Saturday, August 8, 2009

Growing up without TV

Our Rick Warren devotional today talked about moral values and how it effects decisions we make. So I didn't grow up watching TV and I would love to say it doesn't effect my decisions. But on the other hand I didn't hear Gods Word taught in Sunday School either. I read Bible Stories out of our tattered book growing up so I wasn't a total heathen and attended church hearing God's Word preached. Still I needed a personal experience with Jesus which happened in my early teen years.

We had a garden and canned vegetables from the garden. We canned chickens because that's what we had mostly during my lifetime. When I was young I remember butchering a pig and smoking hams. At one time in my life dad bought my grandmother's farm next to our farm and my older sisters and brother took care of that farm. I don't think that lasted for many years until my dad sold the farm to "English" people.

We entertained ourselves playing games outside in the summer along with good hard honest work. I loved helping to put up hay and when the "thrashers" would come. Yep, we went "bare footed" all summer. When I became a teenager I started wearing shoes to church. I do a double - take now going "back" into their homes.

Friday, August 7, 2009

My Hobby - Reading

My mother instilled the love of reading to most of my siblings. Whenever mom would have some time she would find a magazine, or later on in life, books someone brought home from school, she would read them, sometimes overnight.

Growing up we didn't have many books in our home. We had a worn out Bible Story book I read from cover to cover many times. Mom would go to my grandmothers who had like a library and bring books from her house. The bad side to this; dad couldn't stand to see us sitting around reading. Even after all our chores were done it would aggravate him. Sundays was a day we didn't work so I would take a book and crawl into bed to read. Our upstairs didn't have any heat so this was partly to stay warm too. (Out of sight, out of mind!)

My dad played games with us after our evening meal and mom would sit and read. With 12 children she didn't have much time to herself.

I love the library that stocks great books. I have learned to use the internet and request the books then get notified through emails when they come in. Plus you don't need to spend time looking them up.