Burdock and B&W

David is my accident prone child, I have had him in the ER 3-4 times. He had a needle in his knee, a sledding accident where he split his eyelid, damage to his eye from playing in the creek and now his latest.. Which thankfully did not send us to the ER.

We were mowing our neighbors yard, we had two mowers running with everyone alternating turns on the mower. While on his break, David decided to explore the woods.

Suddenly he comes screaming to where I was mowing, blood flowing from his foot. It was an awful lot of blood, considering it was his foot. I had him take his shirt off  and used it to apply pressure to stop the bloodflow.  When I finally examined at the wound I was surprised to see only a small but very deep puncture wound.  Thankfully he had been wearing his barn boots, I hate to imagine what could have happened had he been barefoot.

I cleaned his foot up and had him sit until we were done. When we came home, I carefully cleaned it. But didn't really think to much about it, until the next morning when he complained of it hurting.  Suddenly I realized that this was RUSTY old fence that he had stepped on.. Rusty.. Fence.. Puncture wound... I should probably be taking extra precautions. Especially since there was now some swelling and yet the tiny surface cut was healing shut.

I called his Dr to see if he was uptodate on his tetanus shot. Then I called the B&W lady. She is a local mennonite lady that does the burn and wound treatments for hospitals.

She loves, loves working on people and I have seen the results of her burn care.
She was happy to see us that afternoon. Her whole family gathered round to take a look at his foot.

She wrapped him up and send some extra supplies home with us.  I dropped David off at VBS with his foot wrapped up in burdock leaves. When he came home it looked soo much bettter all the swelling was gone, but there was still a small red mark. 

Crappy picture but it was late and I was tired.. the little white mark is where the fence went into his foot.

First I boiled the burdock leaves in hot water..

Then I carefully wrapped them around is foot..

3 leaves

I am def not a nurse..

I finished it off by wrapping  it in gauze  and a stretch wrap.

He went to sleep with this on. 10 hrs later, I took all the wrapping off and found the foot perfectly fine. No swelling, no redness and very little pain. So I applied the homemade salve and a gauze for the day.

I love finding ways to protect my kids without it affecting their bodies. This was a natural product that was easy to use and made a big difference for him.

Friday Encouragement

Today hug your kiddoes, look them in the eye, listen to their stories and remind them that you love them. 

Love them enough to teach them, to correct them, to tell them about Jesus, teach them to care about others!  

Because someday they will be gone. Someday they will be the ones making decisions about your care. :)

Create in me a pure heart, O God,

    and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

11 Do not cast me from your presence

    or take your Holy Spirit from me.

12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation

    and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,

    so that sinners will turn back to you.

14 Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God,

    you who are God my Savior,

    and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.

15 Open my lips, Lord,

    and my mouth will declare your praise.

16 You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;

    you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.

17 My sacrifice, O God, is[b] a broken spirit;

    a broken and contrite heart

    you, God, will not despise.

Zucchini: cooking for a big family on a budget

 Feeding growing boys and keeping a clean house with lots of kids are both endless tasks.
A friend gave me a couple zucchinis. I decided to see how many different ways I could cook zucchini.

This was our #2 favorite. Zucchini personal pizzas. I brushed the zucchini with oil and grilled one side. After I flipped them I added garlic salt, cheese, pepperoni sausages and pizza sauce! I grilled them for almost 15 minutes! They were so yummy!

I buy shredded mozzarella in bulk, 10 lb bags at a time. I take each bag and divy it out into small freezer bags!
I make my own pizza sauce from local tomatoes.
The sausages were from a foster parent food program. One of those weird foods that require great creativity to use up!
I have also made large batches of gluten free zucchini bread (not cheap, even when you buy in bulk).
I have made zucchini with butter, garlic salt and cheese. I have made zucchini with butter and garlic salt. Sauted, grilled and baked....

I also made zucchini patties with eggs and cheese... Zucchini pizza crust was another hit with the kids.


I currently have 6 zucchini's needing attention. Elizabeth is going to shred 4 of the larger ones and freeze the zucchini in large baggies. The 2 largest ones will be more pizza!

VBS

I am extremely paranoid about where I leave my kids. I am extremely picky with sitters and even people I know who are left alone with my kids. They have had to many bad things happen already and I will do my absolute best to protect them. Bad things happen everywhere. Pedophiles can pass background checks. Our children are vulnerable.  I could tell you stories that would stop you from ever letting your kids go anywhere without you.

However, I can not expect my children to live in a protective bubble all their lives. They need to practice using the skills I have taught them. I need to trust as they get older that they will be able to protect themselves and that God will give them wisdom when I am not around.

So yea, things like camp and VBS are hard for me. I want them to participate, I want them to enjoy these things. Yet I can't just drop my kids anywhere.

The other problem is that it is a royal pain for me to load and unload the littles alone, 5 nights a week for traditional VBS. For the record, there are atleast one vbs every week in this general area in the summer time.

MY kids are all into the spy thing and investigating things.  So when I saw the ad in the local paper, international spy academy and it was 1.5 hrs on Friday, 5 hrs on Saturday and 2.5 hrs on Sunday. Now this was my kinda VBS.

I signed the kids up and got permission for me to stay for the Friday evening event. I generally trust my gut when meeting people. My mother instincts are rarely wrong, so spending the evening Friday would be a good indication of what to expect or if I could trust my kids all day on Saturday.

When we arrived Friday evening, we were pleasantly surprised to see our friends from church were also there! They knew most everyone at this church. That really set my mind at ease.

We were pleasantly welcomed and the kids were thrilled to be there. I sat in for the first introduction part. I had the two littles with me. Nesiah was happily welcomed. Many people took time to stop and say hi to both her and I. (this is unusual in many churches) They welcomed me to help Nesiah participate.

The weekend was a great success and the kids made many wonderful memories and new friends!

Babysitting...

It has been a crazy week, just coming back from vacation. I had agreed to babysit for my friend. She has twin 7 yr olds and a 3 yr old.  The kids were looking forward to swimming and hanging out with their friends.

But first we had some work to do... Food for the crew!

David made yummy fiber balls. Each child has one thing that is sorta their "speciality" and fiber balls is his.

Lots of honey and peanut butter, mixed with oatmeal and chocolate chips. 

Mix it all together and form into balls before placing in freezer.  This is one of our favorite treats. Gluten free and honey as the sweetener! 

Lee helped David finishing making the balls after making his own pumpkin custard.

Pumpkin Custard is Lee's speciality and he makes THE BEST!! Once again, a low sugar and gluten free treat! (this was the only picture I got) 

We had a ton of extra milk so Elizabeth made a double patch of gluten free pancakes for the freezer! Her little friend helped mix them. They had fun and we had 2 meals for the freezer!! 

                                         

After finishing up the 3 food projects, we had lunch and then the real fun began!! 

There was swimming and horse back riding, grooming and more swimming...

This is classic of our summer days work projects in the morning, swimming or reading in the afternoon.  It is amazing the amount of work my 4 oldest can get done in a short amount of time.  

Friday Encouragement..

Father God, I praise your name. I praise you for your strength, for your provision.  God I praise you for carrying me through the storms and through the dark valleys. You are my strength when I am weak. You are my all in all.

Thank you God for being the father of the fatherless and the defender of the widow. Thank you for making that promise a reality in my life. Thank you for giving me wisdom, discernment and patience.

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Homemade goodies... chinese food and yogurt... clash of cultures.

Some days are just crazy busy. We didn't have much planned but things just added together to make it busy.
Elizabeth made homemade strawberry lemonade. The kids love this!! We used 3 lemons, a bag of frozen whole strawberries and half a cup of raw sugar, add in a gallon of water. 

My friend owns an acre of strawberries. She gave us permission to come pick all we wanted. The kids were not impressed. We made a game of it, every time someone would complain, someone else would say "strawberry smoothies", strawberries and pancakes", "strawberry pie"... and everyone would go back to picking. 

Love technology. These guys were not motivated to clean strawberries, but some www.hiskids.net motivated them to keep working...
They cleaned strawberries, while I mashed them and dished them into freezer containers.

We get our milk from a neighbor. She called to tell me they had extra milk available. I decided to try homemade yogurt again, since she had 3 gallons for less then $2 a gallon! The first gallon didn't turn out so well, hopefully I can try again today.
I also want to try making homemade butter with some of the rich yellow cream! 

My kids love Chinese food, but it is expensive to purchase for my entire crew!
So I have a new challenge. Find the perfect recipes for homemade chinese. 

The chicken was easy. Chicken nuggets ($3 for 10 lb bag from local bent and dent)
Barbecue Sauce (1 bottle .99) plus a splash of local honey.
I baked the chicken nuggets and cooked the sauce. Then I mixed the chicken nuggets into the sauce. It WAS AMAZING! 

Then I made the BEST chicken fried rice EVER! The kids think it was almost as good as restaurant chinese.
I had leftover rice, (25 lb bag for $5 at bent and dent) which I fried in butter. I added to cubes of chicken buillion and 1 cup of peas from my garden. I fried it all together then when it was almost done, I added 2 scrambled eggs (from our chickens)

 

Day 5, sick kids and a long drive home

Thursday night I finally slept all night. I woke up feeling refreshed and relaxed. We had to do breakfast without our STM's. We headed out early in hopes of beating the crowds so that breakfast would be more manageable. Thankfully it went well.

I was feeling relaxed and refreshed so I decided to stay for the daily worship, then head to the balcony for one last quiet time before packing up. I had packed a bit that morning so that I could have more free time.

I had my coffee in hand,  kids all settled in, ready to enjoy worship...

and here comes David and T. Sad eyes met mine...

The dreaded words, Mom, I just threw up.

And just like that vacation was OVER.

We loaded up the van while the kids finished their programing.  I met the rest of the kids at the closing ceremony and informed them, no more. We were leaving as soon as it was over. No lunch or final good byes.

We loaded puke buckets in with our luggage and headed home.

The final results, the kids had a grand time. I had a nice break from cooking and daily routines!

Day 4, carnivals and talent shows...

Finally a good nights sleep. I spend about an hour walking before bedtime, but the rest of the night was totally uneventful and everyone slept until 7 am.

Day 4 was a fun day for the kids! We had our regular breakfast together followed by worship time. After worship time was the ladies tea, which I was unable to attend. The kids had their regular programming followed by lunch then THE CARNIVAL!

Day 4 was a rough day for me.  I spend some time in my room watching a movie while little ones napped.  Then I hung out in the lobby chatting with random people.  I did eventually join the big kids at the Carnival, which had been moved inside due to the rain. The kids were having a total blast as usual!

They had all kinds of fun things for the kids to do!

There were dress up clothes...

A huge bounce house!

There was face painting

The kids had been begging me to take them kayaking! I promised we would go kayaking and to the snack shop for ice cream during our family time.

They had so much fun in the boats and the kayaks.

Even our friend Joan joined in the fun!

Lee helped her paddle her boat loaded with kids!

We ended the day with chicken barbecue and a talent show!

The talent show is my favorite part of the week! So awesome!

The Captians... 4 of my kiddoes were in this group! Thank you Captain Bridget! 

KAOS, This was Lee's group. It was so perfect for him! 

She sang a beautiful song in spanish! 

Another beautiful song was sung. (my tired brain does not remember what it was) 

Another group singing... 

The Burghart girls! Love watching them perform!