Feedsack Creations

Last week the rancher lady that Sam works for sent home some feed sacks and a bag that someone had sewed from a feedsack, for a pattern.

She wanted the girls to sew her a few more, and she would pay them.

The bag was so cute, but first we had to look carefully and figure out how it was made. 

First we turned the pattern bag inside out (above) to see how it was made.

Then, below, we cut a feedsack back to size and sewed the bottom seam.

Then we flattened the corners and sewed across the corner a couple inches down.

Then we hemmed the top.

Then we cut strips from what was left of the feed sack and folded them over onto themselves and sewed down the middle to make straps, and sewed the straps onto the top of the bag.

And here was Rose's end result. We were so proud of it!

Well, then Timmy wanted to learn to sew the bags, too, especially if would make him some money! So I helped him. And I don't know why this photo won't go to the middle. It was the first time he had used the sewing machine.

That feedsack creation gave me the idea for this one, which I helped Rose with--

a baby apron for our pastor's granddaughter, since everyone was invited to her first birthday.

We weren't able to go, but we made this for a gift from a rabbit food feedsack!

We made a bow out of strips from the feedsack, and Rose found this little brown bunny button to sew on at the corner.

All at the same time, my nephew Peter Barth (my older sister Dorcas's oldest boy) was getting married.

The wedding was in Michigan, and I would have so loved to be there, as at least six of my siblings and most of their families were there.

Carrie had sewed and knitted kitchen sets which she had hoped to sell, but hasn't been able yet, and so I purchased a set from her for a wedding gift, with Peter's wife Lonni's wedding and kitchen colors (dark red and yellow)

for her kitchen. Carrie uses any money from the kitchen sets for violin lessons.

I mentioned Sam working for a rancher nearby. They raise champion longhorns. Here I'm dropping him and the girls off one day.

Sam getting a pile of feed at Big R.

I'm so thankful for our strong boy.

I pray that he will continue to be a wonderful young man as he already is. I can't be thankful enough for his good attitudes (except for grammar in school) and his obedient and helpful spirit.

Last week our neighbor called, as he had gotten in a big load of alfalfa hay, and so Jonathan took the children over for a load of it for our goats for the winter.

Riding the hay on the way home.

Little rancher boy--and he can't bear to get rid of these pants.

They are so comfortable he tells me, and my sympathies get the better of me, so I let him keep wearing them.

Don't we all have our comfortable clothes that are shamefully ragged--because we like them!

The girls keep picking carrots and tomatoes and beets.

And someone needed a recent photo of Jonathan and me, so since our last photo was a year and a half old, we took another.

Keep the Burrs from Under Your Saddle

"Keep the burrs from under your saddle," said that "Wisdom From a Horse" card.

Not that I ever have any burrs under my saddle.

 Like other people do.

 There's always something that pricks

and--if we let it--

sticks.

Like the prickles that got stuck in Hannah's blanket the night the children slept out in the yard

under the stars.

 It's very romantic--sleeping under stars--

until you roll over into the prickles.

And they are so sharp that it takes leather gloves to get them out of the blanket.

 Everybody has different burrs that stick under their saddles--if they let them.

Like funny-looking teeth that you have to live with.

Or some pesky relationship issue that never goes away.

 Or something brainless you did way back when,

the results of which you are still living with.

 

 Or some other dark, dreary something that bugs you to death

like the owl sitting on top of this nearby telephone pole,

hooting and hooting.

And tipping over every time he hooted.

It was a hoot watching him.

  Maybe what bugs you is your husband--typical of the male species.

 It's frustrating being a woman--

which means you are supposed to submit to that man. 

It doesn't seem to matter that you are a person, too.

 That you have your own ideas, feelings, and beliefs.

Maybe sometimes you would sure do things a lot differently.

You'd live somewhere else, deal with problems differently, not put up with some things anymore.

But you have to submit--just because you are a woman 

and the Bible says you are supposed to submit to this man.

 Sometimes your man (or your woman or your parents or your pastor) can be the burr.

Sometimes the burr is a command of God that we chafe at.

We can chafe--or we can surrender.

We can fight--or we can submit.

We can look cross-eyed at that person--

or smile into their eyes.

 I prayed one day when I was in Ukraine and so very terribly lonely.

I prayed to "make one man happy."

And guess what?

Now I have to --I mean, get to-- submit to him.

And sit on his lap on a Sunday afternoon after a picnic on our way home from church.

 Sit there laughing and giggling and taking pictures of our shoes like newlyweds

after 21 years of a perfectly imperfect marriage.

Or maybe the burr is that you were called to missions, like Gareth and Susan Carter

who spoke today at our church about their goal of going to Cuba in the near future.

Gareth shared how God, through Obama's negotiations, is opening a door to Cuba

through which missionaries need to go.

His wife Susan, whom I recognized from about 30 years ago when my family stayed with her adopted family, shared how God had rescued her from an alcoholic family with five siblings.

A Christian family from Kansas adopted them, and they all became Christians.

Her birth father came to Christ before he died, and last year she and her husband led her birth mother to Christ just before she died.

And then this beautiful lady sang a stunning rendition of a missionary song to the tune of "Londonderry Air." 

A song that talks about giving all and going wherever He may call.

And everything inside you wants to go.

Anywhere.

Go anywhere, just not stay.

China. Cuba. Africa. Ukraine. 

Korea (the country from which the couple was who sat in front of us, studying at the same Missionary Training Institute where the Carters are training for a few weeks.)

Haiti. Nicaragua. The inner city.

Anywhere.

Anywhere but some prairie or in some woods or some city or town somewhere--

just raising kids.

 Just raising kids.

 Just raising kids.

 

Just raising kids...

cleaning up their messes, teaching their lessons, settling their squabbles,

 helping them with their projects, encouraging their interests,

 letting them do what would be fun for you (like picking fresh veggies)

while you stand back and take pictures.

And, yes, making one man happy.

You can chafe with the burrs under your saddle--

the mission field you'd like to be on,

the situation you'd rather be in,

the finances you'd rather have,

the water you have to be sparing with just to have enough,

or sit your imperfect self on your imperfect hubby's lap and laugh with each other by a stream.

"Keep the burrs from under your saddle," says the wisdom of a horse.

And so the little mother on the prairie dries the tears that fall on a Sunday morning in a missionary service, and blogs her heart out, with the thought on another card:

"Live your life as if everything--

even that burr--

is a miracle."

That Beautiful Rose!

"I have just one verse," the pastor said as he opened his Bible for the message, after service preliminaries that had been graced with a sweet sense of God's presence.

"Song of Solomon 2:1.

"I am the Rose of Sharon and the Lily of the Valley."

And then, as he pulled a beautiful rose out from its hiding place behind the pulpit, he began to talk about Sharon's Rose--a Rose with the majesty of the mountains and unexcelled beauty.

A Rose that was a Beautiful Savior, Wonderful Lord and Master, Bright and Morning Star.

This Rose was so held up to our esteem that it seemed to tower high above our heads,

yet its beauty dripped healing balm down into the crevices of our hearts.

I can't do the simple sermon justice. 

Because most of us can't relate to such an amazingly beautiful flower.

Most of us relate better to the wilted morning glories struggling to clamber up the sides of Grandma's windmill--or perhaps we even relate to the squeaky windmill that just seems to go around in one circle after another.

We can relate to the drooping bachelors buttons that are either lonely bachelors
or have lost all our buttons.

Or perhaps we could relate better to the scrawny squash plant that was minus most of its leaves from the hailstorm, or the tiny little bindweed blossom that had wound itself around the squash leaf stem

in its efforts to climb a little higher in this life by riding the coattails of someone better than we.

We can relate to Grandma's violas with their dark faces that so easily see the negative side of life and the people around us.

A few of us could even relate to the very amazing tomato plant out there in Grandma's garden that she said she counted 70 tomatoes on--just one plant!

But the truth behind that plant is that it was hogging the water from the sprinkler and not letting the water reach the other plants.

So yes, that tomato plant could brag about how many tomatoes it was producing, but it was a hindrance to grace reaching the people around it. 

How easy it is to want all the grace and mercy for ourselves

and forget to show grace and mercy and love to the other tomato plants. 

And of course, some of us could certainly relate to the cucumber plants that were producing some nice cucumbers, but their leaves where white instead of green, and full of holes where bugs had eaten away at their reputations, and now they were covered with some sort of white powder that must be some sort of pesticide.

It's so easy to powder ourselves with cynicism and bitterness and defensiveness to try to protect ourselves from getting damaged again.

And of course, many of us could really just relate to a frog--without any further descriptions.

But who could possibly relate to this Sharon's Rose?

This sweet, beautiful, fragrant, majestic, unsurpassed Rose?

This Pearl of Great Price, this Sweeter than honey to my soul?

This fulness of the Godhead, this healer of broken hearts?

            And then, the pastor said, how did we treat this Rose?
And he hit the pulpit with that beautiful rose!

 He hit it hard, and we were stunned at his awful deed!
That beautiful rose instantly broke into pieces, the part with the beautiful blossom falling onto the floor, petals going every which way, and a broken stem lying there in all its shocking brokenness.

Someone behind us gasped.

 "This is what we do to Him by our disobedience and negligence," said the pastor.

"He was beaten and spit upon and His back lacerated with a cat-o-nine-tails."

And as our horrified eyes looked at that poor bruised and broken rose, 

the rose that once was beautiful,

the pastor told how 

our Savior was bruised for our iniquities

and how He hung on the cross for our sins.

 He became broken bread and crushed grapes turned into wine.

 And it was all for us.

But then that beautiful rose did not stay in the grave. 

He arose and is coming again for us.

And the pastor pulled out a second rose, just as beautiful as the first.

He told how the grave could not hold this Rose and how He is coming again, not to be beaten and bruised ever again, but to be the Name above all names, the Rose before which every knee shall bow.

********************************'

And then the pastor asked us to stand and sing with him, 

"Jesus, Jesus, Jesus,

There's just something about that Name..."

And we sang "Jesus, Name Above All Names..." 

And the pastor said if, during the final chorus, anyone would want to come up to the altar and pray,

they were welcome.

And a mother sitting there--all she wanted to do was to go up there like the pastor said,

only instead of pray,

she just wanted to gather up all those broken fragments of the rose.

 She wanted to gather up all those broken pieces and hug them to herself and say in front of everybody that she just wanted to say "Thank You" for this beautiful Rose allowing Himself to be broken for us. 

She wanted to, but she did not have words to say what she wanted.

She was afraid that at her rate, it would just be a scene of some sort.

But the tears would not stay down.

In Sunday School that morning, they had discussed the ten lepers, and how only one came back to thank Jesus.

And here we'd been just told again the wonderful story of Jesus, and how He'd been broken for us,

and was there no one to thank Him?

The pastor's prayer ended with amen, and through tear blurred eyes

all of a sudden, the mother saw that not everyone was ignoring 

Sweet Sharon's broken rose.

A small child had taken off out of her seat and down the aisle--

and the mother knew what she was going to do!

That little daughter who loved animals...

 and loved music,

 the little daughter who can't bear to watch another cry,

who sympathizes with anyone in pain or sorrow,

she went straight up front and began to gather up the bruised petals with eager fingers.

 Unnoticed by anyone in particular, (except perhaps that mother who had wanted to do just that)

there she went.

Her childish innocence led the way for the one who had been afraid to make a scene.

"A little child shall lead them,"

and so the mother followed, and with her arm around her daughter's shoulders, 

she watched her gather up the broken petals strewn around the pulpit.

Together they gathered them gently, broken stem and all, 

and paused for a moment

kneeling there at the altar with simple, childish impulse

to say "Thank you!" 

Just a little child 

and another leper, another just "Samaritan," another Mary weeping at His feet...

 Just before leaving in our van, the pastor handed something inside the door

for the little girl who had cared about the broken rose.

And in the front seat where her mother sat, 

God handed another kind of rose--

the rose of a beautiful thought that took time to put together.

"Could you pull in here?" she asked her husband as they passed a cemetery on the way to dinner at Grandma and pa's.

"I want to see if there are any lilies of the valley!"

There weren't any, exactly, except these ones.
But it seemed to her that the pastor had forgotten to finish the sermon, and a thought was gnawing at her.

The pastor had forgotten about the lily of the valley.

 And when we are too weak and small and broken to relate in any way to the beautiful

Rose of Sharon,

when we can't even relate to its brokenness (because who can relate to such immense brokenness and such incomparable bruising as our sins did to His beauty?) 

we can relate to the little lilies with bowed heads,

the simple little flowers that prefer the shade

and bloom with heads that are always bowed...
whether in cemeteries or photos online as these were, or just in the secret, humble, broken corners of our hearts...

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The little white flowers with heads always bowed, saying, 

"Thank You!"
"I am the rose of Sharon," said our loving Lord.
"and the lily of the valleys."
And the Beloved responds from the depths of her heart in the next verse,
"Like a lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters."
May our hearts be inspired to be among His beloved whose love and gratitude for His love is like a lily among thorns.