The Heymann Family Journal

I dug a hole in the ground, lined it with fire bricks, and burned a pile of wood. Then I pushed the Coles to the side, and put an iron pot in the hole. It was full of chicken that had been wrapped in foil. The top of the pot was covered with foil. then I put the Coles around and on top of the pot. Then topped that with soil. Now we are waiting for a few hours to see if our chicken cooks. If it works out, I will cook our thanksgiving turkey this way. I've seen it done on you tube. The ground was steaming as I covered it with soil. I've heard the ground can hold the heat for 12 hours. It works like a slow cooker or Crockpot. These kind of things fascinate me. The Coles can be used in my garden. Coles produced under low oxygen can help improve soil in a vegetable garden. In fact it causes the production to increase as much as 300%. It’s called Bio char. So I’m cooking lunch and making Bio char for my vegetable garden. The chicken worked. It cooked in 3 hours....

we will be lefting our Dahlias this week.

Today I got a birthday card from Nicole for my 51st Birthday. It's really cute, area 51! Philip and Thomas bought me a new cell phone. I got some great art from Sarah. Juergen took us all to lunch at a Thai place. I enjoy watching the boys eat Thai food. Jessica gave me a big hug. It's been a very nice day.

The kids helped me pick up the wood stove I bought on eBay. I needed their help because it's very heavy! But it’s also very nice! It will go into the greenhouse as soon as the cement foundation is dry. So maybe by next weekend our greenhouse will be heated. It snowed today. I’m not a big fan of snow. I would rather have a sunny fall day. But there you go! I don't have big plans for my birthday. I'll go to church tomorrow. Sarah assures me she has presents for me (cute)! The kids are also making me lunch. Juergen has a business trip this week. The kids have fall vacation. If the weather was good I would finish the outside plaster of the greenhouse. Instead I guess we will be playing board games, watching movies and prepping the attic for insulation that will be put in at the end of the week. I hope I can get in some extra sleep. When it's this cold and wet I don't feel like doing much at all! Maybe I'll teach Sarah to sew? That will be like th...

I'm putting my high raised beds in my greenhouse. I think I'll replace the raised beds with straw beds. If I can find the bales this fall, I may put the bales in this year. That way I can plant in the straw next summer. You add compost tea to the bales. They become very fertile.

Nicole and I want to have a big Thanksgiving party Nov 18th. I don't have a big oven. I thought I would try cooking either turkey or chicken in a fire pit. If you wrap the turkey well with aluminum foil and put it into a pan with a lid on it, then it will not get dirty. You can cook it over night (12 hours) and it is suppose to turn out great. I like marinating my turkey in brandy for 3 days in the refrigerator. This leaves a very good flavor, and the meat falls off the bones. My birthday is this Sunday. I’m a little too tired to plan anything big for Sunday. We will be working on the greenhouse all weekend. But I think I would love to have a big American Thanksgiving. It’s not a holiday in Germany, but we can all thank God. We also want to raise a little money for Send a cow in Africa . They do agricultural development with poor families. So we will eat a big meal,and also help poor farmers in Ethiopia feed their families.

The teaching went well I think. At least I think so. Nicole and I have been working on the plaster on the greenhouse. But the weather has turned cold. It's not so much fun to be outside. And my knee really hurts. I need to get some rest. I just got over the flu, and I'm not so strong at the moment.

Tonight I get to teach on preparing for the end times, what did Jesus say in Matthew 25. It's not about saving food or building a cabin in the woods, it's about knowing God personally, serving him faithfully and sharing his heart for the poor. I love this chapter in the Bible. I have to say that it has changed my life. And I love, love, love teaching with Juergen.

  Nicole wants to do a serious painting this year in oil. But to warm up she may paint some star wars paintings, and make some star wars masks. We thought they maybe more commercial. she has to start selling works this year. We thought nerd star wars fans have money? Anyway, these pictures are ideas for Nicole.

I won the bid on eBay for a small wood stove for the greenhouse. It's pretty cool. you can lift the top on it to cook a pot of water. It has tiles around it. This will help keep the oven hot after the fire dies down. It is not very big, and the price was good. We did think about building a rocket stove, but the oil barrels rust out every one or 2 years. I didn't want to be fixing it every year. So a tile stove was my 2nd choice.

We decided we need to do something more to the front wall of the greenhouse. Other wise it will look to massive. Eventually when all the plaster is up, the whole thing will be painted white. So we thought some sort of mosaic would be good. Just a simple pattern, nothing too complex. I bought stones on eBay today. They are already cut and ready to go. So perhaps my artist daughter can create something special for us.

I like the idea of using wood on the greenhouse. Juergen and the kids finished the walls of the greenhouse today. We still need to finish putting on the earthen plaster. I want to find some wooden branches to nail to the front wall. Then I want to cover those branches with concrete. I saw this done in Italy. I thought it looked really cool. I think the front of the greenhouse would look too plain without something more. I'm still sick so I didn't help today. Instead I'm working on what I'm teaching on Tuesday night. I'll be teaching on how to be prepared for the end times. It is mostly a teaching on Matthew 25. This is one of my very favorite chapters in the Bible. Anyway, I love the greenhouse. I still need a heater. We will start moving plants in (God willing) next week. I can fit 6 to 8 high raised beds. I have room for a very long table. I'll also put 2 of our large water containers, a total of 1300 liters of water in the greenhouse. This...

I have an oil barrel, and I'm going to try making biochar. It can raise the ph in your soil so you should not over use it. Also, you should break it up, soak it in water and add good compost to it before adding it to the soil. If you don't break it up and soak it in water first, it will compete with the plants for water. This is very important.

I have very good job security. I've been sick for 2 days now and I found out no one in my family knows how to put dishes in the dish washer, pick up a broom or do laundry. Or maybe they just want me to feel appreciated? I would invest in frozen pizza and Mc Donald’s stock if it looks like I'm get sick again. I managed to keep a bowl of oat meal down. So I’m on the mends! PS. Juergen did a load of dishes and he wants you all to know that!

I just read that the real unemployment rate in the US is : U6 Rate 14.7 Percent, as U3 Falls to 7.8 Percent . That means allot of people just gave up looking. The unemployment rate in Germany is 5.5%- We are doing fine, but so many of my friends and family are unemployed or under employed. This is why I care about this election. I'm still sick. Juergen had a few meetings at work, but was able to come home early to take care of the kids. Thank God he has flex time! I find it funny that women think it's sexist for Romney to say his chief of staff wanted flex time. Anyone with kids needs flex time. My kids will be eating allot of Mc Donald’s and pizza because Juergen does not cook much. My brother is a good cook. I would love to have him around to cook me chicken soup. I think I could keep that down today. The weather looks lovely outside, and it's my God Childs 2nd birthday. I'm sad about what I'm missing being sick. But thank God for a husband that can...

My awful head cold has graduated to a stomach flu. Not fun!

I won a bid on eBay for the tiles of an old oven. It does not include the oven, just tiles. I don't really know how many tiles are missing or damaged after they took the oven apart. But most of the tiles are said to be in good condition. We probably need to wait until next year to have the oven built. It will cost a few thousand Euros for the oven and labor. But I didn't want some new oven in my old house. I like this simple oven. It should look very nice in the hallway. I only paid 8 Euro for it. I hope it is mostly in good condition. If not, I'm sure I can find a cool way to use these awesome tiles.

We got some nice weather today (cold but no rain). So Nicole and I started to put cob on the front wall of the green house. The mud was ice cold. My hands could not take much of it. I did cob the wall under the cross. And that was the easy part because the bricks have texture, and the cob sticks well to the bricks. We had bought a special plastic net to nail to the wood, but forgot that in Juergen’s car. So we tried gunny sacks and an old net you put over strawberries. The strawberry net works much better. But hopefully both will stick to the wall. Juergen needs to finish putting up the wood on the wall. We hope to put up 2 or 3 coats of cob, then a wash of paint you make out of ground up chalk and butter milk. Nicole took a class on making paint from anything. Evidently butter milk paint dry’s hard and last a very long time. You make cob with sand, clay soil, cow or horse manure, water and straw. It generally is 3 parts sand to one part clay and manure. But t...

Juergen and the kids worked on the green house all day. Most of the walls and door are up. There is only a small portion of the wall to finish. And the brick wall in the back got built higher so the stove pipe can exit out that wall. I also mixed up some earthen plaster (cob) to plaster the wood with. I bought a net to staple to the wood. I'll try plastering the wood on Monday. It will get a few coats of cob, then lime on the top coat. Nicole also painted a special sealer on the concrete on the bottle wall. We don't want the wall to fall apart in the rain. It looks like one more weekends work to finish this green house. And it will be awesome!

I read this today, and pass it on to you. Saturday, March 7, 2009 AN URGENT MESSAGE I am compelled by the Holy Spirit to send out an urgent message to all on our mailing list, and to friends and to bishops we have met all over the world. AN EARTH-SHATTERING CALAMITY IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN. IT IS GOING TO BE SO FRIGHTENING, WE ARE ALL GOING TO TREMBLE - EVEN THE GODLIEST AMONG US. For ten years I have been warning about a thousand fires coming to New York City. It will engulf the whole megaplex, including areas of New Jersey and Connecticut. Major cities all across America will experience riots and blazing fires—such as we saw in Watts, Los Angeles, years ago. There will be riots and fires in cities worldwide. There will be looting—including Times Square, New York City. What we are experiencing now is not a recession, not even a depression. We are under God’s wrath. In Psalm 11 it is written, “If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (v. 3). God is judging the rag...

As a resident of the EU I proudly accept this years Nobel prize for peace. And I pledge to use my 2 cents to promote peace….but don’t you think they should have given the prize to someone like the amazing 14 year old blogger in Pakistan Malala Yousfzai? It seems to me the EU deserves the prize as much as Obama did. The Peace Prize Committee are so out of touch! There are so many deserving people, how ridicules! Sorry if I offend my fellow EU winners. Just my opinion.

I don't care how they try to spin it, Biden was awful and he also lied about Libya during the debate. I think Ryan was great but they cut him off everytime he started to make a point.

22 years ago I married the most wonderful man! He is out in the garden today building my green house. We had breakfast out. And I just love him! Here are a few of thousands of photo’s and millions of memories.

Nicole and I are still working on the wall outside. You can not go very fast or the cement does not hold the weight of the bottles. Jessica is sick today. Her teacher brought her home early. Juergen wants me to teach next week. I was not ready, and I thought I was going to teach in 2 weeks. But I'm more ready then Juergen. So I need to pull my thoughts together. And of course we have our wedding Anniversary tomorrow, and Thomas' birthday party on Sunday. So I have to clean the house, and shop and cook for the party. I was not planning to be this busy. It would have been fine if I was not teaching. But I love the topic, and I am grateful to teach even when it makes things a little busy. Juergen and I want to go out to breakfast tomorrow. Then I guess he will work on the green house while I work on my teaching. He needs to translate my notes Sunday night. And I'll clean, shop and cook in the afternoon and evening. Fun, Fun, Fun! But I'm glad Thomas will ...

Philip, Thomas, Sarah and I joined some good friends on a trip to Freiburg yesterday. We watched a soccer game, then had lunch in the old town. Freiberg is a beautiful town in the black forest. I've always passed by it on the way down to Italy. I did not know idea it was so nice. I also wanted to show you how our bottle wall is progressing. We ran out of concrete, and it's starting to rain. We will just have to continue with this tomorrow. But it is really starting to look great.