Photo of the Week

This is a series of two pictures I took in Piedras Negras, Mexico last summer.  A band of musicians played for our group while we danced and attempted to sing along. 

Happy Monday!

All About the Local

I'm not a 100 Mile food diet person or a locavore or nothing kind of eater.  I do, however believe in gardening and supporting local businesses. I don't think it's just about what I'm putting into my body, although it matters, but supporting the economy of neighbors and family businesses.

Why buy something that has been imported from another country when a person down the street is selling the same thing?  It might cost a little more, but its money used for a good reason and you are enabling someone with a livelihood.  With that being said, let me highlight an amazing restaurant in our area.

Babylon

It's owned by an Iraqi family and the food is amazing.  I love Mediterranean food and it's hard to find in this area. You should definitely give this place a try. I had an awesome Tikka Chicken sandwich and Jordan recommends the Falafel sandwich.

We will definitely be heading back to this restaurant for a night out. It might miss out on aesthetics, but it makes up for it in taste.

Source: bbcgoodfood.com 

The Frugal Life

Waste not, want not.  That’s what my great grandmother preached as we washed off the plastic utensils from KFC’s lunch to reuse at a later date.  Nothing was to be thrown away, not even the bag that frozen chicken came in.  Everything had a second purpose, even if it seemed odd.  

She grew up in a time, where everything needed to have a second purpose, but today that really isn’t the case.  Plastic bottles, cardboard boxes and packaging for an endless number of products are items intended to be disposable.  They have a purpose, to deliver the contents inside and then that’s it, they’re finished.  Items like this can over run our recycle bins and garbage cans and eventually our land fills.  What can be done?

I think my great grandmother had another reason behind saving strange items; save money.  There are so many uses for everyday garbage; you just have to be creative.  Since we garden a lot of our “trash” ends up there.  

Our food scraps are compost, yogurt cups are great seed starters as well as paper egg cartons, and they can be planted with the seeds.  Plastic bottles become tiny green houses over individual plants and scrap wood makes for a great raised bed.  

Many of these items, if purchased for their specific purpose, such as seed starting planters cost money.  That money adds up fast especially when already paid for an item that does the same thing. 

But you don’t need a garden to reuse would be trash.  Here are some ideas:

Recycled kids toys

Tin Can Lights 

Newspaper gift bags

And our spring project:  A greenhouse made out of old windows!  It's going to awesome.

Sources unknown- e-mail me if you know it.

Happy Thursday!

Top 5 Travel Movies

There are some movies that just get you in the mood for traveling around the globe

1. 180 degrees South - it's a documentary about Patagonia and the founders of Patagonia and Northface clothing companies.  Excellent, makes me want to climb a mountain. 

2. Outsourced - a cute movie on cultural diversities and the pain it causes if you don't adapt.

3. I'm actually not a huge fan of this movie, just because of the ending.  But it is still an great movie and Emile Hirsch does an amazing job.  This is Jordan's favorite movie.

4. The Ramen Girl - I looks bad, I'm aware, but the movie was actually pretty good.  It's about a girl who follows her boyfriend to Tokyo, then leaves her.  She decides to stay and apprentice with a Ramen chef. This movie makes me want to cook.

5. Eat Pray Love - So although it's a bit lacking it makes me want to stay in one place for several months, eat a lot and meet local people.  

Happy Wednesday! 

January Newsletter

If you didn't receive a newsletter in the mail or you want to be added to my mailing list e-mail me
 jennie@crossroadsmissions.com

Happy Tuesday!

Photo of the Week

I took this picture in West Virginia a couple summers back when I interned with Appalachian Service Project as a photojournalist.

Happy Monday!

The Frugal lifestyle

Support raising as a means of living puts a different perspective on everyday purchases.  Even though my husband has his fulltime job, we are far more aware of where our money is going now that I depend on who it is coming from. 

Jordan and I have always lived frugally mostly due to the fact that I changed my life’s work a couple times since graduating college.  We still live comfortably and indulge every once and a while with fancy dinners and day trips to Asheville, but those fun things are now even more sporadic. 

We certainly don’t mind setting budgets and cutting back, it’s kind of a challenge to see how much less we can spend from one month to the next.  Here are a couple of ways we have managed to cut back.

·      Eat in as much as possible

o   Jordan packs his lunch for work and I get free lunch where I work

o   We participate in potlucks with friends usually twice a week

o   I freeze any leftovers for easy meals when we’re too busy to cook

o   We never turn down a free meal-unless it is only meat (Jordan’s a vegetarian)

·      Cut back on entertainment

o   We don’t have cable, it wasted our time and our money

o   We don’t go out to the movies unless it is an extra special occasion

o   We find free things like hiking or hulu

·      Save on bills

o   We shop at Earthfare for dairy and Kroger for everything elsebecause we can save on the 10 items for $10 special and we get points that we can use to save 10 cents per gallon on gas

o   Online coupons are awesome. Earthfare has a coupon every week that is usually spend $5 get this free

o   Our heat stays at 68 in the winter and our air at 75 in the summer

o   We have a rain barrel we use to water the garden

We feel that living frugally isn’t just about saving money, but about living simply. Life can get messy when you have too much stuff to deal with. What do you do to cut back spending? 

5 Things I don’t want to live without:

1. 1.     Coffee – it gets me going
   2.     iMac – the best present I ever bought
   3.     Sharpie Pens – my husband says I have a pen fetish
   4.     Jergens Almond lotion – it’s cheap and it smells wonderful
   5.     Cottage Living Magazine – I like the pictures and it inspires me

Images from Cottage Living

So what is it that you are doing?

As I dive into this new life of support raising one of the questions I get asked most is, “What is it that you are doing again?”  It’s a great question with an elaborate answer.  In short I will help in providing media resources for low budget organizations. 

For glamour I tell people, “I’ll be traveling the world taking pictures of exotic people and places.”  While that sounds amazing, and certainly dream-like, there is a lot more to my new position. 

For starters, my passion is photography.  I want to photograph something amazing.  Something that can change a persons mind or inspire motivation.  If you know me well you probably know that I love to travel, to anywhere, at anytime.  I believe that traveling to new cultures, meeting new people is the ultimate in education and in understanding yourself.  Another more recent interest of mine is designing.  I love creating new things even if it is letterhead and business cards.  A lot can be said for good design. 

So combining all of those things into one job is a real dream come true. Lets not forget about ministry behind it.  Even if I had the opportunity to do all of these things outside of missions, it would still be a job I like.  But using my skills to help out ministries that are helping so many other people, now that adds some depth. 

Another part of my job will be to lead small groups of participants that want to learn more about how media works in ministry.  Such as how good photography can increase exposure and donations for an organization. 

So what will I be doing? I will be traveling, photographing, designing, leading, and teaching for a higher purpose.  To help those that helps others. What could be better than that?

Check out Storytellers website for more information on what I will be doing and how to get involved!

Photo of the Week

You have probably seen this picture before if you have attend my art show, seen my printed book from photography out west, or have visited my other blog.  This picture I took in May 2010 on a three week journey to Arizona, Utah, and Colorado.  This of course is the Grand Canyon in all of its majesty.  My husband and I along with two friends hiked into the canyon for a two night trip.  It was the hardest and most painful hike I've ever made.  Our only option for an overnight trip was a trail that no one else wanted to take.  It was supposed to have bubbling streams and lushes shade.  Instead it was 100 degrees with dried up creek beds, and lets not even discuss the wind.  It made for a wonderful adventure that I certainly will never forget.

Happy Monday!