A new blog for a new start...

As you can probably tell by the title of my blog, I am a Christian homemaker.  My husband, Erik, and I have been married for a little over 4 years, and we have two beautiful daughters, Anna and Lydia.  I will upload more photos as I have time.  Erik and I were married before my last year of college (majoring in Missions/Outreach), and we got pregnant a few months after our wedding.  Anna was a surprise, but such a blessing.  Lydia is 27 months younger than Anna, and was born September '07.  For the first time since college, I held a part-time job at our local state park over this past summer, and the change it caused in my household and family life was the final kick in the tail to get me to listen to God calling me to the honor of being my husband's helpmeet, raising our wonderful children, and keeping our home.  

In the realm of keeping the home, the two most important things I've been working on lately have been improving the quality of the foods we are eating, and the condition of our home.  As far as foods, I have recently gone from using sweetners to avoid refined sugars to using all natural sugars, honey or stevia.  I have also started using alot of whole wheat flour rather than avoiding alot of grain based foods (which was my previous false notion of the way to avoid white flour, etc).  Raised by a diabetic, I had alot of concepts of healthy eating that were partially accurate but not thorough enough for me to apply in my life.  For instance, I grew up avoiding sugary foods, but ate chemically sweetened substitutes.    After a discovery a few months ago that I believe I'm allergic to some preservatives found in common store bought bread, or really any processed food, I started making our own bread.  Along with a few other changes, like having fresh organic produce from our local farmer's market, I lost about 10 pounds without realizing it.  Now, I have plenty more weight to lose, but as I have made even more changes, I have lost a total of 30 pounds over the last few months.  I'm hoping for about 100 more by this time next year, but mostly I want to strive to become more and more healthy, and raise my girls having healthy eating as the norm, not something they have to discover on their own later in life.

  In regard to the condition of our home, this is something I've been constantly struggling with and striving to improve.  Since we married, my husband and I have lived in 5 different places.  With each move, we have purged unnecessary belongings including clothes, furniture, knick-knacks, childhood belongings that no longer hold any meaning, and much more. We've even given away a truck to a church friend in need of a vehicle.  All this to say I have a long way to go, but I am constantly trying to get down to the bare necessities, and create systems to keep the remaining material possessions in order and efficient.  

  For anyone stumbling across this post, or reading back from a future post of interest, I apologize for the rambling, but I feel like it is necessary to introduce myself and give a platform from which to discuss certain topics in the future.

God's blessings to everyone!