A Day in the Life

It’s a new month! Guys, we are three-quarters through 2019- how did that happen? For me, this is my first year in parenthood, and on top of that there have been many other transitions in this year. So much so that it feels like January was 24 months ago.

Well, snap back to October with me. I thought you dear readers would enjoy if I share a bit about A Day in the Life of yours truly. As we settle in to a routine and become more familiar with Ebenezer, this would be a good way for you to imagine life as it is right now for the three of us.

So, let’s get started!

Somewhere between 4 and 5am: Brierly wakes up. I can’t tell you much more about that because I’m still snoozing.

Somewhere between 5:30 and 6:30, Charlotte and I wake up. We have a relaxed morning and usually stay in the home. While the apprentices are busy in their Productive Learning Areas (crops, dairy, broilers, layers, pecan trees) and Brierly is managing the dairy and learning about the cropping side of the business, you can find Charlie and me doing any of the following activities at home: she likes to sit on the bed and play with toys, we listen to podcasts, (sometimes Spanish ones for her to hear more Spanish than just from mom and dad!), I read my Bible, have coffee with coconut oil or Tanganda tea with fresh milk and honey. I work on a lesson or two in the Ndebele language, work on blog posts, fold laundry, or work in the kitchen on brewing kombucha, or making master tonic (Fire cider) for the apprentices.

Enjoying mornings with good coffee and good reads (Thanks for the book loan, Doug!)

Charlie's laundry is done 3 times a week for us. All I have to do is take it off the line and fold!

8-8:45am- the bell rings and the apprentices head to breakfast and devotions. Brierly comes back and we have breakfast! Considering we have a 2-top stove and no oven, and the lack of gluten-free baking options, breakfast is usually red-sorghum porridge, oatmeal, or my favorite, a savory plate full of eggs, hash browns, and avocado.

Charlotte loves breakfast time since she gets to sit in Brierly’s arms and have bits of porridge or avocado or egg yolk.

Silly time with dad, Charlotte is learning to use her tongue!

Charlie loves meal times

After Breakfast until 1pm- You can find Charlotte and I doing the same activities mentioned above, unless we venture out in the sun to get some wifi for checking Whatsapp messages, or we need to get in touch with someone about duties in the Demo Garden. The Demo Garden is an exciting plot of land on Ebenezer where all sorts of veggies are grown on a smaller scale, that are for the Dining Hall, to sell at Farm Stores, or to show the apprentices how to grow it before it’s done on a full hectare, or more. Brierly and I are part of the team in charge of the Demo Garden, so I’m learning about different crop spacings, how to avoid pests by strategic planting, and just how far behind we are on our composting! Charlotte also usually has a morning nap or two.

Can you tell based on my “Somewhere between ….” and not knowing if Charlotte will nap once or twice in a morning, that I’m not really on that tight of a routine? Somehow that gene or skill did not get passed down to me!

Spinach in the Demo Garden

1-2pm Lunch time! We tend to each lunch from the Dining Hall, which is always sadza (boiled white corn meal thickened to a mashed potato consistency), with any of the following sides: cooked spinach(or other green- chomoulia, rape, kale, etc), cabbage, soya chunks, sour milk, or baked beans.

If it’s soya chunks or sour milk, I tend to forego the side and eat the sadza plain or cut it into slices and add some butter and peanut butter! You can only adapt so much at a time, right!?

Cheeky donkeys look for food scraps between the dining hall (not pictured) and the wood pile.

2-6pm- Lessons, Naps, and Farm Store

Depending on the day, I’ll either have Ndebele lessons on Mondays and Tuesdays at 2pm with Mrs Nyams, or I’ll visit the Farm Store at 3:30 when the fresh milk arrives from the dairy. Charlotte loves riding in the stroller and getting to hear the birds, see the trees move in the wind, say hi to apprentices, and hang on to toys as she rides. Once in a while, the neighbor kids come and we read books together. Charlotte loves the attention!

Mrs Nyams, my Ndebele language teacher

Enjoying our afternoon walks when the sun isn't so strong!

This farm store visit yielded me some onions and pecans. There are no plastic bags at the store, so the stroller is very helpful!

6pm-Supper and in for the evening.

Brierly finishes work around 6 and I make supper for us. While we do have refrigeration now -Wahoo!- we still aren’t able to get ahold of many basic foods, due to availability in the stores as well as inflation causing us to budget very tightly. So we try to mix it up between rice and potatoes as our starch, and onions, carrots, butternut , greens, avocados, eggs and green pepper as sides/main meals. Special treats are: broccoli, Greek yogurt, bacon, cheese, green beans, rotisserie chicken, and corned beef. And since I didn’t mention it earlier and I’m in the middle of telling you what we usually eat, our typical snacks during the day are peanuts, oranges, bananas, apples, pears, and pecan nuts!

Supper Menu: Sauteed cabbage, onion, and butternut. Dessert: Apples in Greek yogurt with honey and chia seeds.

8pm- Winding down

Brierly usually heads to bed just after 8pm. Charlotte and I chill either on the bed or couch, feed another time or two, read a book, and once she’s down for the night, I catch up on reading if I have any energy left! I’m behind on a one-year chronological Bible reading plan, so I always have more chapters I can read. But I’m slowly getting back on track!

Well that’s what a day looks like for me over here!

A few weekly things that happen- Thursday nights are Family Night where we gather for a meal in our “Families” that consist of 20 apprentices and a few staff members, and then everyone gathers for a fun service of singing, games, skits, and a message by a staff member or guest speaker. Also, Thursday is when we definitely get to eat meat since the dining hall makes a special meal for Family Nights!

The apprentices in our "Orange Thuli" Family!

Another weekly thing that happens are my Ndebele lessons that I mentioned above. I go over the workbook that I have with a staff member, Mrs. Nyams. She helps me get pronunciations right (There are 3 different clicks with 3 variations on each, as well as other fun sounds to wrap my tongue around) and she also let’s me know when the lesson book says something that isn’t in the regional dialect, and what I should say instead.

About once a week, sometimes more sometimes less, we go to town. Bulawayo is about an hour away, and Brierly has work to do at one of the other farms we’re associated with at Ebenezer. This could be checking on the Jersey bulls that are being reared at a farm called Hamara, or making sure feed gets delivered to the dairy, or buying replacement parts for the milk chillers. It’s during these town trips that I sit down on the wifi and connect with you guys! Charlotte and I have more than one home here where we know we are welcome to make ourselves comfortable, and I am so thankful for all the hospitality we continually receive. We’ll get groceries and perhaps an americano if it’s before 3pm (can’t fall asleep otherwise!) and spend the night in town.

I'm getting more efficient at packing and unpacking for town.

Brierly making sure he's on the same page with the transport guys.

The drive into town- lots of pedestrians and animals to watch out for!

Our last weekly even that I want to share is church! There are 3 churches we’ve been able to visit since moving here, one being a local community church a few kilometers from Ebenezer, and the other two in town. Each church seems to be a thriving community of people who want to know God more and care about what the Bible says, which is amazing. Since we tend to go to town during the week, we stay in the Ebenezer community on the weekends and attend the local church. But it’s nice to know we have found a couple places to gather for worship if we are in town on a Sunday as well!

So what do you all think? Am I too busy? Not doing enough? Am I struggling? Am I where I’m supposed to be?

To be honest, I’m really enjoying doing exactly what I’m doing right now. I didn’t mention that all of this happens between a million sessions of nursing Charlotte, snuggling with Charlotte, and making sure she knows she’s getting attention! So between all of those things, it seems like the days go by pretty quickly. I truly am grateful that I get to enjoy the time with Charlotte during her young months, and that we get to be home when Brierly finishes work for the day. I think I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be and I’m excited for this season of motherhood, learning about a new place, supporting Brierly in a new position, and getting to share encouragement with apprentices and fellow staff members at Ebenezer. It can be hard to not have all the foods I’d like to eat, or the heat can keep me inside during the afternoons, and temporary housing until our staff house is built can affect my desire to nest, but in the scheme of things, I feel blessed, and God is gracious! The good far outweighs the challenges. Plus, if we go based on the Bible and Jesus' life, not to many of his followers lived super comfortable lives. So I think it's good to expect some struggle in your life, if it's for the right purpose!

What about you? Are you able to see the blessings in your life today? Do you have an attitude towards your struggles that allows you to endure them with joy? Gratitude can change our whole perspective! Take courage and look at the good things in your life, and give thanks for them, no matter the season you’re in.

NOTE: I realize that I went down a rabbit trail and I did not end this post on the same topic that I started it. However, I like where I started it and I like where it ended, and I hope you're okay with that too! Perhaps I'll get better at staying on topic in future posts.

Growing in Courage,

Mackenzie