Happy Independence Day!

I often feel uncomfortable around displays of overt patriotism.  It often seems unthinking, a general “The USA is the best – it doesn’t matter what we or our government does, we’re still always right.”  And so, I tend to shy away from saying anything that could be construed as, “I love my country.”  I don’t know that I think Christians should really say that – I think our allegiance needs to be higher than to our country.

But the fact is, I still get teary listening to the Star Spangled Banner being sung (particularly when it’s sung well – go here to find three fun examples) and I am incredibly grateful for the peaceful nation that we live in, where we are basically free to live and speak as we think is right.

Here is how we express our patriotism – by growing our own vegetables, buying at thrift stores, making our own presents, and generally resisting the “fast food, fast everything” mantra/disease that seems to be taking over our country.  Or, you could say, we’re “sticking it to The Man” – particularly big agribusiness.  (In the interests of true self-disclosure, I would like to confess that Tina and I did go shopping at the outlets yesterday and I bought 4 dresses.  Excessive I know, but I needed one for a wedding, one was only $5, one is for school, and the other one was because Tina insisted.  And I haven’t bought a dress for over two years.  So we don’t always manage to resist the lure of capitalism.)

Early fruits of our garden:

Chard and lettuce:

Cauliflower (yes, one huge plant produced that little cute head)

Baby pumpkin on its way (with many more growing on the plant):

One day’s picking from our 6 cucumber plants.  The two at the top are from the regular plants and the others are from the pickling cucumber plants – we bought 4 of them and I’m hoping to make quite a few jars of pickles this year!

Thrift store finds – including our Christmas cookies cutters from when we were growing up (plus a couple animals).  How awesome is that?!?!?!?

And, the third sewing project of the summer – this is the first time I’ve managed to actually line up stripes correctly! (The other side was off about about an 1/8 inch.  Arrrghhh.)  Tina chose the fabric on our trip to NYC in May and I made the bag for her.  I used brown flannel for the lining.  Isn’t it cute?

And finally, some cards I made from an old nature book that I got for free from the Book Thing.  This is my favorite way to make cards – find beautiful pictures in old books, find beautiful paper to compliment them, and then put them together.

Peace, love, and blessings to you all.