Getting a fix

How about taking a look at two cute boys! Busy, energetic, daring!

August Word: Extravagant

Extravagant: lavish, Exceeding reasonable bounds, outrageous, immoderate
This is my August word of the Month to live By! I have been pondering this for several weeks here-after someone told me to have an "extravagantly good day"! How would that look for me? Would it be like Romans 12:1: "in view of God's mercy, offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God....Maybe John 10:10 is more appropriate "I come that they may have life and have it more abundantly"


1.Share extravagantly with at least 2 people every day. Be spontaneous.
2. memorize a new verse (an extravagance of my mind)
3. practice a spiritual discipline (fasting, prayer walking..)
4. Extravagant in encouragement, extravant in giving, in enthusiasm
5. Listen. Spend time paying attention to what God has to say to me.
Already I find this much harder to put into practice than it is even to write about. It's way too easy to fall into old habits, to let my circumstances get me down, to let emotion run away with me. I hate it.
Casting Crowns has a song that speaks it all Jesus Your Love is Extravagant. absolutely.

Camping and More!

Forgive me for pointing you to the slide show on the sidebar. It's all you 'll ever want to see of our camping trip. And just think, we have another week of vacation and pictures to share with you in the future. Aren't you lucky!

Camping Tools

We have the coolest cooking "pan" for our camping adventures. It is an old lid from a wash machine. We found out the hard way that they can't be lids from newer machines, but that's another story. Ron uses it exclusively to cook everything we eat when camping. But the fun part is watching him clean it from use to use. Here he is getting started. First he takes a piece of wood and scrapes off most of the grease and whatever else is there. Then he uses a paper towel to clean the heavy stuff off..



Next he puts it on a nice hot fire and heats the rest of the grease up so it is runny. Cleans it with another paper towel, and this time he adds a wad of aluminum foil to scrape it all off. i have no idea why the aluminum foil makes such a big difference but he always uses it. Then he heats up the pan one more time. After all what germs can live under hot conditions?



Then we're ready to cook away! Bacon is the best done on this pan, though we have cooked burgers and brats and potatoes and other vegetables. We have had people we're camping with watch as he cleans this thing up and then refuse to eat any of the food we fix. it does look a bit unsanitary, I guess since we put no soap or water to the thing since we've gotten it. If you used cast iron you wouldn't either, and i don't see that as much different.

We also have this handy little thing, now too. The Dutch Oven. It operates more like an oven than a grill and we're still getting used to it. We fixed meatloaf in it for this trip and that worked right well! Desserts will be a snap in this thing once we figure it all out. our first try with this and we burned a perfectly good pot roast to a crisp. Oh well.

Vacation Effects

Was our camping trip worth the effort, you ask? All that prep work, and now the aches and pains? You betcha! Despite a body that hurts in every single joint from stuff no woman my age should be doing these days, i.e. tubing, swimming, and sleeping outdoors, it was so cool to be with friends if even for a short time. We had 50 degree nights which was perfect for campfires and snuggling down into sleeping bags. We swam in Lake Superior (brrrr) we ate like campers (too much) and we caught up. Sad to say, though, we had no one new to share the "Norwegian of the Year" story with. We have to recruit some campers who think having goof ball friends is a good idea! Hurrah for friends. Hurrah for friends who take us just like we are and laugh with us and cry with us, and pray for us. I am exhausted with piles of laundry to do. I am renewed!