Preserving the Harvest - Drying Tomatoes

Put some parchment paper on the bottom of a rimmed cookie sheet. Slice your tomatoes, about a half inch slices. Spread them in one layer on the baking sheet. Sprinkle with coarse salt, some fresh ground pepper, and add some basil from the garden. (Basil not necessary, but it sure looks pretty and tastes amazing...)


Set your oven to a low temp...I did these tomatoes at 200 degrees.


200 degrees for "up to" twelve hours. It is the "up to" that will get you, if you aren't careful. This particular day, the humidity was very, very low for my area for this time of year. So this batch of tomatoes only took about three hours! But it can take up to twelve.


All the moisture will dry out, and the tomatoes will shrink and darken. By the time they are done, they will be akin to tomato "chips"...almost crispy. Their flavor is intense, but delicious. You want them to be quite dry, but not burnt. They should peel off the parchment paper pretty easily.


Store these dried tomatoes in a freezer bag, and put them in your freezer. They are great for pizza, for homemade herb breads like foccacia, and soups. They retain their intense flavor and all their vitamins for about six months.


And now, for your viewing delight, I toss in yet another totally unrelated, cute grandson picture:

Be. Still. My. Heart.

Words...Worn

Most of you know - I am all about words. I decorate my home and I garnish my inner world with the best of them.

And now...I decorate myself and others with words!

This is my demo - my very first bracelet. Hannah has already claimed it as her own, and she says she'd buy more. I trust her fashion sixth sense. If Hannah loves it, others will too.

I will be designing different widths of bracelets, different words, different colorways, some with embellishment, some not.

This very first demo is a hand sewn bracelet, with antiqued metal closures on the other side (OOPS! I'll get a picture of the pretty clasp, when I put one like this up in my shop. When I finally get my shop up and running, that is.) The "Grace" bracelet is hand embroidered (by me) on burlap (burlap won't fray, because of the special sewing treatment I gave it) , and the embroidered burlap is attached securely to the fabric bracelet. The fabric for this bracelet is in a mustard yellow/teal blue colorway.

More ideas and designs are on the way....even a few collections are in the works - a "Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter" collection of four, a Christmas holiday collection, a Good Word collection(based on a Scripture), a French collection, a Romantic collection, perfect for Valentines, and a colorway collection.

I am having such fun designing and creating these. I'll let you know when I have hand- sewn enough of these bracelets (and other things!) to put up a little online shop. I already own the domain I've chosen - I just wish very much that I had the computer skills to design a nice, marketable website...if anyone knows of a web designer who charges reasonable prices, do let me know!

My Grandbay-bay is Eight Months Old

...above, you see his seven month picture...and below, his picture from today:


He's been eight months old for some days, now, but his momma has been busy. Today was his eight month picture day, and we could. not. keep. him. still.

Those two up there? They are both my cuties. I love them beyond words.

I am sloppy blessed...or, in King James English, "my cup runneth over."

My Morning at the Farmer's Market

It was a beautiful morning today, so I decided to go to our city's downtown area and visit the farmer's market. At the last minute, Hannah and grandson decided to load up with me and come along.

After about an hour of fresh air and sunshine, Little Britches was done.



Solid gone.

So. Many. People. They stopped on a dime, right in their tracks, to admire his napping cuteness.

Can you even stand it?

Me neither.

Play Hurt

As I sit down in front of this little netbook tonight, I'm thinking about the phrase, "Play Hurt".

My son Isaac is near-legendary for playing his basketball through an injury. He twisted his ankle in a game last year, and played the whole game. He contracted mono last summer, lost about 15 pounds, and couldn't get his strength back. He kept coming down with flu after flu last winter, and still played his heart out, every game. He played a couple of games with a high fever.

Then, he sprained an ankle in a national tournament this past March...and...you guessed it. He played hurt. And won a game for his team. He recently sprained his other ankle (badly) and has gone back to work (roofing!) before it has had a chance to completely heal. He will be okay - it is good for him to, within reason, learn that life is about "Playing Hurt".

It is particularly true of church life...of life in Christ. Every great man or woman of God has to "play hurt". Church life, as my Preacher said this past Sunday, is not all warm fuzzies. People hurt you. Oh Lawdy-Lawd, do they ever hurt you.

David said, "Let the righteous smite me...it won't kill me." (My paraphrase).

People who whine about being hurt by the church have come to the wrong blog for sympathy. Join the club, my friend.

And play hurt.

You do not have to wait until you are all 'specially healed up and whole to serve God and love His people. You don't have to wait till you feel all better to obey God in the Next Thing, and tend your relationships. You don't have to wait for a feeling to go fix your relationships. You just drag that donkey-butt back to the church you last left, and you forgive and you forge ahead.

This life is war, friend. Spiritual war. The war is out there. I do not care how hurt you have been by your church experience, I am here to tell you, the worst day in His house is better than a thousand good days anywhere else. The devil is out to kill, steal, and destroy...the body of Christ is simply human and fallible.

Please, please lose the notion that the saints are out to get you. There are some mean people, some sorry saints, in every church...but by and large, you are not their first target, you won't be their last, and they don't fall asleep dreaming of ways they can harm you, because you are simply not that important to them, and that is part of the problem. If you were more important to them, they'd be hurting you differently, but they'd still hurt you from time to time.

Let them smite me. When it is all said and done, the proof is exactly this: they will be the ones to leave, and I will still be right here, shot through but still loving The Bride. Me? I play hurt, baby.

I can say this, just now, because I'm in my happy place. No one at all has hurt me lately. No one has left in a wrong way, in fact some have been added...and added back. Church life is good for me, these days.

To get to the good days...the precious stuff...you have to play through the pain.

Play Hurt. Your team is counting on you.

Dedicated to Matt and Kelly Bailey

"Five good children are an immense luxury, and to deny one's self other luxuries in order to raise them is not self-denial at all, but merely an intelligent choice of investment."

--Edward Sandford Martin, The Luxury of Children (1904)

~~~~~~~

Yeah. The Baileys are expecting! That would bring the Harvest Baby Total up to....

seven. Not even kidding you. Seven. I dance. I spin. I clap like a child. Children are a reward, and so Harvest and her families must be overflowing with divine favor. This grace-message is proving itself to be extremely pleasing to the Father.

I Want

I want...what do I want? It is important to know.

I want to dwell in possibility.

I want to inspire you. ("others" is too generic and remote for me. I want to inspire you.)

I want to be inspired.

I want to be able to use a Tan Towel without streaking myself.

I want to behold the beauty of the Lord and to inquire every single day in His temple.

I want to live in the reality of Christ in me, Christ as me.

And Oh. Mah. Weeeerd. I want a zoom lens.

I want to worry less and take joy more.

I want to let go of what is out of my control anyway. And that would be almost everything in life besides what I wear tomorrow.

I want to cling tightly to grace.

I want a different car. Didn't used to. Now I do. Now that my Preacher has his new truck, I'm smitten with the ardent desire to drive something decent. And for me, that would still be something older, but older on purpose...older for a reason...older by choice. Hmmmm. Kind of like me. I'm so stinking proud that I am finally a grandmother, and it is my choice to embrace it.

The very idea of a "hot car", with any woman over 40 at the wheel, just makes me smirk. My son's young girlfriend drives a Mustang, for crying out loud, and she looks adorable behind the wheel, and that car is perfect for her. She gains major cool-points for driving it. Me? I'm forty plus. I'd lose major cool points, by trying too hard. I can't do the "I-drive-this-because-I-can-and-I-need-for-you-to-think-I'm-still-hot" car. I'd rather eat dirt and die. But pay no attention to me. I don't know anything.

I heart the older Volvo station wagons!


Hear me out. Someday I'll find me one, all boxy-looking and in perfect shape, white or black, and she shall become mine. It's an "intellectual-but-cool-and-good-looking-in-an-elegant-40-something-way"chick thing. I love the idea that I drive the car I inherited from my grandmother. That's the vibe I'm going for. I'm weird like that. I do all my own psychoanalyzation, because to be analyzed by others gets tedious and boring. And the results are nearly always inaccurate.

It goes all the way back to the TV show "Judging Amy". Plus, I would still need the sort of vehicle that I can toss all my antique store finds in. Something besides a green mini van. Amen.

I want to be more like Jesus. And I know...after that rant about middle aged women and their image cars, you don't believe me. But I do. I really do.

I want to be a Barnabus Friend, a Paul Mentor of young Timothys, and to be Jesus' John the Beloved. To lay my head upon His breast.

I want dark chocolate.

I want to see even more souls saved.

I want to be out of debt, and for the Vols to win the SEC championship - both things this year, by some miracle, pleaseGod.

I want more of God's glory on full display in my life, and I want to laugh with a best girlfriend until my eyes pop out of my skull and my very life passes before my eyes, which will make me laugh even harder.

I want to grow old with my peeps - all my family, grandchildren present and grandchildren to be. All of Harvest Church present, all of Harvest Church to be. My vision encompasses the years and the generations like that.

I want crab legs. Right now.

I want Sarah Palin to be Chris Christie's Vice President.

I want either Peyton Manning or Tim Tebow to play for a Superbowl ring this year.

I want to shut up now, because you want me to shut up now.