Pruned Again

It was a couple of weeks after we decided as a family that we wanted to actually pursue trying to find land together.  We had looked at two houses, and I had spent I-don't-want-to-admit-how-many hours poring over houses on the internet trying to find options that would suit us.  Then I found it.  THE house.  I knew the moment I saw the listing that it was perfect.  It was in the area of town that we thought we were going to focus on, it had enough bedrooms and bathrooms for all of us, 10 acres, a barn, the price was right, and...it had a pool.  I was sold.  As soon as we possibly could, we scheduled a visit with our realtor, Randy.  Our excitement only grew as the drive out took less time than Google maps predicted - about 15 minutes.  My mom fell in love with the neighborhood on the drive in, and when we got there, not only did it have a pool, it had a windmill!  Sustainability, here we come!  We then proceeded to pester our poor realtor for any drop of information we squeeze out of him.  You see, the property was bank owned and was being sold using an auction system.  We couldn't just make an offer.  We soon learned that the day we saw it was just couple of days after an auction for the property had ended.  Then we learned that a bid had been accepted.  The house had sat vacant for four years with no acceptable offers.  Then, just a couple of days before we saw it and fell head over heels, an acceptable offer was made before we even had a chance to do anything.  My heart knew that God had saved us from moving somewhere He didn't want us.  My emotions were an.gry. and accused Him of teasing.

At the beginning of each new year our congregation spends a week in fasting and prayer, seeking the Lord for the theme He wants to emphasize to us.  I get to design the graphic, and at the end of the week we have a celebration banquet where our theme for the new year is presented.  It took a couple of weeks, but He was faithful to gently remind me of our theme for the year: God Present: Pruning and Producing.  "He cleanses and repeatedly prunes every branch that continues to bear fruit, to make it bear more and richer and more excellent fruit."  John 15:2b.

Ouch.  We'd been pruned.  

Our appetites had been whetted, though, and we spent the next 3 months house hunting once, sometimes twice a week.  It took 3 months of intensive hunting for us to find another place worth putting an offer on.  This house was completely different but just as exciting to us.  Once again, about 15 minutes away in a part of town we discovered we liked even more.  There are trees!  It was a steel building someone had turned into a home overlooking a stocked pond.  If you know my dad very well, you know what a big deal that is.  We were just as excited about this place as the last place, and we've spent the last two weeks working really hard to get our house ready to put on the market so we could make an offer. There were unique circumstances surrounding this house that made it difficult to sell, so we weren't too worried about time. 

Today we learned that it's now off the market.  We don't know the details yet...our realtor is in New Zealand for two weeks (totally jealous, by the way).

Pruned again.  Pruning doesn't feel good, and no one ever asks the plant if it wants to be pruned...how it feels about being pruned.  The Vinedresser, in His wisdom, simply does what He knows must be done.  

The good news is, there will be fruit.

-Kendra

Experiments in Soap Making: Homemade Liquid Hand Soap Plus an Unexpected Fringe Benefit

I am on a quest to make everything I possibly can - food, cleaning products, beauty products...I've sewn many of my own clothes for years.  I LOVE to learn, and when I get excited about a new topic, I tend to ravenously devour all the information about it that I can find.  This sustainability project has been no exception.  I've been interested in and working toward modifying the way we eat for a long time...years.  But five months ago, I couldn't have cared less about what I used to clean my sink or moisturize my face.  I mean, I cared, but in the sense of what could I buy at the store that would do the best job?  I wasn't interested in natural or homemade.  They used science to figure all that out, right?  All I had to do was choose the best product.

The more I read, though, the more I like knowing exactly what is in the products I'm using, and the more I stop drinking the marketing kool-aid, so-to-speak.

So.  When I ran out of hand soap in my bathroom, I made my own.  I usually dig around on the internet a bit and read what other people have done, glean from those various sources and then form my own plan.  I was able to make the soap from everything I already had on hand - water, liquid castile soap, and essential oils.  I had purchased some Dr. Bronner's liquid castile soap already to make homemade cleaning products as we ran out.  I had also purchased some essential oils for the same reason.  

I simply rinsed then filled my empty soap dispenser 3/4 of the way full of water, then filled it the rest of the way with liquid castile and several drops of the essential oils I had on hand - tea tree oil, peppermint, and lavender.

It's not a perfect system yet, the soap has the consistency of water, and tends to leak out of the pump whenever I touch it.  My intention is to buy a foaming soap dispenser from Specialty Bottle.  The price is $1.16 (plus shipping), but they are out of stock for the time being.

The reason I am not purchasing a foaming soap dispenser full of soap at the store and using it up is because of the unexpected fringe benefit I discovered when I began using my soap.  I am prone to dry skin.  I always have dry hands, but every winter they crack and bleed and my knuckles get crusty with dry skin (ew, I know)...no matter how much lotion I put on.  When I started using my soap, within a WEEK my hands had completely healed.  No more cracking and bleeding.  No more knuckle crust.  My hands still feel slightly dry (which is now easily remedied by lotion, or my homemade moisturizer which I will post about soon), but my skin looks healthy and smooth.  A fluke?  A coincidence?  No.  I recently went out of town for several days, and it wasn't long before my hands were painfully cracked and bleeding again.  Now that I've been home for a week, once again, healed and smooth!

A side note:  I am sensitive about some things, and you can make your own decision about this, but in the future, I will probably purchase a brand of liquid castile other than Dr. Bronners.  The product is great, and widely recommended; the philosophy of the founder...questionable.  You can read the bottle for yourself and decide what your level of comfort is...but like I said, I'm sensitive, so...  I'm really interested in trying to make my own liquid castile soap someday!  But that is another blog post for another day.

-Kendra

This post shared at Frugally Sustainable's Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways #74