Lost Art of Living Series: Ferments

I am going to be going through a series called Lost Art of Living.

I'm always shocked that not only does my generation not know how to cook, but they don't know how food has been handled for centuries. 

I want to breakdown a number of practices my family has:

(1) Fermented Food

(2) Bone Broths

(3) Raw Milk

(4) Sourdough Breads

(5) Soaking, Sprouting, Fermenting Grains

(6) Herbal Medicine in the Home

(7) Organic, Grass-Fed Meats

And Whatever Else Crosses My Mind!

I want to talk about how to cook, how to stick within a budget making these things, how to get the kids on board, how to fit these practices into a busy life.

These will all be Youtube style videos. 

None will be glorious.

All will be real life, probably whim of the moment, and definitely filled with screaming kids, spit up on my shirt, makeup smeared on my face, and interruption filled events because that's what you get!!

If you're new here, I am a mom of 6 children (so far). We mesh all sorts of styles of life with our faith in Yeshua (Jesus) of the Bible and our relationship with Him that makes us sure we will go to heaven when we die. You'll experience some Liberian culture, some American culture, some Jewish culture, and a whole lot of love for Jesus. 

We have dealt with many, MANY chronic illnesses as well as some that have close to taken the lives of our children. We are proud to announce that through the practices I want to lay out in this Lost Art of Living Series we have nearly cured all of them! Praise God!

Feel free to comment, subscribe, leave feedback. Check us out on Facebook (Alex Cassie Deputie), Youtube, and, of course my blog here!

Here is the first video:

The Purge

The Purge.

I'm SO Not talking about the movie... sick...

I'm talking about what happens in our home every spring and fall.

I had my checklists, charts, graphs, pictures, bullet points, schedule... haha just kidding... kinda...

You're thinking What the heck is she talking about?!?

I'M SO TIERED OKAY!

The Purge.

We start with everyone's clothes. I tally up how many pieces everyone has then I make my lists of what items are needed. Usually spring and summer things are on sale at the end of summer such as well as swim wear and summer shoes. 

It's a great time to get things for next season!

I scored a new suit for Alex for $9 at Walmart.

We're going to try some shoe places for summer shoes for next year.

Wha happens when you let the kids label their own bins without supervision... 

Next day we go through winter clothes and the closet that we store things in. I, again, tally what everyone has and needs and re consider how things are organized. I usually rearrange furniture, purchase some new organizing pieces, or install some new hooks and shelves. With a large family you continually need to do this year after year. People move in, people move out, new babies enter stage left, family flow and function changes.

The final day is tallying school supplies and re organizing any bins or baskets that store things. Decoration changes usually happens this day! Here's some pics of the final products :)

Entry Way

For our shoes. So tired of piles of shoes everywhere.
Hoping to get those hanging dividers to place in here.

Backpacks, vests, and sweatshirts.
We're building a separate place for jackets and snow pants.

Dining Room

Added a buffet table. We can't seem to fit food and everyones plates and cups on the table anymore. 

Kitchen

Still trying to find a new place for my bulk bins so I can place plants on that shelf. 

Yes we eat that many eggs...

As you can see we eat mostly canned food and bulk goods.

My new chalkboards my girls gave me and our medicine cabinet. 

Office/Guest Room

Games, Gift Wrap, and family library or reference books.

School supplies, school books and craft supplies

I have a few more things left to clean and organize before I'm done (is it ever really done?), but I'm in a good place to start our school year this coming Tuesday.

This guy is ready to go to the gun range...  or maybe a nap?

I had a very sweet moment with the Lord this morning. Exhausted, running on coffee and pure "mission mode" mentality and sleepless adrenalin (if that's a thing? - I guess it is in mom world), I have been up until 1:00am and up at 5:45am, I had my quiet time with Jesus and my Bible and coffee. Then I was reading some article on feminism. After this I made an egg bake and jumped in the shower. With 30 minutes left until my egg bake was done, I woke up one of my girls to get her in the shower.

I was brushing her hair - the one that has a LOT OF THICK CURLY HAIR - and I tapped into "mission mode". Hurry, get this done, quickly, let's go!

Then the Lord stopped me. He reminded me of when I make Challah bread for our Shabbat and how I spend that time kneading my bread and praying for my family. I pray over our food, over my husband, over my kids, over my home, over my church family, all while I knead those loaves of Challah. It takes a while, and it's strenuous work, but I turned it into a time I look forward to each week.

The Lord reminded me of the article I read about feminism. He was pouring into my heart a renewed love and passion for my children, my husband, my home, and my church family. I was overwhelmed with patience and joy and excitement to provide a safe, organized, comfortable place for these growing characters, these souls that will spend their lives on a tiresome journey called life, these precious children of God who are bombarded by the world, their flesh and the enemy day in and day out.

Then the Lord whispered into my heart to spend the time showering and brushing, praying over my daughter. I prayed that the Lord would make her a beautiful, chaste, meek, faithful daughter of Him. We had great conversation in the steamy bathroom on this cool morning in the quiet before anyone else's little feet came pit pattering across the floors. 

As I did my bi-annual purge, I took this renewed perspective and prayed over my home. I prayed that our school year would be fruitful. I prayed I wouldn't hold my home to dear to myself, but that the Lord would have His way with it. I prayed it would be a clean, comfortable, welcoming place, fully functional for all that the Lord wants to use it for. 

I guess the Lord had more then just a physical purge for our home this season. It was a spiritual one ridding me of my poor perspective and cultivating that joy that I blog about so often.

There really is No Greater Joy then to serve the Lord and to see my children walk in truth.

Here's some ideas for the checklists I use for this during season. 

I add onto them and change them every year to better fit our needs. 

This has a page 2 that includes:

Tape (scotch)

Tape (masking)

Tape (duct)

Tempera Paint

Water Colors

Print Brushes

Hot Glue

If you would like these emailed to you, please shoot me an email.

Getting Your Milk Supply Off To A Great Start

Here are some tips and tricks (as a mama of 6) that I've used to get a LARGE milk storage in my freezer as well as get my milk supply off to a great start.

This is an average pump after a feeding.

• Once Milk Comes In, PUMP! Right when that milk comes in, start pumping after every feeding- even through the night. Yes, it seems like a daunting task, but you should be in bed (or at least at home) resting from your labor and delivery anyway. I pump after every single feeding for about 2 weeks or so, then I start tapering it down to 1-2 times a day during the 3rd and 4th week.
• Water and Food: Please drink LOTS of water and eat LOTS of food high in calories, fat, protein, nutrients.
• Organic Raw Milk: If you can get raw milk, drinking 2-4 large glasses of this a day really boosts your milk supply.
• Sleep: Taking naps (I know it can be hard, I have 6 kids!!) makes a big difference in your nursing and milk supply levels. 
• Dont Stress: Enjoy the chaos, cancel most of your plans and tasks, enjoy nursing, pumping and building up your storage and milk supply. It's going to save you stress and time in the long run mama!
• Pregnancy and Breastfeeding Tincture: Not only do the herbs selected for this tincture increase and support a LARGE milk supply, but they also help with colic babies! I can tell when I have forgotten to take this tincture since Evelyn will be a bit more gassy then normal. My sister has said the same thing with her newborn. (You can get 10% off using to code: NOGREATERJOY2018)

Now take a look at my stash now that Evelyn is 1 month old! 

2 drawers and the whole fridge door full... soon this freezer may be exclusively for breast milk!

It's INSANE RIGHT?!

What do I do with all this milk?

• Babysitters: I never have to worry about needing to be apart from Evelyn in the next year.
• Sicknesses: Ear infections or really any sickness that comes I can warm up a bottle of this nutrient, antibody rich milk for any of my children in a flash
• Other Moms: I have used my milk supply to help other moms who need some supplemental feedings for their infants

I suppose there are many other creative things you can do with this liquid gold.

I love being able to provide my baby with the healthiest (cheapest) options that I can and starting my child off to a great start with breast milk is one of the ways I can do that! YAY!!

Insanity of Life with Newborn #6

The baby is changed, fed, burped and laid down... success!

SHHH!! Don't move or talk to loud. She's finally asleep! 

Waaaaaaaa!

Another 2 hours pass and again, baby is changed, fed, burped, asleep. 
My husband is snoring next to me, and I can hear a couple kids breathing loudly and some beds squeaking as they toss and turn in their slumber - these old hand-me-down bunk beds have really run their course.  Even when the house rests it's never fully silent. The deep breathing, the fan humming, the darkness comforting. I finally rest my head and fall asleep.

Several hours later I hear the grunting and squeaking of my newborn at the foot of my bed. I know I have a few minutes before she starts crying to be nursed. I lean over and glance at my phone. 2:30am. I got a good 2 hours of sleep. Waddling to the bathroom I hear my 4th born begin to talk in his sleep. He's woken up with nightmares almost every night since he was about 9-months old. I tiptoe back to my room hoping not to exasperate him in his dreaming state.

I nurse Evelyn, lay her down, pray she stays asleep and start to pump. As I pump I drink the remainder of my water, take my Pregnancy and Breastfeeding Tincture and PMS tincture and browse Pinterest just to stay awake. This cycle repeats 1-2 more times before her 8am feeding at which time both my toddler and 4-year-old are already awake and "dying of starvation."

I quick go downstairs, grab some bananas, use the bathroom, grab some cold coffee out of the pot (hey, I'm desperate...), and hurry back upstairs to nurse the baby. I feed the boys bananas while I begin my nursing/pumping routine. Thankfully one of my older 3 kids wakes up and can start getting the boys ready for the day. Also, thankfully, I put some steel cut oats in the crock pot the night before and they're all set to get dished up.

Half asleep I make my way downstairs, baby in one arm, two containers full of breast milk in the other, and the other two girls carrying everything else I need but don't have enough arms to haul downstairs.  Then I blink. Sometime between waking up, wiping my toddlers butt, changing the baby from spitting up and blowing out, brewing some hot coffee, nursing again, feeding myself some breakfast, and getting the girls settled in to do their reading with me, I look at my phone and its 12pm - noon! 

No wonder the toddler is so crabby... it's lunch time and we just finished breakfast.

I brushed my hair at 6pm.

I changed my bra for the first time in 3 days at 8pm.

Here it is 11pm and what am I doing?

Listening to the quiet sounds of snoring children... and blogging...

not sleeping... blogging... 

Motherhood is strange.

Insanity sometimes.

I don't think I'll ever think straight or be able to truly focus on anything... ever again.

But I can't tell you how much JOY I have being able to proclaim that I am a PROUD mother of 6 beautiful children. 

I love them, my husband, and most of all my Jesus who gives me the strength, patience, endurance, peace, joy, and selflessness to do this insane thing called motherhood. 

Preparing for the New Year/School Year: Large Family Style

Ahh the third trimester! 

Not much energy, but a STRONG desire to NEST! 

Thankfully I've remained physically strong and worked out the entire pregnancy! What perfect timing to nest! 

Now, I am NOT a "minimalist", but I DO love the mentality to only keep what is necessary. In America, we are given more to want and greed and often have to learn to choose moderation and contentment. This is crucial when you have 6 children and 3 adults in one modest-sized home (I LOVE MY HOME!). Several times a year we go through all our belongings (clothes, towels and sheets, toiletries, books, craft supplies, board games, shoes and coats, toys) and keep only what is in good condition, builds us up, or that we've used regularly.

Too much is more to manage, more that occupies our time. 

Too many toys means more time picking up.

Too much craft supplies means a larger mess to clean up.

Too much clothing, blankets, towels and sheets means more time spent on laundry.

Too many dishes means more to wash.

Too much living room clutter makes things feel smaller and cramped. 

We do school from January-October so that November and December can be filled with leisure, baking, family & friends, and wraps up with purging and organizing for the school year & New Year! We spent the last week of December pulling out my stock pile of supplies and refilling what we need for the year as far as crayons, markers, glue, scissors, rulers, paper, and pencils (Lakeshore Learning or Costco bulk people!). We also weed through used coloring books, broken board games, and useless activities from last Christmas. 

Alex talking to the kids about the New Year and things the Lord's laid on his heart for our family 

__________________________________________

Pray and Plan: Alex and I sit down and evaluate the kids characters, their progress in school, our daily schedule and happenings, our desires, goals, and our plan to grow our children into maturity. We type it up and pray over it. I then work on the logistics in my own time typing up a tentative daily schedule and make sure all my ministry and business plans don't interfere with the bulk of our days. 

Character
? What character traits does each child need to mature in?
? How can we get them there?
? What are some problem areas?
? Where do they need to become more responsible?
? What affects their negative behavior?
? Can it be removed or replaced?
? Where can they have more independence?
? Are the children respectful?
? Do they respond how we want them to?
? Where and why is there contention in the home?
? Where and why is there laziness?

Home
? How is the daily flow?
? Are the house cores manageable?
? How can you split up all the house work amongst the kids to keep it clean and organized?
? Are meals managble - time, money, healthy, enough to share?
? Are meal prep times convient or can they be combined to create less time in the kitchen?
? Can another family member take over in making 1-2 of the daily meals?
? Is the home too cluttered?
? How can you spend less time cleaning?
? Is clothing clean, modest, in good condition?
? Is the managing of clothing an effective system or can it be simplified more?

Personal
? Is your prayer and devotional life the first thing, most important, uncompromising?
? Does your marriage have time? 
? Is your spouse REALLY held as most important?
? Do you have a date night?
? A family night?
? A sabbath?
? Do you get enough sleep (night and naps - or one night a week your spouse takes over the midnight wanderers)?
? Can the kids sleeping schedule adjust to suit yours better?
? Do you get exercise (10-30 minutes a day)?

Ministry
? Are you serving the church in some way?
? Are you freeing your husband up to lead in the church?
? Is your ministry interfering with your home life?
? Can you alter something so it doesn't interfere, but still serve?
? How can the kids serve along side you (sit quietly - serve along side you)?

Curriculum
? What are the main goals?
? Does it all fit in a day/week?
? What do you want to teach and what can be indepentendet or simplified?
? Can you afford what you're using or wanting to use?
? Is there a less expensive option?
? Does everything need to be taught at this time?
? Can you do "mini courses" focusing on one subject for half the year and another the other half?
? Does your time off fit with the pulse of your family's life or can it be adjusted?

Time and Flow
? Do schedules or routines work better for your family (set times for events, or just an idea of what comes next)?
? Do you have ideas for the younger kids to keep them occupied?
? Do the younger kids have time with you during the day?
? Is there time unscheduled for kids to be bored (SO IMPORTANT!)? 
? Are there open-ended, educational materials provided for bored times (books, encyclopedias, legos, blocks, crafts, library books)?
? Does daddy get time with the kids?
? Can things adjust so they get time with their dad and it works with his schedule (late nights, early mornings, school at different time during the day?)?

New Year Shortbread cookies and Tea!!!

_____________________________

The beauty of homeschool is the flexibility we get. Don't get caught up in the conventional idea of school or how to run a home. 

You don't HAVE to fold clothes, match socks, or hang dresses. 

You can have a family closet with everyone's clothes.

You can mop the floor in swim suits with soapy water and plastic boats floating everywhere.

Baking, gardening, grocery shopping, and filling the car with gas can all be educational.

Your children's character training will make them FAR more productive to society then formal schooling will.

You don't have to finish that lesson that day.

You can do 4 lessons in one day.

Everyone can join in the reading of that biography and glean something from it.

You can have a math day, then a reading day, then a science day instead of doing all in one day.

You can do a 3 day school week or a 6 day school week.

Your schooling can be in the evening, on the weekend, or through the summer.

You can all stay up until midnight and start your day at 10am.

You can double dinner and eat it again the next day.

You can eat left over dinner for lunch the following day. 

You can snack ALL DAY then you don't need to make lunch!

The kids day can consist of mostly house work and very little school work.

You can have a whole day dedicated to BORDEM where kids explore what they're interested in.

You can have field trips in the mornings - on week days!

Sick days can be science documentary days or history audio book days. 

You can combine the older kids and the younger kids in the same level of curriculum and teach them all at the same time.

What do YOU want?

What CAN you do?

Will your children be ready for adulthood?

Can they manage time, money, relationships?

Do they have a work ethic?

Can they make wise choices?

Do they know how to learn?

All this is what my husband and I think and pray over during this time and readjust how things flow. 

I hope this helps you! 

The last thing I want to stress is the importance of your children's character: They cannot learn or be taught if they cannot listen and respect to authority, if they cannot control what they want and do what they need to do. If they do not respond to the parent properly, how can you teach them anything?! How will they be ready for life as an adult? This is SO IMPORTANT and needs to take priority over formal schooling.

Deputie's Hanukkah 2017!!! **LOTS OF PHOTOS!!**

Happy Hanukkah!

We LOVE celebrating Hanukkah as a family! We've done it before half-heartedly, but this year we purposed to go all out. We typed up our own Bible study to do each night of Hanukkah, went over the history of the holiday as a family, made all the traditional food, listened to the music, and purposed to try to have people over and involved over the whole 8-day celebration!

In the first part of this post I want to talk about how simple it is to start celebrating this holiday then I want to zoom into the studies we did and how we see Yeshua (that's Jesus' actual name folks!) throughout the WHOLE Bible! My husband lead these studies and had the kids or whoever was joining us that night read the passages out loud. These studies were filled with some serious laughter sessions! Sometimes it took us over an hour to do one of these because we were having so much fun!

Where Do We Start?
(1) Get a Hanukkah Menorah. These Menorah's have 1 Shemash (the servant candle in the center) and 8 branches for the 8 days the oil lasted for the Macabees when they were rededicating the temple.

(2) Know the History: Do a quick study on the history of this holiday.

(3) Know what the Bible Says: Research where the Feast of Dedication is mentioned in the scripture. It's important to realize that Jesus celebrated this holiday as well as read what he said while attending this feast.

(4) Cook some Food: Fried in oil is really the goal. You can make latkes or traditional Hanukkah doughnuts called sufganiyot or just make simple friend doughnuts. We eat a very un-kosher Hanukkah meal (after all we are Gentiles), so we're not too strict on the dairy-meat regulations or even the pork regulations... Just being honest.

(5) Print the Study and Open Your Bibles: At sundown light the shemash, use the she mash to light the first candle, pull out your Bible's and start exploring the Light of the World through all of history!

(6) Play Games and Watch movies: You can play the traditional dreidel game with chocolate coins, or just your normal board games or card games. You can watch movies as a family, dance to music, or just wrestle on the floor.

It's really not that difficult. But the studies are the core of the holiday for us. Even if we don't have time every evening to sit down and play games, we fit the study in before we do anything else.

Why Do This?
Personally, the Lord laid on our heart while we were in Israel this last month to celebrate all the feasts of the Bible with our kids this year. WE have celebrated Hanukkah a little bit our whole marriage, but never fully. We do it simply for the opportunity to teach our kids the deep symbolic meanings of these feasts and how they all mirror Jesus Christ (Yeshua)! It's amazing the amount of wisdom, knowledge, and peace that we've seen our family grow into over this 8-day celebration!

We don't feel we have any religious obligation to celebrate this feast, we simply wanted to use it as a time to teach our children and enjoy a feast that Jesus celebrated. It has so much more meaning then Christmas does in terms of Biblical application.

What If My Husband's Not On Board?
He's the head of the home! Ask him if he's okay with you celebrating it and ask him if he's willing to participate in any degree even if it's just being present. If he's still not feeling it, then let it go. You can still lead your children in a Bible study without celebrating the whole holiday. :)

8-Night Bible Studies:
These are the core to the celebration for our family. Everything else is just icing on the sufganiyot! We easily spend 1-2 hours on these studies and ask questions, cross references verses, bring in the kids memory verses from their CKC books (similar to Awana), and talk about current events, historical events, and prophetic events. It's so rich, yet so simple. Every person receives something from these studies. Our 4-year old all the way to the adults that join us that night. 

I attached a PDF copy of what we started with for our studies and some activity ideas for the day. We added to these as we went through them and they'll probably change as the years progress and we make our celebration of Hanukkah our own!

If you want the full study in PDF just leave a comment below with your email and I will email it to you without publicly sharing your email address. :)

Day One: Light of Creation
We learned that Jesus (Yeshua) is the light of the world who has always been since the beginning of Creation. All things are made for Him and through Him and nothing was made without Him. We learned that in Him there is no darkness!

We made traditional jelly doughnuts (Sufganiyot) invited a few friends over, made paper dreidels, had a Big feast, frosted Hanukkah cookies, and watched half of Fiddler on the Roof!

Day Two: Light of Noah
We explored the similarities of Judah Maccabee and Noah standing u for righteousness in a dark time. We learned how Yeshua and the ark that Noah put his faith in are similar. Yeshua is our salvation that hides us from God's (Yahweh's) wrath coming on the earth to judge sin. We talked about what faith is and how we can apply the faith Noah had to our lives.

We made TONS of cinnamon sugar doughnuts, then packed up our feast and shared it at church with our brothers and sisters in Christ!

Day Three: Light of Abraham
We explored Abraham's obedience to Yahweh and his willingness to sacrifice his son, just like Yahweh did with His son Yeshua!

We colored some wooden dreidels, did a questionnaire sheet on Abraham's story, spent time dancing, had a big feast, ate doughnuts, played dreidel then finished watching Fiddler on the Roof.

Day Four: Light of Moses and Israel
We read through the Passover and investigated the parallels between the Passover lamb and Yeshua! We also read about when Moses received the law from Yahweh on Mount Sinai and how the intention of the law was to show us our need for a Savior. 

This was Alex and I's date night, so the kids had fun with their babysitter playing games, watching a short movie, and dancing to music. 

Day Five: Light of Yeshua: Birth, Life, and Death
We went to my mom and step-dad's house for our celebration this night. We read Isaiah 53 and talked about how that passage was written hundreds of years before Jesus. We broke it down and talked about how it applied to Yeshua. We read through the story of Yeshua's birth, some of death, and His purpose for coming to earth. We went over the gospel message and how we can attain salvation.

My mom and husband set out my mom's Christmas Village, we ate food, cut the kids hair, danced to music, played with toys, and watched movies until late into the night.

Day Six: Light Given to the Jewish People then the Gentiles
We learned about how Yeshua was Jewish and talked about what it meant to become a Jew. We learned that Yahweh chose the Jewish people to be a light in this world. We read that the Jewish people rejected Yeshua as Messiah and salvation was available to Gentiles. We learned what "grafted in" means and looked at the grafted in symbol and talked about what it means for us.

On this night, we laughed so HARD during the study! Aryeh was enjoying himself so much he was just hysterical. He was opening a Bible pretending to read and then at any sign of something funny he was rolling on the ground laughing. Elias fell asleep while sitting up during the study which caused us to laugh even harder. The people we planned to get together with ended up getting sick so it was just us.

Day Seven: Light of Today (Evangelism & Great Commission)
On this night we spent the day making our Hanukkah Window Decorations that I put off until Day 7! Oops!! We did our study and then spent the night watching movies and eating cookies. Nothing too exciting this night. Our plan was to practice sharing the gospel and role play situations with the kids, but we were so wiped out we ended up just going to bed :)

Day Eight: Light of Rapture & Millennium Reign of Yeshua
Our last night was one with two of our dearest little friends and we talked about Yeshua's return! We were anticipating this evening to be a joyous one sharing with the kids what we have to look forward to, but turns out one of the scriptures we read lead to the discussion of the ANti-Christ, mark of the beast, and installment of the one-world religion which lead to fountains of tears! 

We shared with the kids that there are believers all over the world being put to death for their beliefs. We also reassured the kids we won't be here when this anti-Christ system is put into motion, however, persecution is a real thing and death is going to come to all of us. But we get to reign and rule with Jesus Christ for all eternity!!! 

Oh, the hope we have!

We had a complete blast celebrating Hanukkah this year and plan on doing it every year adding to our family traditions and hopefully bringing others along for the ride with us! Alex already has many ideas and is jotting down things he wants to implement next year!