. All the tilling I did on Friday in the garden had crusted over. It would have to be done again. A whole afternoon virtually wasted last week. But I had no such thoughts. I was determined that I would serve my family and my God by having a servant's heart and living this situation to the hilt.

I started the tiller. I tilled a looooonnnggg, wide row. And half of another.

I lived it to the hilt all right. Killed it dead. Ahem.

I guess I should 'fess up. Unbeknowst to me, the entire row had been planted Saturday while I was gone.

I sure did a thorough job of it. Ruined all that work, (which we have no seeds to replant) while trying to live life to the hilt. *sigh* Just as I thought I was learning something. ;)

-Rachel

Taste and See Family Farm Pt. 1

I promised that I'd do a post about the launching of our new family business: Taste and See Family Farm. ( I drew the image for the logo, and Sarah did all the graphics designing :)
We are doing this business with the Walkers, (our cousins- think the "mysterious Matthew" :P ) as a way to use our land profitably. The vision is to grow produce and flowers to sell at farmers' markets, co-ops, and other venues like that. So we have set out to do just that. Dad hauled loads and loads and loads of cotton tailings from the cotton gin down the road to use as fertilizer in the garden. Then he tilled up around 2 acres of land. Now keep in mind that it is advisable that one adult keep up with 1/2 acre of land, full time. So we have a garden that would keep 4 adults occupied full time. Needless to say, that keeps us on our toes, seeing as we already have a landscape business, and a house to run! :P
The flowers for cutting and selling are down at the Walker's land, and the vegetables are up here with us. But before we could do any sort of "in the ground" planting, though, we had to start seeds inside.
So into channel trays and 512's (meaning a flat with 512 cells) we planted flower seeds, some herbs, and tomatoes and peppers. In our house alone, we had over 4,000 plants. Yes, 4,000.

Euphorbia sprouts :p These can make you go temporarily blind if the juice gets in your eye! :P
Once the plants got their first set of true leaves, we had to transplant them into new flats- 72's. (72 cells per flat) So we'd go along the channel trays and 512's with little skewers and prick out the seedlings, transfer them to the 72's and so on.

This is Leah, Mama, Anna, and I pricking out some seedlings in the dining room.

My hand- see how tiny the seedlings are! They often grow in clumps, and you have to separate them!

We are getting to be prime little Latin scholars, rattling off lists of plant names as if they were the times tables! :P

Stay tuned for Part Two- We'll tell you about the growth and hardening off of all the plants....and how you direct seed flowers about the size of a grain of salt- by hand! :P

More Complicated Than You'd Think....

We have been doing a lot of work in the garden recently, due to the fact that between the Walkers and ourselves, we've started a market-gardening venture on our land. We'll post more fully about that at some point! :) Anyway, today we spent all day out in the garden, and my job was to finish twining the peas on the trellis and to spray all the peas, the onions, the radishes, and the turnips with this:

Okay....so maybe not literally. More like this:

Fish Emulsion smells just like a fishing tackle box with rotting fish inside. :) But it's amazing for the garden, so I devoted myself to spraying all the plants with it. I ended up drenched and smelling like chum myself. :P So after my job was done I ran inside, scrubbed myself in the shower and, still smelling like a fish, (though a clean fish) I am writing this blog post. :)

The main point of this post was to show you something I have learned this year in the garden. Pay close attention...

This is earth

This is soil

This is dirt.

Got it? If you didn't, go back and read that part over again.

Now, you may be wondering why I posted three of the same photos. Let me explain. If you are Mary Lennox of The Secret Garden,  or perhaps another British person, that handful of sediment is earth. 

"Might I have a bit of earth?" :)

Take the same handful of sediment and if you are an educated person filling trays to do something like this...

Chances are....it's soil.

And if that self-same sediment falls on the floor and you have to sweep it up... in the space of three seconds you have suddenly become acquainted with the last persona of the sediment: 

Dirt.

Now do you have it? :) You'll know you're a real gardener when you can simply take stock of your surroundings and be able to tell just which that handful of sediment is. ;) ~Rachel