Words of Praise and Worship - Remembering Andy

For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” - Romans 9:15

We just arrived home from my father-in-laws funeral. The trip took us to northern Michigan, to lots of tears, and to much joy.  Alger Lynn Langworthy (Andy to most everyone) passed away on Sunday July 24, 2011 just 2 days shy of his 80th birthday.

I wish I could say that I knew Andy well, however, because my wife and I met late in our lives I only was able to talk with him a few times. The times we did talk I found his stories and humor heart-warming, authentic, and grew to love him in my own way.

I also came to know Andy through his remarkable children, my wife being the last born of six girls and two twin boys. They are a truly wonderful lot, hardworking, full of life, ready with a joke, or an offer of help. His legacy also includes many grandchildren and great grandchildren. 

Through choices made or ones forced upon him, Andy's life was a hard road. He forced many of those who loved him away, and chose many things as poor substitutes. It was only during the last few years that his kids came back into his life bringing him joy, peace, and an end to loneliness.

The reason I started this entry with the verse from Romans was that after much prayer, Andy came to know the Lord shortly before he passed. He always thought that he was too bad to be saved, however, Jesus finally made him understand that is the message of the gospel. The Lord had mercy on Alger Lynn Langworthy.

We brought this cherry tree home from Andy's house in tribute and memory of him.

British Bread and Butter pickles

One of the fun things we do every year at StonePath is to try and find some new canning recipe. Our criteria is to find a recipe that uses products that we grow (although we did do champagne blush jelly one year from complete store bought that was wonderful) on the farm.

Last year was the year for pumpkin pickles. They were a big hit and we quickly went through every jar we had. I don't count ground cherry jam because the ground cherry itself was an experiment and there's nothing unusual about the jam.

This year our pickling cukes are really producing so we started hunting for something other then the regular dill, sweet, bread and butter, etc... That's when we found British Bread and Butter pickles.

The recipe is a variation of regular bread and butter pickles as found in the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving.

British Bread and Butter Pickles

10 cups sliced, trimmed pickling cucumbers

4 medium onions

1/2 cup pickling or canning salt

3 cups cider vinegar

2 cups packed brown sugar

2 tbsp mustard seed

1 tsp celery seed

1 tsp ground turmeric

1 tsp ground ginger

1. In a glass or stainless steel bowl, combine cucumbers, onions and salt. Mix well and cover with cold water and let stand at room temp for 2 hours. After allowing the cucumbers to stand, rinse them well in a colander under cool water and drain.

2. In a large stainless steel saucepan, combine vinegar, brown sugar, mustard seed, celery seed, turmeric, and ginger. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring to dissolve sugar. Stir in the vegetables and return to a boil.

3. Pack vegetables into hot jars to with a 1/2 headspace. Remove air bubbles and adjust headspace, if necessary, by adding hot pickling liquid. Wipe rim and screw on cap.

4. Place jars in a boiling water canner, completely covering the lids. Process for 10 minutes.

Mid-Season Farm update

I thought it would be useful to give a Mid-Season farm report on what's going on at StonePath, the good and the not so good. The gardens are in full flush, everything is green and growing.

We've had lots to harvest so far, including bush beans, banana peppers, hot peppers, lots of pickles, and lettuce. Pickles have been the hero of the season so far with no end in sight. We've canned lots of kosher dills,and British bread and butter pickles.

The tomatoes are just coming in and they look beautiful. We have somewhere around 140-150 plants and look forward to a very busy canning year. We do lots of salsa, pizza sauce and, of course, whole tomatoes. This looks to be a bumper crop year.

On the down-side, something is destroying our squash. I planted a 60' row of pumpkins that did wonderfully last year, this year we've lost most of the plants. I used floating row cover to thwart squash beetles, but something still managed to get them. I am in the process of doing a CSI style investigation. We'll have to get our pie pumpkins from the Amish produce auction for this year.

Our zucchini, yellow squash, acorn squash, and butternuts all seem to be faring better. However, they are all growing slowly. We got these in early and I think the extreme wet is to blame. A good friend of mine who runs a very large, organic farm has observed that his early crops are growing much slower then his later crops.

Weeds are always a challenge with our busy schedule, however, this year our kids finally have decided to help out and weed three beds a day. They have been a tremendous blessing.

I have to say that over-all I have been pleased with the performance of the farm this year. It's still has a lot of growing season left and we are hopeful for big yields. Organic gardening can be a frustrating learning environment, but the results definitely are worth while.

Buckets of Love

There hasn't been much happening at StonePath the past couple days.  The kids managed to get some beds weeded (what a blessing to have willing helpers), which allowed us to focus on some in home projects. We are finishing a remodel on our front, family room.  Shell and I have been called to lead our churches Senior High Youth Group, and plan to hold meetings there. It will be great fun and a true blessing.

In the meantime, we were able to participate and see completed a very cool mission project. We have been involved with The Risley Agricultural Center which is a non-profit, Christ centered ministry.  One of the projects we recently helped with was the "Buckets of Love" ministry. It's a simple, yet wonderful, ministry where we planted 5 gallon buckets with a tomato plant to be given to the poor. We planted and delivered around 140 buckets to the needy in our area yesterday.

Words of Praise and Worship

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. - Jeremiah 29:11

This oft-quoted verse, known by some many, fills me with both awe and challenge. The God of the universe, who sets the electrons in their paths around a nucleus, has taken time to think about me. He has not only considered me, He has made a plan for me.

The challenge in that verse is in the daily living. Do we truly trust God in times of trial that He really has a plan for our lives? The second part of the challenge is have we set our ideas on what it means to prosper in accordance to His will? What is our response if our expectations are not met by God? That is the challenge of faith.

First canning of the season

Yesterday was a good day of canning and freezing produce from StonePath.  We knew we had pickle cukes ready to harvest and we were pleasantly surprised at the amount we had to work with.

We were thinking that we would only be able to get a few jars worth, but ended up with enough for two water bath canner loads. 

I will confess that we cheat on pickles. We have found that the Mrs. Wages brand of instant pickles to be very easy to use with excellent results. Next year we may plan on growing lots of dill to scratch can pickles.

Our method is fairly straight forward.  The Mrs. Wages product is a dry mix of spices that is added to a white vinegar and water bath. The liquid is brought to a boil and added to the already packed, hot jars.

We process quart jars for 10 minutes and pints for 5 minutes in a boiling water bath.  A couple years ago we went to Lehman's Hardware in Kidron, Ohio and purchased a Camp Chief outdoor stove. This stove has been a great addition, it keeps the kitchen cooler and speeds the process up tremendously.

We ended up with 5 quarts and 8 pints of kosher dill pickles. This volume should continue throughout the summer.  We love kosher dill, polish dill, and bread & butter pickles.

The other item we made a small batch of was Apple Rhubarb Chutney. Chutney is in the same category of relish and salsa, except that chutney's usually have more fruit and tend to be saucier. Many recipes have nuts, although the one we did does not.  We'll use this chutney on pork roast, or even spread on crackers with some cream cheese.

The recipe for this chutney came from the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving which is a great resource for anyone who likes to preserve food at home.

Apple Rhubarb Chutney

4 cups - diced, peeled, cored apples (treated to prevent browning)

4 cups - granulated sugar

2 cups - diced rhubarb

1/2 cup - water

Grated zest and juice of 1 lemon

1/2 cup - dried cranberries

1 tsp - ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp - ground nutmeg

1. In a large stainless steel pot, combine apples, sugar, rhubarb, water, lemon zest and juice. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring constantly. Reduce heat and boil gently, stirring frequently for 15 minutes.  Add the cranberries, cinnamon, and nutmeg.  Boil gently, stirring frequently, until thick enough to mound on a spoon, about 15 minutes.

2. Ladle hot chutney into hot jars, leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Remove air bubbles and adjust headspace.

3. Process jars in a boiling water bath for 10 minutes, making sure the lids are covered by water.

Yields 4 1/2 pint jars.

We finished the day with pickles, chutney, and 6 cups of banana pepper rings. We freeze the peppers in food saver bags by the cup to use later on pizza or omelets.



http://homesteadrevival.blogspot.com/2011/07/barn-hop-20.html



Words of Praise and Worship

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your  ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight." Proverbs 3:5-6

This verse has, as of late, become my life verse and my guide. The truth contained in it, and the challenge it presents are enormous and life changing. That simple word "Trust", so often spoken but rarely lived out convicts me every time I read it.

The writer of this proverb had me nailed from the first line.  Not only do I struggle in trusting God, I definitely want to lean on myself. Somehow, I figure that the God of the universe can't help me as well as I can help myself. That's where the trouble begins.

Whether the issue is a sin, an unbridled tongue, fear, worry, or any of the nagging issues that daily beset me, God simply says to trust Him completely, ignore what I think is right, SUBMIT to His will and then He will work the issue out.

I want to be careful and not imply that God will take away hard times, we know from scripture that we are promised to experience trials, persecution, hard times, etc... If, however, we submit and trust fully God promises to make the path straight.  He will help us through the hardship and grow us in the journey.

The forest will still be dark and full of danger, however, the path through it will be straight and guarded by angels, if we only trust.

StonePath gets a new stone path

We purchased the slate needed to complete the path from the driveway to the front gate this past weekend.  Laying out a path sounds like a fairly straight forward proposition, however, it is anything but straight forward.

We have found that creating a path is as much art as labor.  You can't just throw the slate down any old way.  So we usually lay it in a pattern and live with it a few days before making it permanent. The pattern pictured above is the winner thus far and, unless something changes in my wife's mind, I'll set it tomorrow.

We love using stone around our farm (hence the name of the place), it adds a sense of time and permanence.

Our goal is to have slate paths running throughout the entire farm.  Currently, we use straw to layer the paths around the raised beds, but next spring we will install the slate paths. 

Our kitchen garden has always had a water problem that really impacts the growth of the crops.  We plan on raising the beds in stone approx 2' above the current level pictured above.  Our new asparagus bed will get the same treatment.

Black Horse Rider watch

"When the Lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, 'Come!' I looked, and there before me was a black horse! It's rider was holding a pair of scales in his hand. Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, 'A quart of wheat for a day's wages, and three quarts of barley for a day's wages, and do not damage the wine!" - Revelation 6:5


I decided to start a weekly segment on my blog regarding the coming global food crisis. Many of you in the United States will probably wonder what I'm ranting about. Food in the U.S. seems ample and the stores are always fully stocked. That may make it seem like everything is honky dory, however, there are storm clouds on the horizon and the Rider in Revelations is getting ready to mount his steed.

I have been watching various news articles, both Internet and regular news, for any information about crops, food stocks, droughts, etc...  That information I have been compiling and will sort, digest, and summarize for you.  The patterns are plain to see and frightening in their forecast.

My goal with this information is not to frighten, however, it's to send a call to people to wake up and pay attention to the world around us.  It's a call to action, to preparedness, and watchfulness.  I especially hope to awaken the children of God to be watchful as Christ commanded us.  He told us to recognize the seasons and be prepared for His coming.

The first topic I wanted to discuss is the decline and impending end of the Ogallala Aquifer.  An aquifer is a body of water trapped hundreds of feet below the surface.  It's trapped usually between two different plates and they vary in size and gallons of water trapped.

The Ogallala Aquifer stretches from the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains through the badlands of South Dakota and into the Texas Panhandle.  At it's deepest, in Nebraska and Kansas, it is roughly 300 feet deep.  That changes the further south you travel.  Around Amarillo, Texas the depth is from 0-50 feet. This Aquifer does not refill, when it's gone, it's gone.

The problem has been the rapid draining of the Aquifer by over farming, poor resource management, and surface drought.  Researches now believe that the Ogallala Aquifer may only have a few decades left until it is dry. The fact that it will dry up is not in debate, the time until the last drop is removed will depend on how the resource can be managed.  The best hope is to manage the decline. The shallowest areas will probably be dry within 10 years.

The impact of this loss will be felt world-wide.  The agricultural area supported by the aquifer provides 20 percent of America's grain and corn, not to mention how much of the world market depends on food produced in this section of the U.S.  A collapse in this area will mean starvation in many areas of the world.

I encourage everyone reading this to take steps to grow and store food at home.  Anyone with even the smallest plot can grow enough food to make a difference.  If you live in an apartment or do not have the space to grow a garden, find some like-minded friends purchase a small plot and form a small, private community garden/farm, start to build a few months of food in your pantry while food is still inexpensive.  There are many tips available on how to prepare, that's not the focus of my topic. 

My urgent prayer is that those who call Christ, Savior, will begin to watch and tell others of the impending troubles. There is a storm coming and the horseman are preparing their mounts.

First harvest.

We were able to freeze both banana peppers and hot, hungarian peppers yesterday.  I love this time of the season when the garden is starting to take-off and we begin to harvest.  Everything looks fantastic except for the broccoli.  The very wet spring caused such a delay in planting that the crop never lived up to it's potential.  We are seeing many of the plants bolting before establishing any real heads.

I was able to get my hands on approx 1/2 acre up the road.  My friend and I plowed and disced the ground that was fallow for many years.  We planted corn and squash and hope for a late, big yield. We intend to plow up more this year and at least plant winter wheat as a cover crop and green manure.  Hopefully, we can really add lots to the pantry with this new acreage.

Words of Praise and Worship

 ¹ Blessed is the one 

   who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take    or sit in the company of mockers, 

² but whose delight is in the law of the LORD,    and who meditates on his law day and night. 

³ That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,    which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither—    whatever they do prospers. - Psalm 1:1-3

I hope everyone has a wonderful 4th of July.  Remember the sacrifices made by so many that this nation might live.  God has blessed this land for His purpose, however, if we do not recognize His hand and yield to his purpose, I believe He will remove His blessing.