Skip to main content

Camping Out

I wore the covers off the Little House on the Prairie books when I was a kid. Much of my pretend was informed by the trek that Ma and Pa made across the prairie with Laura and Mary and Carrie in tow. My sister and I turned the picnic table into a makeshift covered wagon complete with Pet and Patty, our trusty saw horses. I loved the way Ma could turn a grassy campsite into a home complete with a vase of flowers and freshly ironed linens.

The reason for this trip down memory lane?


Our kitchen sink has been removed to make room for...

...this new and improved model.
I'm thankful for the years spent at Grandpa's summer bootcamp where I learned that dishwashers are for sissies. Grandpa's dishwashing rules: Fill the tub with scalding water. Hotter! Hotter! Glassware first, silverware next, plates and finally the pots and pans.

Lauren and John dry. They've never been to Grandpa's Bootcamp. Grandpa would roll over in his grave if he knew that these two whippersnappers are playing Jenga with the clean dishes.
Labels:

Comments

Sarah said…
Nice sink Kate! Can't wait to see the real, modern thing installed. The kids appear to be having way too much fun doing dishes.

sem
August 12, 2008 at 11:19 AM
Xandra@Heart-of-Service said…
I had to laugh at the reference to Little House on the Prairie! I too, wore out my set of books. What's so funny is that my mom arrived last night from a vacation of visiting all of the sites where Laura lived, and we are going to look at all the pictures this morning. I'll be thinking of you...

Xandra
August 13, 2008 at 8:23 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Child's Story Bible

I have recommended the following book so frequently that I think a post is in order so that I may recommend it to the world. In the early nineteen hundreds, when my grandparents were growing from children to adults, when they were meeting and marrying and making ends meet during the Depression, Catherine F. Vos was at work. She had been out shopping, looking for the perfect children’s story bible. The Christian bookstores of the day must have had the same unsatisfactory fare for young children that they carry today. Her standards were high as she was the wife of a professor of theology and she could not find what she was looking for. So she started to write. The results of her writing, The Child’s Story Bible was first published in stages between the years of 1934-1936. It’s been republished in every decade since that time. My grandparents had my parents and they met and married and had me and somewhere along the way I acquired a Bible. I read from the book of Proverbs from time to t
10 comments
Read more

A Sure Foundation

The kids and I have been nibbling our way through the book of Isaiah for months. It's our first venture as a family into the prophets. We wrestle with the message. It's a book for our times. Isaiah wrote to his people, the people of Judah, at the dawn of a long season of international turmoil. Assyria ran rough shod over the Middle East, followed in quick succession by Babylon, Persia and Greece. According to Isaiah, each empire was brought down because of they were quick to gloat over their achievements but failed to give God the time of day. The sin of haughty eyes he calls it. I brown the meat and simmer the stew and slice a crusty loaf of Italian bread but do not bow my head before I eat. It's the little red hen complex. I ground the wheat and kneaded the dough and sliced the carrots. I don't take into account that I didn't make the carrots or the wheat grow. I forget to be thankful that there are groceries in the pantry and healthy children around the table.
15 comments
Read more

Finding Rest: Part Two (Scroll down three posts to read this story from the beginning)

Why share such a personal story ? I share it because I have talked to enough women to know that underneath the makeup and the matching outfits and the small talk that make up our exteriors, we are a broken people. To pretend otherwise creates isolation. Thoughtful honesty creates closer relationships and greater understanding. When we share the way God works in the difficult things of life it encourages first oneself and then others. For some of us, the pieces have been patched and restored and there is wholeness where there was none before. But some of us are walking wounded, barely hanging on and wondering if there is hope. We have a choice. We can either be completely shattered by bitterness, depression and anger or we can lay the fragments before the One who can take the sharp slivers and jagged pieces and create a beautiful, productive life. Here is the conclusion to John's story. When John was ten, he was sullen and moody and difficult and so was I. But I was no longer proud.
28 comments
Read more