Curious about what’s happening with Julia, Sadie and Mary Kate? Well, I caught up with the Stoney Ridge Roving Reporter who just happened to catch an interview with Mary Kate … something about a SCANDAL at Windmill Farm!

Stoney Ridge Times Roving Reporter: Mary Kate, I was hoping to have a chance to speak with your sister, Sadie.

M.K.: Sorry. Sadie doesn’t like to talk to strangers. She’s shy like that.

Stoney Ridge Times Roving Reporter: Well, maybe you could answer a few questions for the local newspaper.

M.K.: No, I shouldn’t. (Looks intrigued.) What sort of questions?

Stoney Ridge Times Roving Reporter: I was speaking to someone who mentioned there was a scandal at Windmill Farm. Something involving Sadie.

M.K.: (Stamps her foot in anger) Who said that? Was it Jimmy Fisher? I’ll sure it was! Everything that comes out of his mouth is a gullywasher of lies.

Read the rest here!!

For four years, my family of six lived in Hong Kong in a high-rise apartment, about half the size of our house in California. My sons shared a bedroom, my daughters had tiny rooms, there was no family room and only a small kitchen. Our yard was a 5’ x 3’ concrete patio that overlooked the South China Sea. And we absolutely loved it.

Our family grew closer during those years of living in a small space. I saw the same thing happen in other families, too. Tight quarters became a blessing. As one dad said, “Back home, my teenager would head off to her room and disappear. Here, she can’t hide.”

Contrary to logic, small can be good. Very good. 

My theme for the month of May is “Small is the New Big.” Do you have a short story to share about how you have survived and thrived in small spaces? Or ideas to organize when space is at a premium? Let us know! You’ll be entered into a giveaway for Godiva’s mini-cupcakes, delivered right to your door! A small way to say thank you.

Thank you all so much for following along with the Repurposing series I ran in April. I LOVED your participation and ideas. As you know I also hosted a housekeeping kit giveaway.

Three folks (chosen at random) who shared their Reduce, Reuse and Recycling tips will receive a galvanized bucket loaded with Clorox™ GreenWorks products and a pair of snazzy cleaning gloves!

Congratulations to the winners from this month’s 30 Days of Repurposing…

Lynn Kavanagh: I use a double wall insulated tumbler to take water with me raher than buy bottled water. I re-use the tins from my tea to store other items in my kitchen. I re-use the container the gum I buy comes in to store floss picks for my travel bag & my purse. I also re-use prescription bottles to store lots of items. I remove the labels & wash them. In my bathroom, I use one tall one to hold my manicure scissors & my tweezers. I have another tall one that holds all my eyeliners & a third one holds the q-tips. In my travel bag, one holds cotton balls.

Meghan Finley: I swap paper products for cloth. Always reuse plastic containers. Recycle aluminum and am learning to compost.

Felecia Digsby: I clean with natural products.

For the entire month of April, I will be sharing your ideas for repurposing, reducing, and recycling! Be sure to click the link below to sign up for your chance to win 1 of 3 housekeeping kits!

I take my #5 plastics to Whole Food who then sends to an organization that turns it into toothbrushes. 

For the entire month of April, I will be sharing your ideas for repurposing, reducing, and recycling! Be sure to click the link below to sign up for your chance to win 1 of 3 housekeeping kits!

Simplify! Going back to nature doesn’t require MORE products and processes – it is about having and doing and needing LESS! Going green should first and foremost be simplifying your life and your space from all of the additives and products and junk that do nothing but clutter up your world.

For the entire month of April, I will be sharing your ideas for repurposing, reducing, and recycling! Be sure to click the link below to sign up for your chance to win 1 of 3 housekeeping kits!

Use cool water in laundry washing.

I’m a big advocate of keeping life simple.

Easier to say than to do, I know! And what’s simple for me may not be the same thing as what’s simple for you. But one thing I really believe we all need to do, regardless of the size of your house or your bank account, is to live with less.

One of the reasons I not only “preach it but practice it” is because I grew up in a home that was really, really, REALLY messy. All of the time. My folks are dear, kind people, but they never took care of their stuff. Or their parents’ stuff. So when they moved out of their home into a retirement facility…guess who ended up having to take care of all of that stuff? Yup…me and my siblings.

It took us four months to clean out my parents’ house. It. Was. Awful.

There’s a verse in the Bible (Matthew 6:19-21) in which Jesus tells listeners not to lay up for themselves treasures on earth, where rust and moth can attack. As I was cleaning out my parents’ home…where so much rust and moth had attacked so much stuff…I realized that Jesus was spot-on! Rust and moth attack things that aren’t used. Things that are neglected. Forgotten. Devalued.

One of my life-simplification principles is that if something isn’t used, it’s given away. 

Here are some tips from “O” magazine (March 2010) about how to help you make decisions about what to keep or what to toss:

Toss it if…
1) You have twice as many as you need.
2) It’s a gift you don’t love.
3) It’s not worth repairing.
4) Your gut says lose it.
5) You don’t know what it is.

Keep it if…
1) It’s sentimental gold.
2) It fits your life today.
3) You think it’s gorgeous (even if no one else does).
4) You’d buy it again.
5) You’ll find a place for it.

For the entire month of April, I will be sharing your ideas for repurposing, reducing, and recycling! Be sure to click the link below to sign up for your chance to win 1 of 3 housekeeping kits!

All non meat food waste is thrown out for our chickens. It provides them with food from the waste and anything they don’t eat attracts insects which they eat. Also the ground is fertilized with the chicken droppings and uneaten waste.

Dear Mr. Cash,

I’m writing this letter today for two reasons.  I really want to thank you, and I owe you an apology.

First off, let me just say, Mr. Cash, that the Schrocks are big fans.  After we watched that movie about you, which I think you would’ve liked, my own Mr. Schrock went out and bought the soundtrack right along with one of your CDs.

I can never listen to that without tapping my toes and singing along.  I just can’t do it.  Every single time, I’m transported to another time and another place.  I remember your roots as I’m singing the words, and that’s why I want to thank you.

Your story is inspiring, Mr. Cash.  You were born into hardship, weren’t you?  Your family was dirt poor, and you were knocked around.  A lot.  But you had a gift, Mr. Cash.  Oh, you had a gift.

For a girl who has a chest full of hopes and dreams of her own, people like you inspire me.  Your story says once more that with hard work, some natural talent, and a never-give-up spirit (and, I might add, a tiny seed of faith), anything is possible.

Your life teaches me some sobering lessons, too, about where fame and fortune can take you.  Success can be a minefield, can’t it?  And that’s why walking with wisdom and listening to the One True Voice is so critical.  Living any other way is a dangerous proposition.

On a lighter note, though, it would make you happy to know that one of your biggest fans is a four-year-old.  That would be mine.  He can sing “Walk the Line” and “Train of Love,” but his favorites really are “Guess Things Happen That Way” and “There You Go.”  He plays these over and over and over until I have to stop his little finger from hitting that “back” arrow one more time.  That’s how much he loves your music.

I knew we were in deep weeds the day I heard your tunes blasting in the house.  From outside.  Where three of the boys were allegedly cleaning out the family van.  I cringed, waiting for someone in the neighborhood to bawl, “TURN THAT THING DOWN,” but it never happened.  I’d like to think that inside, they were tapping their own toes and singing along, too.

I have to apologize, though, for what Boy Two has done to your song, “Luther Played the Boogie.”  Why, just the other night, I was tapping away at my keyboard upstairs.  They were playing your CD, and all of a sudden I heard Rodney Rathbone singing “Luther.”

Who’s Rodney, you ask?  Well, he’s a whiny, snotty bully on their favorite story series, Adventures in Odyssey.  Lately, B2 has perfected what we call his “Rodney” voice, so when out of the blue “Rodney Rathbone” is whining out “Luther Played the Boogie,” all full of trills and quavers and really obnoxious tones, I couldn’t help it.  I laughed.  Well, actually, I howled like an African hyena, it sounded so crazy.  We weren’t trying to be disrespectful, Mr. Cash, we really weren’t.  But it was just so funny, I couldn’t help it.

Somehow, I think that years hence, that goofy show will be resurrected at a family gathering for his children and nieces and nephews, and the whole pack of us will howl again.  I really hope you don’t mind.

I would like to think that someday, my work will outlast me just like yours has outlasted you.  That’s a beautiful thought, and it motivates me to pour my heart and soul into the thing that I’ve been called to do.

Thank you again, Mr. Cash, for sharing your gift with the world and for inspiring the rest of us to keep dreaming, to work hard, and to never give up.

Your fan,

Rhonda Schrock

For the entire month of April, I will be sharing your ideas for repurposing, reducing, and recycling! Be sure to click the link below to sign up for your chance to win 1 of 3 housekeeping kits!

I go green by reusing plastic bags and by using plastic containers instead of sandwich bags for lunch sandwiches.