The first of January...

Hello everyone... 

Here I am finally.. 

A beautiful Sunday afternoon and I am giving my new laptop a trial run.. 

Can't say that I am doing very good so far but we shall see.  

I won't bore you with all the details of me getting used to this but I am sure as the post goes on you will see my inexpertise..Not sure that is a word but you no doubt get my drift.. 

I loaded my pics on with my tablet and then turned this one to my dashboard .. 

I cannot find how to copy and paste as there seems to be no right click so the pics are all helter skelter... 

Whatever... 

One of our grandsons will show up and guide me before the next post, I am sure.  

Meanwhile, please be patient with me.. 

As usual just sharing some of our days with you all.. 

I think you must be finding this pretty boring each time.. 

Anyway... 

Above are a few little dried wreaths that I made the other day... 

Terry picked me a huge bunch of these flowers last summer (everlastings, I think they are called)..

the pic is below.. 

they dried very well... but I still need to put some ribbon and such on them. 

These are little prairie dolls I made from clothespins for two wee girls I know..

I found almost the whole set of Little House on the Prairie books for them and I thought they might like the dolls to go with them.. 

Soup days are very common here in the Henry house.. smile.. 

Trying to add more grains.. 

This one has barley, wild rice and something else, I think.. 

Just a tomato and chicken stock base and veggies.. 

I am not a meat lover so can leave that out really easy .. 

Especially when Terry prefers something else... 

Christmas just about depleted my gift pantry except for preserves so am pottering away making a few things.. 

A wee wreath here, a bottle or two of air freshener there or whatever... 

I used a bottle already for a hostess gift... 

Found a few more bottles in my closet the other day so plan to make a few more... 

I was telling Shonda about the idea of using glass vinegar jars for spray bottles.. Whether it is for room fresheners or cleaners.  

They are lovely. 

The spray contraption from the plastic bottles fit right on the nice glass one.. 

The only thing is that she and I bought our glass jars of vinegar in Calais as we couldn't find the right ones here in New Brunswick... 

Shared this on Instagram the other day.. 

makes perfect sense, eh? 

This is the pile of flowers all dried.. 

I just laid them on a shelf in the sunroom and then cut and glued them to small grapevine wreaths.. 

Will show you a pic when they are finished... 

Had a lovely time opening these dear gifts from our son the other day.. 

They were a bit late but not any less appreciated.. 

It was fun to receive them and know he wrapped each one.. 

We like you have the dearest children.. 

No matter how old they get nor how far away they roam they will always be our babies.. 

Miss this one an awful lot at times... 

So many of us here in Maritime Canada have loved ones out west working so I am not alone in this for sure.. 

Just pray daily that God keeps his Hand upon him.... 

We have started having our town days once a week again and we look forward to them.. 

Do you have a town day?  

I think it may be a retired couples who don't live in the city kind of thing.. grin.. 

I do enjoy this one day but unlike my dear mother I am not a shopper and never have been.. 

I prefer thrift and book shops above everything and farmer type market stores.. Love them, too.. 

Anyway.. 

Here are my finds the other day.. 

A dear little jam jar (old china), a tray to put this laptop on for when i use it, several books, cookbooks, Louis L:Amour although I think I have read every one but I am lucky if I can find one that I almost forget (grin), fancy cutting scissors, a valance for the laundry room, a pale yellow lace tablecloth, a potholder, a woven basket for my crochet, a sign that says Always Kiss Me Goodnight for our room... (just to remind him)  grin and a recycle bag or two.. 

In the Salvation Army they have lovely bags of cloth and such that you can buy for your purchases for only 25 cents.. 

The one above is from Old Navy... 

Sometimes after church on Sundays we go to the Big Stop for lunch.. 

We almost always buy the same thing.. 

He gets Liver and Onions and I buy soup or chowder.. 

This is clam chowder... 

It is better at times then others... 

This was a fair day... But the last time it was delicious... 

I dug out my crochet the other day and made a coffee cup cozy... 

It is finished but needs to have a couple of buttons sewed on and I have a plant pot hanger also mostly finished.. 

Love these winter days for pottering about, don't you?

I keep my little chochet projects in this little bag I made.. 

It is an old piece of embroidery tablecloth or such that was pretty well done for but salvaged enough for a drawstring bag... 

I wanted to share once again this recipe for good health... 

It s called Fire Shot and I really think it makes me feel better.. I bought a couple of little shot glasses at the thrift and try to take this on a regular basis.. 

It can't hurt you anyway I guess unless you are like my friend Pam and alergic to something like cinnamon.. 

Anyway dear hearts this is all for today.. 

Not done very well and I know there are misspelling but can't figure that one out yet either.. 

But all is well.. 

This old body has it's days with whatever but am blessed beyond measure... 

Have lost several dear ones the last few weeks and it makes me appreciate all that God has done for me.. 

Don't want to get melancholy but if I went today there are no complaints. 

He has been faithful... 

Thanks for dropping by once again and hopefully this blog will pick up and I will be more faithful to it... 

Loving these January days and the sweetness of home that they bring.. 

Candlelight, soup simmering on the stove, quiet chores and projects and sweet music.... 

Hubby busy in his workshop downstairs and Charlie snoring on the rug.. 

God is good... 

Sending hugs and blessings your way...

Saturday and Keepers...

Good Evening my friends.. 

Here we are another Saturday evening and once again I am posting.. 

I do hope you are having a good weekend.. 

This week I prepared for our Keepers of the Home meeting which we had today.. 

We had a roll of Christmas paper and a roll of brown parcel paper to make a garland.. 

A bit of twin and homespun rags and some sparkle.. 

We also made a table runner and some labels ... 

Here we used napkins and such..

I will show you more next post as I forgot to take pics of the labels and runners.. sorry.. 

I also took this Schnitz or Farmers Fruit Cake to have for our lunch.. 

It is an Ontario Mennonite recipe and uses dried apples.. 

I had a bag left over from last Fall and wanted to use them up.. 

It made 2 big cakes and is simply delicious.. 

Or I think so as I love fruit type cakes.. 

The flavour is very unique ... 

I hope to run my dehydrators this week getting a new supply of dried apples for the Winter.. 

Here are the girls learning a ribbon broach and ribbon roses from Carman.. 

We only had coffee, tea and Tim Hortons muffins for breakfast as we were going to have soup for lunch.. 

I love paper crafts as they are so relaxing to do.. 

A bit of glue and paper and such and voila you have it finished. smile.. 

We had a sweet visitor all the way from Manitoba today.. 

Melissa... 

She won one of the ribbon broaches ! 

So happy to have her company... 

Remember the soup base that we learned about a few meetings ago?  

Well, Carman went out very early this morning to her farmer's market and bought an organic chicken.. 

She took it home and cut it in two and brought a half plus her new cooker to our meeting.. 

The chicken was cooked in 20 minutes.. 

She adjusted the recipe from her Romanian way to Canadian busy ladies method.. grin...

She placed the chicken pieces, a whole onion, a few parsnip, half a bunch of celery, 3 carrots and water into her new pressure cooker which does 7 different chores (like rice cooker, canner and such) and cooked it away while we did crafts.. 

She bought this wonder pot from Costco...

Then later she added only a third of the soup base.. 

And a bit of her homemade tomato juice and several potatoes chopped up.. 

It simmered away while we crafted and then at lunch time it was ready.. 

This was served over polenta along with fresh rolls..  

So good.. 

We usually just have a breakfast together but this was a once a year craft day for Christmas.. 

Twas fun !

Our little devotional was on Psalms 91 and a challenge to read it everyday for 30 days.. We will learn to really appreciate that Christ is our refuge and dwelling place no matter what goes on in this crazy world we live in.. 

Psalm 91

1 Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
    will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.[a]
2 I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
    my God, in whom I trust.”

3 Surely he will save you
    from the fowler’s snare
    and from the deadly pestilence.
4 He will cover you with his feathers,
    and under his wings you will find refuge;
    his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
5 You will not fear the terror of night,
    nor the arrow that flies by day,
6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness,
    nor the plague that destroys at midday.
7 A thousand may fall at your side,
    ten thousand at your right hand,
    but it will not come near you.
8 You will only observe with your eyes
    and see the punishment of the wicked.

9 If you say, “The Lord is my refuge,”
    and you make the Most High your dwelling,
10 no harm will overtake you,
    no disaster will come near your tent.
11 For he will command his angels concerning you
    to guard you in all your ways;
12 they will lift you up in their hands,
    so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
13 You will tread on the lion and the cobra;
    you will trample the great lion and the serpent.

14 “Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him;
    I will protect him,  for he acknowledges my name.
15 He will call on me, and I will answer him;
    I will be with him in trouble,
    I will deliver him and honor him.
16 With long life I will satisfy him
    and show him my salvation.”

 Thank you dear hearts for visiting and letting me know you dropped by.. 
I appreciate it.. 
Still busy trying to get things done around here.. 
We were to the cottage and Terry winterised it for the season but our cold room still needs done and so on and so on.. 
It is sort of discouraging when you know a lot of people are all trimmed and decorated for Christmas !! 

The only thing I have done in that direction is to start a new Pinterest Board with some ideas for this year.. 
I plan to go a new direction by just using fresh and simple decorations.. 
When the holidays are over all I will do is take it down and not have to pack it all away... 
I have been wanting to do experiment with this for a couple of years so we will see how it turns out.. 
Here is my pinterest link...

 https://www.pinterest.com/fayehenry/a-fresh-simple-christmas/

Let me know what you think?  I will use special keepsakes and ornaments, of course but mostly fresh greens and such.. 

Terry and Dustin are gathering me lots of greens, mosses, cones and rose hip branches, etc. and putting them on the deck.. I will work away every once in awhile on garlands, wreaths and whatever but keep them in the cold until a few weeks before Christmas.. They would dry out if I did them before that, eh? 

Anyway.. we shall see....

Tomorrow is the Lord's Day.. Have a blessed one.. 
Sending you hugs from Eastern Canada...

The blog is back....

Hello my dears.. 

So glad to be able to post here tonight.. 

Early this morning my dear sister called me to say that something was wrong with The Blessed Hearth... 

She said some popup kept her from seeing anything of the blog.. 

Great !!

You who have been following the blog know that I am not a computer wizard by anyone's imagination.. 

I started blogging about 5 years ago when we bought our first computer.. 

A dear lady who was my hero most of my life. (Sara) told me to learn everything I could about it when I mentioned to her that we had bought one.. 

I decided then to try and do just that.. smile.. 

So.. 

I had found a few blogs that I loved and took the plunge for one of my own.. 

It was scary many times but through trial and error I managed to get a blog started... 

It was called Primitive Lace and really was just a learning phase for me.. 

When I started the Keepers of the Home group I decided I would try a blog about Home.. 

In time, I stopped the first one and centred my time on The Blessed Hearth.. 

It has been a blessing and I have met so many dear people... 

I never really know who reads this or even just looks at the pics but am so thrilled when someone like my sweet cousin told me today that she never misses a post or my sister and you all leaving sweet comments either here or on my FB page... 

Anyway... 

After she called I took a look and my heart sank.. 

I took about an hour and tried to fix it and thought for sure it was over... smile.. 

We went to the farm for the day and when we came home I tried for about 2 hours to find what was wrong.. 

I could not get rid of the pop up.. 

Believe me, I am praying and asking the Lord for help and as always He was faithful and I happened to find a forum that said to delete java links.. 

I did.. all of them and checked and it was fixed.. 

Thank you, dear Lord.. 

So.. 

Here we are.. 

Just a little everyday post of things we are doing..

Home things.. 

Shonda did a lot of painting, the dear girl.. 

Cupboard doors are all painted in the Linen colour.. 

She and her Dad were busy for hours... 

Then she glazed them all.. 

As usual, I cooked.. grin.. 

Soup season is back again and of course this soup junkie is back on board.. 

Vegetable Soup.. 

Eat as much as you like.. Hardly any calories.. 

Flavoured with pesto... 

We are doing our counter top, too so I won't be able to show you the finished job for awhile.. 

It is hunting season here, you know.. grin.. 

All in due time... 

Then another drive to the farm ... 

Isn't this beautiful.. 

A house in Albert County, of course.. 

I cleaned and decluttered the cupboards and took some of the excess to the farm house.. 

Just a few old dishes and such.. 

Terry started the floor in the pantry and I made some no knead bread..

Caesar Salad...

And stew...

It was a fun day but I did wonder how I would get this blog fixed.. 

So glad it worked.. 

I will have to return the blog list and such again later.. 

Somehow the Spam Pop up was coming through one of the links ... 

Disgusting, eh? 

Anyway, dear hearts thanks for your visits and comments.. 

I really appreciate you all.. 

God bless... 

Winter days and Winter nights..

Good Evening dear hearts.. 

Hope you are having a great week.. 

We are having a January thaw here in New Brunswick which is lovely, although it has caused a bit of flooding in the area.. 

Otherwise everything is good here on the home front..

We are just doing Winter things like baking bread, making soups, cleaning the freezer and cold room and such..  

Then we have a nice supper and enjoy the long evenings.. 

I go to bed earlier in the Winter and read for an hour or so before I go to sleep.. 

Do you read before snoozing off..

Something woke me up in the middle of the night.. 

As I lay there I heard someone walking under our open window..   

I could tell that it was something bigger then a cat so I jabbed Terry in the ribs and whispered that there was something outside.. 

It took him a minute to wake up but then he said it was just deer.. 

How could he know that...

I heard it again and gave him another jab.. 

I guess he decided he may as well get up and look .. 

The moon was bright and he could see 2 deer plainly.. 

He said one of the deer had a bad leg and it looked like it might have been broken.. 

I expect all the ice on Saturday probably caused lots of injuries in the deer population.   

The poor things.. 

We could see lots of tracks around the apple trees this morning..

At least they found something to eat.. 

I wonder if they will come back tonight.. smile..

I have been informed not to wake up Mr. Henry again as it took him sometime to get back to sleep.. 

He said my shivering and shaking kept him awake.. 

Oh brother... LOL..

I am preparing for our Keepers of the Home meeting which will be held on Saturday morning at 9 am.. 

If you live near Salisbury and would like to join us we would love to have you.. 

Just let me know by email or twitter.. 

houseofhenry@hotmail.com 

 or

HERE  which is my twitter account.. 

That is all for tonight so please keep warm and safe.. 

I hope I am not boring you and you all come back.. OK...

I look forward to hearing from you . 

God bless and keep you.. 

Hugs..

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