Things I Love (April 2025 Edition)
hope of growing things, composted life, sourdough, scent of water, wind
Hope for Growing Things: I aspire to be a real gardener and every year put a few things in the ground. What I lack in know-how, I make up for in enthusiasm. I don’t know anyone who gets more excited to see little things coming up out of the ground than I do. Azalea and I took a trip to the hardware store and bought some marigolds, vinca, and petunias to plant in the beds in our front yard. Every time I walk by these flowers it makes me feel rich.
We have been pulling up weeds and getting the soil ready to plant our backyard seeds. Which brings me to something that I love:
Compost. What a loaded metaphor! I keep a bowl on the kitchen counter for all of our kitchen scraps. When it gets too unsightly, someone takes it out and dumps it in a heap at the edge of our yard. Every now and then we will turn it under the soil that is around it. But for the most part, we are super lazy. We just make a pile. Leaves fall on top of it. Worms find it. And eventually, I dig around and find beautiful, loose, rich-smelling soil. There is something so comforting about the whole process to me. It is the picture of redemption and the kindness of God. Throw me the waste of your life, and let me make something useful and fertile where beautiful, life-giving, nourishing things can grow.
The Scent of Water: I just finished rereading this moving novel by Elizabeth Goudge about a woman who inherits the home of a deceased aunt that she never knew. As the story unfolds, through old diaries and the characters we meet, we discover the aunt’s bouts with mental illness and seasons of losing herself in darkness, the struggle to understand her condition and to find peace within the limitations of her life. The story is about hope for broken things, about losing yourself and trusting yourself to God and allowing him to bring you through. When Aunt Mary was still a girl, after she had had her first struggles with her dark times, an old man told her a prayer that would help her all of her life. “Lord, have mercy. Thee I adore. Into thy hands.” I have been saying this prayer, and I find it does help to relieve my fears, express the deepest desire of my heart—to love and please God, and reminds me that surrender is the best that I can do at any moment.” Highly recommend. Thanks to
for introducing me to Elizabeth Goudge through her soul-stirring book of recommendations, Book Girl.Gluten-Free Sourdough: I have done it! I am still tweaking my measurements, but so far, I’ve made 7 loaves of (hard, but) delicious loaves of gluten free sourdough. I have sliced them all up and stuck them in a bag in the freezer, and am enjoying them every morning with a fried egg and some orange marmalade. Thanks so much to
for writing this post where she gave me hope that I could do this. I also love having sourdough discard in the fridge. This feels like a new era of baking ahead of me.Kitchen Help: We are going to try each of the older kids (6 out of 9) taking over the cooking of a meal one night a week. The idea is this: each child is assigned a weekday to make dinner. They have already decided what it will be. I will help as needed the first week or two, with the idea that every Monday night is burger night (or whatever it is) and in a few weeks, I won’t have to help when we make burgers, etc. The thought of not having to think about/prep/plan/cook dinner 6 nights out of the week is a huge relief to me. I love to cook and bake, but I am literally spending half of my waking hours doing it right now. This feels like a great way to teach some good life/kitchen skills as well. And it gives all the picky eaters a chance to pick what they’d like to learn to make.
Wind: I am typing this in my front yard, and the wind is absolutely wild. I mostly tend to forget that I am alive. But a gust of wind like this reminds me. I am here. There is breath in my body. There is a beating heart inside me. The world, as dark and difficult as it can be, is full of the beauty, grace, and breath of God. I want to breathe it in. I want to live.
Sending hope for many beautiful things to love in your life,
Mackenzie
Upcoming: Today is the last day to RSVP for next Monday’s women’s event at The Torch in Cornelia. Just shoot me a message if you want to come by midnight tonight! April 21, 6:30-8:30, dinner and journals will be provided. Would love to have you join us. I’m going to be speaking about finding vision for your life and listening to the voice of God.
Rosie won!!! Thanks so much to all who came out to hear our daughter, Rosie, compete at Fender’s Alley last week. She won the first round, and will go on to the final round on May 3, at 6:00 p.m. The winner will get an evening gig at Fenders Alley as well as studio time in local recording studio. Would love to see you there! If you want to hear Rosie’s music, you can find her here on Substack at
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Paloma’s Journals and Postcards are Now Available in our Family Shop!
Our fifteen-year-old daughter, Paloma has a new unlined journal/sketchbook available just in time for spring! Use it as a garden journal, write your memoirs, doodle, write your prayers, copy passages from the Bible or your favorite books… It has 30 adorable little drawings in the corners of the pages. She also has her adorable drawings available as printable color-your-own postcards. You can find these in our shop by clicking the image below.
From the family archive:
As Good Friday approaches, I want to share this song again that Randy wrote a couple of years ago. It is a reflection on and response to Christ’s suffering, which has given us life.