Weed Relief, A New Dynasty, More than 8 Hours in the Day....Created for Work

As I said before, we've definitely been drowning in vines,or I should say, weeds, at least up until recently.  The problem was the weeds were literally taking over.  I was worried about this and would ask RM about it regularly, but he kept assuring me that once the grape hoe he had purchased last year got fixed and on his tractor all would be ok.  The problem with that was the alleged "fix" was no small project.  It ended up being a waaaay bigger deal than he realized.  In the olden days, I would have gotten stressed and taken on RM's stress as I thought it was admirable to be stressed together!  Strange thinking, clearly.  Now, I just go through each day with my thoughts being mainly concerned with feeding kids and keeping them in clean clothes in a sort of clean home.  I figured if I was supposed to be stressed about the weeds RM would tell me.

As the weeds got higher and higher, he kept working and working on this grape hoe.  The main reason for the delay was that he had to design a 250 lb (iron? steel?  I have no idea...something heavy) attachment that would fit on to the bottom of the tractor.  The grape hoe would then attach to that and away we would go!  But it was not that simple to attach something so heavy in such an awkward place.  Not only did he have to design it, get it all welded up, and then attach it to the tractor, but after that he had to learn all about hydraulics because he then had to make the grape hoe's hydraulics function properly.  Oh my goodness.  It was such an ordeal.  I never paid any attention really except to see him all the time under the tractor, beside the tractor, swearing at the tractor, thinking in the car about the tractor.....and then recovering from the muscle soreness given to him by the tractor.  Poor guy!

He was getting very discouraged and was about to give up.  This was taking too long and the weeds were getting too high.  He asked our neighbour to hoe the vines.  But then, amazingly, after reworking every single hose, redrilling, replacing, reattaching......he got the thing to work!  It was truly a miracle, to us at least!  It was at this point I finally asked him to explain how he went about this and he explained every step to me.  I was in awe of all the work he had done.  So much effort that no one will ever know.  But it was worth it.  He cancelled the neighbour coming over and he went out and hoed our own vines for the first time by machine, no more hand hoeing like last year.  It was such a great day!  Our vines now actually look like real vines!

I asked him later, "What do other farmers do if they aren't engineers and don't know how to design tractor attachments?!!!!!"  "They pay a lot of money to get someone to do it for them," was his answer.  So in a way, it is a blessing and a curse that he knows how to do everything.  On the one hand, it will be how we make money and save money by not paying someone to do all the work he does.  And then, on the other hand, it means a lot more work for him, but in a strange way, he does kind of like the work.  He just wishes that he could do it full time and not have to do a full time job outside of the house which makes for all this extra work at night, on weekends, or on holiday time.  Maybe one day.

In the meantime I read in a devotional book this morning that our burdens and tasks are God's way of preparing us for heaven.  So we should gladly take our burdens and be joyful for how God is using them in our lives.

This week will mark the beginning of another crazy adventure we are on.  We have kitten dynasties and now we are attempting to have a microgreen dynasty.  What is a microgreen?  They are those cute little sprouts that you see on the top of entrees at fancy restaurants.  They are usually pea shoots or some other kind of mini-vegetable.  They are sold in tiny little clamshell containers or large trays and people love them!  So we decided, in the name of always looking for additional ways to provide for our family, to pay for trips to Africa, to pay down debt, to give meaningful work to our children, to keep us off the streets, we started a microgreen business.....this past weekend.  Just like that.  Bought the seeds.  Bought the soil.  Bought the trays and the shelving and the lights.  And then planted like crazy, because, as we like to say, there are more than 8 hours in the day. 

The plan is to start selling (if they all grow well....so far so good) at the farmer's market this weekend.  It's just a few hours every Saturday morning, and then perhaps to other restaurants or on the street.  We're all kind of excited about this as we have other things up our sleeves to eventually sell as well that we make on the farm, crafty things, etc.  It should be fun!

Why can't we just be normal people?  One lady asked my husband once, "Can't you just be an engineer?"  No.  He can't.  I can't either.  There is something in us that drives us to do more.  We are driven by necessity as we have a lot of mouths to feed.  We are driven by Scripture that tells us to use our time wisely.  We're driven by the the study on diligence we did years ago.  We also are always reminded of the story of Elisha who asked the widow who was in debt and was being threatened that her sons would be taken from her, "What do you have?"  She had oil.  We have land and a large family and a really unusual husband/dad who can do so many things.  Knowing we are in one of the most ideal places in Canada to grow things like vines, we grow vines.   Knowing we are in a very touristy area that loves healthy food, we grow microgreens.  And, of course, there's always hay.  Knowing we have lots of people to help us, we use our kids and amazingly enough, they buy into it!  Most of the time anyway....

The widow and her sons still had to fight for their freedom from debt.  God didn't just magically pour the oil into containers.  They had to go around and get the containers and fill them and as they moved forward in faith, God provided the miracle.  This is what we are doing, too.  We are moving forward completely in faith as we have NEVER DONE ANY OF THESE THINGS BEFORE!!!!   We are trusting God will bless our little farm and all the crazy things we are doing.  What is my role in all of this?  Well, the usual things, keep kids fed and watered.  Somehow keep the house in some semblance of order and then my biggest role is to be the cheerleader/co-visionary and help RM carry out all these bizarre plans and dreams we have.

But I really do love it.  In RM's planning, he designed the vines with "trails".  We can walk through our vine trails and enjoy the scenery, the birds singing, just being together outside.  It can be magical.  Our kids ride their bikes through the trails and I take friends on walks when they come over.  It's hard not to buy into it when you are surrounded by nature and all of God's creation.  I would almost feel badly if we weren't using our land this way or even our kids!  We are all created to work (in fact, I have a book on our shelf called Created to Work!"). 

To prove this even more, in the animal kingdom, they are also created by God and we are to take dominion over them.  At Marineland, they've been told recently they are no longer supposed to use the animals as "entertainment", instead on as "educational".  What my son is noticing is that now that they are no longer allowed to do all the tricks and other behaviours they've been trained to do, they are now showing more aggressive behaviours.  This is because they LOVE working, they love entertaining, they love to do what they've been taught to do, but this has been taken away from the animals.  It is the same in human beings.  If they are not doing what they are created to do, they get bored and develop bad behaviours.  The more we give our kids to do, the more they rise to the challenge and the more fulfilled they are.  They are on their devices less, outside more, and sleep way better, too.  All in all, I love what I'm seeing in them.

My day is planned for me - I'll be in the vines for sure, taping, weeding, etc.  I have a boatload of laundry to fold and deliver, meals to make....I think I wrote this once, "I never wake up wondering what I should do each day...."  Today will be no different, but I'm good with that.  In Canada, you wait soooooooo long for the warm weather.  It's here now and I don't want to miss one minute of it.