| Heartchange 1 - 14 July 2001 Dear Sisters We have been going through a lot of changes this past month. A lot has happened and now that it is time for me to write and tell you ~ it all leaves my mind! Do you think I can remember? Blank! Ha! The saddest of occasions, though, is the fact that my brother's puppy got sick. We took it to one vet who misdiagnosed it's illness. Then we had to consult another. The latter vet told us that the puppy had a jaw disorder, which would hinder his ability to eat as he grew into a bigger dog. Furthermore, that this jaw disorder also compromised the rest of the puppy's skeletal system. Poor Toby had become lame in his hind legs. Sadly, we had him put down. My daughter, Sarah was with me at the time, and my heart swelled with love for her as I watched her suppress so much emotion. She was so strong. All the way home, I wanted to talk with her, as I battled my own tears, but, alas, Sarah wasn't ready to talk. The very next day she came to me, handed me a paper and said "Mamma, I'd like you to read this". It was her full commentary on the whole trip to the vet(s). The facts, her thoughts, her feelings. When I had read her composition, I realised yet again what treasure I have in my children. They never cease to amaze me. I was glad I hadn't pushed for conversation. Two weeks after this incident, we were offered a beautiful 3-year-old Labrador named "Lucky". He is so gorgeous! He sits, gives paw, begs, walks nicely next to his master (mistress), takes food gently and absolutely loves the children. I wonder who are the "Lucky" ones? This type of thing always reminds me of a scene in 'The Sound Of Music', where Mother Superior tells Maria that '....whenever God closes a door, He opens a window....' Whenever its time to compose a new menu, I always get stuck, and can't make a decision as what to put on the menu. And so ~ what I've started to do is draw up a 'draft' email, listing what we ate for dinner each night. When I log on to the computer, I just add the latest meal recipe. That way, I have a list of what we've actually eaten and enjoyed, which will be a tremendous help for next 'Menu Planning Session'. At the end of the month, I'll send myself this email! Fun! For the sisters in Australia who may have the flu or family with the flu during our winter season, here is what has helped me recently with a bout of the 'dreaded lurgy'. Bed rest: Yep! I remained in bed for a whole day! My sweet husband and children ran the home, and made food to boot! It's always helpful to rest, sleep, and wear a lot of bedclothes, working up a sauna for yourself! Lots of Water: Drinking the water flushed out the germs from my system. Vitamin C: I took between 4000mg to 10 000mg per day for three days Kyolic Garlic: 3 capsules per day Echinacea: 2000mg per day Fresh fruit and vegetables: I ate mainly fruit, which I bought on the second day of the flu. Paracetamol: I only took this for the aches and pains ~ during the first 24 hours of the flu. Praise God that He has designed an automatic built-in healing system within our bodies! As you all know ~ my eldest daughter, Emma is 18. She is a tremendous helpto us around the home, as well as our business. She helps and teaches her younger brother and sister, too. At the moment, Emma is busy setting up and implementing a schedule for our craft/sewing days, as well as the days we bake. She is searching through favourite craft books, selecting which projects we can work on. She makes a list of these and jots down the materials needed to make the item. She is also paging through our cookbooks and selecting family favourites to prepare on our baking day. Finally, she writes the schedule as to what week we will make such and such, and then makes a separate list for me ~ so that when we go into town to do our shopping and errands, I can make sure that we have those items to work on the projects. Emma's diligence in this area is a tremendous help to me. I don't have to think about it, and I know that ultimately, I am giving my daughters the opportunity to accomplish all manner of crafts, and to create all manner of gastronomical delights! (Needless to say ~ my husband is thoroughly enjoying the 'special' food creations!) We love to listen to 'Patch the Pirate' tapes. They are stories with a Christian moral theme, explain salvation through the adventures of the characters, as well as introducing many a catchy ditty! Young and old are fond of these tapes. In fact, it was our very own Pastor who recommended them to us. He has his own set, even though his children are all grown! Smile..... Here is the ordering information : Worship Music Ministries P O Box 3390 North Nowra NSW 2541 Ph/Fax 02-44235532 [email protected] http://travel.to/wmm Their tapes are $18 and $75 for a treasury. CD's are $22 and music books $11. <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< Finally, Sisters, I'll leave you with Mrs Isabella Beeton's Words of Wisdom: Mrs Beeton took managing a household seriously and taught women to value their work; "As with he commander of an army, or the leader of any enterprise, so it is with the mistress of any house. Her spirit will be seen through the whole establishment; and in just proportion as she performs her duties intelligently and thoroughly, so will her domestics follow her path. Of all those acquirements, which more particularly belong to the feminine character, there are none which take the higher rank in our estimation than such as enter into a knowledge of household duties; for on those are perpetually dependent the happiness, comfort and well-being of a family." With love, Helen Heartchange 15 - 31 July 2001 Dear Sisters We have had a few days out of the home. When this happens, I always seem to get stuck on evening dinners. Needless to say, it is always good to have a 'fall-back' plan. For us, that is toasted sandwiches and cereal! Yes, we love cereal. Andre likes his toasted sandwiches, while the children and I will have our choice of hot and cold breakfast foods. Emma and Sarah like cold cereal, while Sam likes Weetbix*tm with hot milk and sugar. Personally, I have polenta (fine yellow cornmeal/ mealiemeal) mixed with milk and sugar or honey. You mix a paste of polenta with milk, heat it in the microwave, stir some more, add some more milk, then heat again. Sugar and/ or honey can be added when the polenta is cooked, after around 8 minutes of putting it in and taking it out of the microwave to stir, preventing lumps. I wanted to tell you about this ~ especially the Australian and South African ladies, as it is winter where we are. This sure does make a wholesome meal and warms you up ~ right to your bones! <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< Emma has been working with Andre as together, they refurbish commercial linen trolleys. It never fails to make me smile when I see this. I believe that my daughter is being trained as a help meet for her (future, if any) husband by being a help to her father now. She has seen me help him over the years, and now she is the 'muscles' of the female De Bruins! Truly multi-skilled. I watch and hold things close to my heart from the 'wings'. <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< Andre took me out this week. The children went to the movies, while we went out to a local restaurant for dinner. It was wonderful! Because we were in a 'neutral' territory (neither the home, nor the workshop), we both seemed to relax and conversation spilled over. Our discussion topic? The children! Yes, sisters ~ they are so very important, aren't they? Sometimes it's hard to discuss them when their ears seem to be everywhere, like tiny radars, picking up any 'keywords' about themselves. Even though we speak Afrikaans to each other, they are starting to 'catch on' what we are saying. We made many important decisions that night, and drew some conclusions to a few concerns we have had. I will be sharing these conclusions with you shortly. One of the decisions we made was that we are going to strive to get out ~ away from the home/ business at least once a month. As the weather gets warmer, even if we spend time in a park or tourist venue, it is still an opportunity to recharge our decision-making batteries! <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< I had a lovely salad on my night out with my sweetheart. Simple but delicious. Here it is: ~ Assorted lettuce leaves Spanish onion rings Tomatoes Capsicum Grilled chicken tenderloins Crispy bacon slivers. The whole salad was dressed with a mustard/ vinegar dressing and served in a huge dish, which reminded me of Oliver "Please, Sir, can I have some more?". Mmmmmm...... <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< We have had a wonderful week of learning. The children absolutely love it when I take them to the library and sift through books for our studies. At the moment, we are studying Ancient Egypt, incorporating Bible, language arts, geography (not a word commonly used nowadays!) and science in one study. The children have different exercise books for different subjects, while I have a momma notebook. Instead of writing down what we want to do, I record what we actually do ~ in as much detail as possible. I like to keep a record of what we have accomplished, not a record of what we hoped to accomplish. Its a mindset, isn't it? Like the cup half full or half empty. Just lately, I believe that the Lord is filling my cup to the brim! Praise His Name! <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< It is so apparent to me, through using and sifting through many library books, that we, as mommas have to be on our toes with our eyes wide open as to what our children read. Many of the history books deny Christ, Creation and promote evolution (evilution, as my dad calls it!). We have to be the ever-watchful mamma hawk, don't we? <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< And talking of books ~ we managed to pick up some lovely old edition books from local op-shops (thrift stores). I have learned to keep a good book (or two) in our car for the times when we are in town and have to wait for some reason or other. One day, we were on our way to town, and Andre asked me to read. One of the books is called 'Geordie'. The book is set in Scotland in the 1950's, and is about a young lad's adventures on the moors. I started off reading the book with a strong Scottish accent, and found that it was quite hard to continue. "Shall I just read what Geordie says in Scottish?" I asked them. "No, mom ~ carry on with the accent throughout" they chided. Andre agreed with a smile. "I love it when you read to us, Helen", he said. A few days later, Sarah came to me and told me "Mom, these books you get are great. I can hardly put this one down. It is so funny". It's amazing what can happen when you leave good literature hanging around! . Moments like these are cherished! <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< We have five dogs, and I learned a tip regarding them from our local vet, Joseph (isn't it amazing how your vet becomes your best friend?~ smile ~ ) Joseph told me that the best way to remember to worm your pets is to do it on the first day of each season. He added that although some people worm their dogs every six weeks, as long as they are wormed at least quarterly, it helps a lot. And so ~ will you remind me to worm our pets on the first day of Spring? hee hee..... <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< The phone has been ringing a lot this week. I battle to stay on track when I have to attend to phone calls. When the children were younger, I would use the answering machine. Now that they are older, I have taught them to answer the phone in a polite (but firm) manner, as so many calls come in during the morning ~ our busiest time, as I'm sure is yours as well. My children answer like this: "Hello" "Hello, is Helen / your mom there?" "She is, but she is unavailable right now. May I take a message for her?" "Could she ring me back, please?" "I'll ask her to ring you back as soon as possible" "Thanks a lot" "You're welcome" This doesn't always happen word for word, but the main point here is that there are no promises, no commitment, as due to our somewhat erratic circumstances at this time, we never know what time that 'time' will arise! We have wondered which response to give, and this came up tops in the vote! Nobody yet has asked why Helen is unavailable. Sisters, this is so free-ing and allows me to focus on my home and family ~ the 'needy'. <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< My children have been squabbling! Over such unimportant things ~ but I guess they don't see them as such. My main aim now that they are older is to make what they are arguing about of no effect. If they are squabbling about who will sit in the front seat (when Emma isn't in the car with us), I make them both sit in the back. If they are squabbling about who should have done a particular chore, I give them both another chore. If they squabble because one of them is minding another's business, I make the one do something for the other ~ preferably not a pleasant favour, too! We have gone through periods of time when life is peaceful and I lap it up. However, when they start squabbling, I believe this is the Lord's way of jolting me back to reality, letting me see that action needs to be taken, and that perhaps I haven't been as diligent in checking their heart-attitudes as I should have. As long as I live, I know that there will be issues, training moments that I will have to deal with regarding my children. I am ashamed to say that when they were younger, I would often scream at them! This got us nowhere, proved that I was out of control, and made my blood pressure soar! ha! Praise God, He is showing me how to grow (older) gracefully! hee..... <>< <>< <>< <>< <>< Sisters ~ a little health tip ~ This week, I've started taking colloidal silver. If you are interested in this wonderful supplement, here is more information: http://www.commercemarketplace.com/home/Silvertec/faq.html#y east_infection I am taking it to boost my immune system. As a momma, I know that I have to stay as healthy as possible. This is part of looking after myself and the well-being of my family. My dad has also given me a book to read on the importance of drinking lots of water. Here is a link to the doctor who wrote the book: http://www.betterwayhealth.com/water-cure.asp I hope you don't mind me sharing this information. I only share what I have found safe, and that has helped my family and I. May you all have a wonderful God-inspired week! Love, Helen |