The Housewife Journal ~ June ~

                                                                         ~ June 2025 ~ 

Summer is here! The work we began in Spring is starting to bear fruit- literally! Blueberries, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, and a few flowers. Amidst the hot and sunny afternoons, we've been blessed with rainy days here and there to cool everything off. Summer plans are being made, and life is good! God has blessed us so much!

~ Out And About ~

 A few days ago, my husband and I went to a cattle show for the kids I used to nanny. I attribute my love of farm-life to the four years I spent with those kids on their farm! I learned to much about animals and gardens and farm equipment from them. Their newest endeavor has been showing cattle. It's about showmanship and handling the cow, but it's also about grooming and fattening them to be judged for breeding or meat. 

We really enjoyed the show. The judge was very good about explaining to the crowd what is was she looked for and why she chose the winner. Two out of four of my kids won first place! 🎉The oldest boy, truly deserved his win for all the hand work he puts into his livestock. He's so knowledgeable and I wasn't surprised at all that he took home a flag! The youngest boy also won for, as the judge put it, his relaxed confidence, which was amazing considering his size compared to his cow!

 It was nice to get outside and do something different on a Saturday. It also made for a fun road-trip! We got coffee and listened to Fr. Ripperger talks on the way there.

~ In The Home ~

Sometime soon, I'm going to post a "look book" of our backyard in the summer. We finally finished painting the chicken coop.😌 All that's left is to paint the gate and run-posts. We buckled down and finished the project in one week, leading up to a Pentecost party we hosted for our family and friends. 

It was a great turnout and again, my husband and I are always amazed at our wonderful community and everyone's generosity and willingness to celebrate feast days together! 

We are trying to find our day that we can commit to making a yearly celebration. We started with St. Patrick's Day, only to realize some of our other friends have a special love for that feast, and they host a party every year. Our Advent party was only because some other friends that typically host the Advent party weren't able to that year, so they asked us to host instead. Pentecost, we forgot was my sister and brother-in law's claimed feast day to host both sides of their family so we probably won't be doing Pentecost next year😂  It's trial and error but hopefully soon, we will find our feast!!! Meanwhile, we'll enjoy using the days that haven't been "taken" yet.

~ Kitchen Happenings ~

Since our garden started producing fruit, we've been trying to come up with things to make with cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, and pretty soon, green bell peppers. So far we've made pickles, tomato sauce, this Mexican cucumber & lime drink, and blueberry pie. Yum!

I've been making homemade ranch dressing, which tastes infinitely better than store-bought. And I finally made sourdough sandwich bread! It's so fluffy and soft and I will probably never go back to processed white bread for sandwiches. I'll share a photo although it isn't the most ascetically pleasing because of how I sliced it. I think next time, to make the loaf more squared for sandwiches, I will make two loaves out of the one recipe until I can purchase one of those longer loaf pans. I have one normal size and one smaller pan. 

What I've learned from this whole process of beginner homesteading, is that the things that make our lives quicker and more convenient, are really not that hard or time consuming to make from scratch. I'm hoping to keep this rhythm up throughout the Summer; utilizing the garden, making more refreshing drinks, sweet & spicy pickles to mix things up, and hopefully I can try some green pepper jelly! June was a good month for the kitchen!

~ Things I'm Grateful For ~

My husband! This month we celebrated 27 years of my wonderful husband, Jonathan.💖 

(I guess this is his introduction to the blog) I'm so grateful I married such a good man.

photo from our courtship

Jonathan always knows how to make me laugh, keeping me from being too serious. He has a kind heart and I'm always amazed by his humility and his willingness to have an open mind and give others the benefit of the doubt. He's an amazing gardener! I honestly can't take credit for any of our produce harvest so far. I love that he is interested in people, (no, like truly interested in who they are and how they're doing) and trying/learning about new things. He's very supportive of me and my homemaking endeavors and without him I wouldn't be able to have time to do what I do at home or write this blog which has been a long-time goal of mine. He makes me a better person and I'm so grateful he has chosen me to spend the rest of his life with him. Love you Jonathan!💕

~ On The Bookshelf ~

I'm embarrassed to say, this has been on off-month for me with reading. I started a book called Mantilla: The Veil of the Bride of Christ but haven't made it very far. It's a book about the practice of women veiling in church of course! From what I've read, it's very good! She goes into the history of veiling and what the Church and Church Fathers have said about it. She also clarifies that it is no longer in Canon Law so women aren't obligated to cover their heads in church. I'm excited to read more! Veiling is such a beautiful tradition that in my opinion, should be brought back, even beyond the TLM parishes.

~ My Spiritual Life ~

I know I said that I haven't been reading much, but I didn't count Spiritual reading in that. I've picked Humility of Heart by Fr. Cajetan da Bergamo. It's just as good as I remember it! If you feel like you could use some humility, it's a great book. If you feel like you're already pretty humble, it's an even better book! It makes me realize I have a long way to go! But it's also encouraging, because they say that the first step to fixing your problem is recognizing you have a problem. 

~ Other Random Things Worth Mentioning ~

If you remember my little sprouts from March or April- I can't remember which- I'm happy to announce I now have my first blooms!! Yay!! This was a goal I never thought I'd achieve this Summer and it's amazing to see God work with what little we give Him. 

orange Cosmos & a pink Zinnia 

I also thought I'd take a minute to share the process of my bigger flower garden in the yard. Creating this garden bed really made me understand what it means to be a Proverbs 31 woman. It was tough but I've never felt so accomplished! Here is what I started with: a patch of dirt (and apparently some poison ivy😖) where Jonathan recently removed a bush.

I weeded out a circle and collected rocks from around our yard to line it. Then I added the saplings from inside. I planted the Sunflower seeds directly in the ground because I guess they're hard to move once they form roots. Eventually things began to grow. The deer really liked the sunflowers. I think I lost three or four so we added some deterrents- poles and Irish Spring soap lining the bed. So far it's worked! A few of the Cosmos are blooming but I am waiting to take a photo when I get some Sunflowers, Marigolds, and Zinnias!

  

I guess that's all for June! Thanks for reading!

Gina💕