You Carried Me

I had the opportunity to read You Carried Me a daughter's memoir this past month. It greatly touched me. It is the story of Melissa Ohden and her mother's botched abortion and how that affected both of their lives.

I am a sucker for memoirs. I love to read about real people and their real lives. It is who I am. As a teen a friend thought I was overly snoopy so as an adult I have tried to moderate that, but I am sure that plays into my love for memoirs as probably my favorite form of literature. So now let me tell you a little about this book.

Melissa grew up in a good home knowing she was adopted but not the details surrounding her birth. How would you tell your precious child that their biological parents had tried to kill them. Not something most of us are equipped to deal with nor sure on how to share. So as a teen she abruptly found out and consequently did not deal with the information well. She lived a very destructive lifestyle while at the same time holding it together enough to finish high school and enter college. At some point she started trying to find her biological parents to find out their story and the why to what happened to her. Through searching for them, being disappointed and finding bits and pieces she began to find forgiveness and peace in her history. She discovered that forgiveness is not just for the offender but also for the offended. It releases some of the pain and hurt you are bearing.

We live in a nation where abortions are encouraged and made to seem insignificant and harmless and that just isn't the case. There are serious negative repercussions to all involved in an abortion. This book isn't preachy but does point those consequences out.

Something I thought was sad and interesting is that people often doubted her story and tried to discredit it. Making her feel as if she was the sinner in the situation. Abortion survivors often don't share that part of their history because of the way they are received when others know.

This was a very well written book with a lot of thought provoking details that will make you think. I highly recommend it!

I received my copy from Plough publishing to read and review the book here on my blog.

Wanderings

Some time this winter we went to the Minnesota Institute of Art. I may be the only person in our family who thinks that place is cool and wants to go there, but I have a bunch of good sports around so they went with me.
We went this time to focus on ancient China history since we were there for a few weeks in our history. They had some videos about that time period we could watch as well. They were pretty neat but lots and long so we only watched a few as there is more to life than sitting in a dark room watching a screen.
Not many can carry off wearing cowboy boots and polyester shorts but my six year old can, and look classily handsome!

We went to the James J. Hill house the other day on a tour. It is quite pretty. Made us house jealous though, their first floor hallway has the same square footage as our whole house, so my men tell me, I didn't do the math. He offered the bishop a quarter of a million dollars in 1876 to not build the cathedral where it is sitting, I guess he thought it would block his view to much. That man was very industrious. 

Part of the servants porch.

Toodle-do,
~Anna

The Doctor is In

Our family took most of the months of October and November to be sick. We weren't flat on our back much of that time we just weren't well. Maybe if we could have just stopped for a week we could have kicked our problems quicker than we did, needless to say we ended up feeling rough for forever. In that time we got to use a lot of my home remedies for curing all sorts of troubles. In case you were curious what to use vinegar and salt for, read on.Although we haven't had a broken leg in our house for some time I thought I would post this picture for old time sake.

Before I begin I need to tell you I am not a Doctor, I only dreamed of being one when I was young. So this is info I have gleaned from experience and hope it might help you as well. It might not, it could just be wishful thinking on our part that it helps.

1. Margaret had an awful earache for a day or so and she began running a fever with it. She was putting hot packs on her ear to soothe it and then I added a few drops of tea tree oil for good measure before she went to sleep that night. Her ear was all better in the morning!

I wish I would have known to do that when my boys had all of their ear infections as young toddlers.

2. If your throat is sore and scratchy dissolve some salt in warm water and gargle often through out the day.

3. We were at the beach and in the sun a bit to long for some of our fair skins. We did try to sun screen ourselves but clearly, not enough. Travis was burnt on his back and chest, oh, he was very red. He actually isn't my best advertisement for this cure but, I think I didn't douse him enough. It always works for me. The remedy for sunburn is VINEGAR. Spread it on with a cotton ball and the burning will go away, it will soon turn to a tan. Keep applying it as you need to for pain control.

4. If you are so nauseated nothing will stay down drink some plain old black tea. It settles your stomach right down. You can add a little sugar if you don't like it on its own. That is all Gregory had for 24 hours or so. At least he wasn't dry heaving his insides out.

5. Sometimes there is so much pressure in my sinuses I just give up and eat a garlic clove and an orange or some other high vitamin C fruit. Then I drink a quart or two of water and I feel so much better. No one wants to be close to me but that is okay, the pain is away! Once in awhile I have to do it another time in about 1/2 hour. It is all good for you so go ahead, try it. 6. Try praying, it works!

7. Beatrice's hair went crazy from to much salt water, or something and was terrible. It was dry and even if you got it all brushed out, she moved and the snarls were right back in there. After weeks of trying to condition it good in her bath and not washing it very often to try to renew her natural oils I gave up and got out the mayonnaise. I slathered it all over her head and she smelled like potato salad for the rest of the evening but the next day after her bath she had slightly greasy hair! and a week or so later she has nice hair, not frizzy, not greasy.

8. I should have paid attention to the warning signals my body was sending me but I didn't and I had a big old UTI. I was in Pain. So, I went to the kitchen and drank myself a couple ounces of vinegar. Then I ate a garlic clove and gallons of water this time. I kept drinking and taking a couple of tablespoons regularly of vinegar. The next morning I felt so much better it was truly amazing, I wasn't running a fever and I could do my job much more comfortably. I continued to take vinegar by the tablespoon for a few days to make sure everything washed out. I have heard if you have a tendency to have kidney or UTI problems you should take a tablespoon every day for maintenance. We also ate dill pickles for a more fun way of getting that vinegar in.

9. Nothing is better for a sore, achy body than a hot shower.

10. Remember to heal your body needs lot of sleep and plenty of fresh fruits and veggies to give it all the vitamins it needs to make those new and healthy cells.

To a more healthy winter!

~Anna

What to do with a few Rubberbands

These guys have been going through a lot of rubber bands recently.

Aaron is the only one around here that seems to know how to tie them as they call it. Today he told Gregory, "I will show you one more time how to do this and then you will need to do it on your own". But anyways, yesterday when they had made their bow and arrows Nahum and Nati each needed one too and it was pretty cute seeing them ask Aaron for tips on how to put them together and the right sticks for the job.

So the best way to make these, if I have been listening right, is to find the right stick. Smaller guys need smaller sticks. Then get several rubbers and knot them together until you have about the same length of band as the stick. Put it onto the stick ends and find some nice straight twigs for arrows.

Have fun hunting small game. Another thing you can do is make a musical instrument. Find some handily placed knobs and stretch them across.

Have fun making beautiful melodies. These are whatever you want them to be. They thought you could use them like helicopters or lots of things. Knot two bands together and have fun with your imagination.

Thanking God for imaginations!

~Anna

Making Salt Crystals, a fun recipe

Here is a fun science expirement to do to revive the last few days of school for this year. It would be especially good for you if you are doing a study on salt or salt water like we were.

Here is what you do to grow your very own salt crystals.

Bring 2 cups of water to a boil and remove water from the heat.

Add salt 1 Tablespoon at a time until the salt no longer dissolves.

Pour the salt water into a clean, clear glass jar.

Tie a paperclip to the end of a string or thread. Tie the other end of the string to a pencil and balance it on the top of the jar.

Allow the paper clip to hang in the water about 1 inch from the bottom of the jar.

Place the jar in a sunny window where it will not be bumped. This is one day later. Two or three days later. One week, four days later.

It was really exciting to see it growing at first, and to see how perfect the cubes always were. The growth has really slowed down now.

People are now regularly asking what are you going to do with them and I don't know. So I need to figure that out I guess. Maybe if I shellac them they could work as jewellery. What do you think? I don't want to loose them by eating them in our supper.

Enjoy!

~Anna

Happy Birthday Wilson Bentley

We had a Birthday Party for Snowflake Bentley today.

He would have been 145 today. His life's passion was snowflakes.

Their many intricacies were very fascinating to him. So in honor of him we,

made snowflakes ourselves! Naturally, we read a book together about Willie. It is a fun book that you might like to read also called Snowflake Bentley. We also made indoor snowmen! Working hard building just the right man. This one is a soldier.

A close up of the soldier.

You have to work fast or you have a puddle instead of a snowman.

Also to honor him we scooped our driveway, again.

Wilson Bentley took amazing pictures of snowflakes. He was the one who discovered that there are not two snowflakes alike. He spent all his winters trying to capture as many flakes as he could.

A pretty interesting guy.

Tomorrow has several more amazing people's birthday's on it. I don't think we will have time for a celebration of them though. To bad.

Blessings to you,

~Anna