Things have been crazy this month. One thing especially added to the craziness: our rental income. There had been some repairs done on the house that our property manager had neglected to inform us about, and the bills for those came due in July. Not too big a deal, except the check we received was considerably smaller than we anticipated. Had she told us about the repairs, we could have budgeted for the difference. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out like that. It meant that we’d have to come up with the difference from Stephen’s paycheck, making our grocery budget very, very tight for the next few weeks.

Our fifth anniversary is in two weeks, and I was telling someone about our plans (or rather, the lack thereof – we still haven’t decided what to do). I mentioned that whatever we did would have to be low-cost because of finances. You know, the whole “we don’t have a lot of money for groceries so we’re certainly not going to spend a lot on an anniversary when we could buy food with the money instead” line of thought. Our other anniversaries have been during lean times, so to come up with a frugal idea this time was nothing new. We’re used to it, so why complain? Eventually there will be a time when we can spend more money on an anniversary, and we’re looking forward to that time, but that doesn’t mean to get discouraged now.

Well, after that conversation, I pretty much forgot about it, until today.

I went out to get the mail, and there was a check in the mail. This very same person had sent us $100 for grocery money. What a blessing!

What made it even more special to me was the bills I had paid earlier this week. I had paid a bill by direct debit. We had the money in the account, but it was hard for me to pay the bill knowing how little money it would leave for gas and food. I know God said that He would provide, but sometimes it’s still scary to take that step in trusting Him. I think that the Lord specifically moved this person to send us grocery money so that I would have that reminder that He would indeed provide.

Another nice thing: Meijer is having some great sales this week! Yeah!

I just posted this over at the Prairie Homemaker boards, and I thought I’d post it here too for those that wondered how to make good sweet tea.

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How to Make Sweet Tea

We make ours on the stove. Get a small saucepan out and fill it with water. Add 1 full cup of sugar to the pan and put it on the stove to boil. I’ve had it with as much as 2 cups of sugar….I love it that way but that’s way too much sugar for everyday tea.

When it comes to a rolling boil, turn off the burner and drop in 2 family size or 4 regular sized teabags. We usually tie the strings together to make it a little easier to fish them out later. Leave the pot on the burner until the water is nice and dark – maybe 10 minutes or so. We never time that part……sometimes it sits as long as 12 hours…sometimes we use it while it’s still warm.

Pour steeped tea into a gallon pitcher and fill to the top with cold water. If you’re using a glass pitcher, then be very careful as the boiling water can make the glass crack. Remove the teabags. Sometimes, if the tea hasn’t steeped for very long, we leave the teabags in the pitcher so they can steep a little longer.

Some people don’t add the sugar until you fill the pitcher with water, but by adding the sugar at the beginning, it dissolves better and you don’t have to stand there stirring for forever trying to get it to dissolve.

Enjoy!

After some requests for a printable Master Schedule form for the household notebook, I’ve added one. The first time I tried it, it didn’t work, so hopefully this one will be a bit more user-friendly. I’ve also added a Cleaning Schedule form in the same format. With both documents, you print the background page first (a .pdf file), then put it back in the printer, and print the text document over it (Microsoft Word – the document is already formatted to fit the background). The Microsoft Publisher documents are also available for download so those that have that program can use the original forms.

The forms are on my Notebook Forms page.

Two years ago today I accepted Christ as my personal Lord and Savior. I’ll never forget that incredible peace that washed over me that evening at 11:11 p.m. Wow.

After living a pharisaical life of religion, I am constantly amazed at the love and mercy God showed me when He saved me. I don’t deserve it.

You can read my testimony in more detail here.

Check out this post over on Toni’s blog. I watched the video just cracking up! I think I’ve seen it before, but it just gives me a case of the giggles. Stephen isn’t bad at all – sometimes I think he’s even less squeamish than I am! The video is too funny, though.

Oh My Poor Dads

P.S. Don’t forget to turn the sound on!

Today I needed to go to the next town over to pick up a list of landlords for us to call. While I was out I stopped at some garage sales. My best deal was a compound hunting bow for Stephen. He said one similar to it would cost $250 new. We paid $30. It will pay off even further if he can bag a deer with it this hunting season. We love venison, and you sure can’t beat the price.

Our time is nearly up at this house we’re currently living in. The owners have so graciously allowed us to live here rent-free; I cannot even begin to tell what a blessing that has been to us. It allowed us to get back on our feet after the move much more quickly than we could have otherwise.

We’ll be needing to move soon, though. The owners have another family that needs to live here (they’re moving to IN from across the country, just like we did). There’s not a bit of upset or hurt feelings here – we’ve known all along that this house is theirs to do with as they please, and we’ve simply been grateful for every week we’ve been allowed to live here.

So today, I drove to a realtor’s office in town to pick up a list of landlords in the area. We’ve been looking a little bit, but now we’re searching in earnest. I called several of the people this afternoon, and the rest will have to wait until this evening. We have a pretty specific idea of what type of house we need, but we’re not sure how easy they are to find or get into, or if they’re even open at this time or not.

One thing I’m really excited about is that we’re looking to move into town, where we’ll be closer to church. We’ve lived 20 minutes from church for most of our marraige, so the thought of living closer is very exciting. It helps that most of the church family lives in or near town too. :O)

We love to watch fireworks, but we discovered something this year. Little man is deathly afraid of the explosion. It seems that lately any loud noise sends him running for Mama or Daddy. I think he would enjoy seeing the lights, but not the accompanying noise.

Tonight several people in our neighborhood were setting off fireworks. We put Little man in bed a little later than usual (we gave him his bedtime snack late – oops). He was out of bed the instant the door closed behind Stephen when he left for work. I laid him back down. One burst of fireworks across the street sent Little manl crying downstairs to find me.

It would have been fun to go see the display this year, but after the hour and a half of “What’s that?” after each explosion. . .I’m not so convinced it would have been a good idea.

It’s 11:53 p.m. and he’s been quiet for twenty minutes now. Hopefully he’ll actually sleep all night tonight. I should probably go upstairs and go to bed too. . .but I think I’m enjoying the peace and (relative) quiet a little bit too much.

Ok. . .I really will go to bed now. . .

We had quite the storm come through early this morning. I’ve heard loud thunder before, but I don’t know that I’ve ever heard it quite that loud. Wow. It was absolutely incredible! One thunderclap was so loud it rattled windows, and another startled me so much I think I jumped a whole foot into the air, lol! We had company in bed too – Little Man was terrified! We ended up going downstairs to sleep until the storm passed.

That storm must have been right above the house (rather than a little ways away). . .we saw some lightning that we think hit ground nearby. We can’t see anything damaged from here inside the house, but I wonder how the rest of the neighborhood fared. Maybe that warrants a walk to see later today. We’ll see.