Harvesting in Lichinga

I've always loved the idea of having my own garden so that I could harvest my own veggies! Maybe my Grandmother put that idea into my head since she used to grow her own veggies when I was a child. About 2 years ago, I started a vegetable garden. As I started it, I really felt that the Lord was going to speak to me as my garden grew. I felt that He was going to use my garden to pour revelation into my life about Himself, my walk with Him, my family life, etc. I prepared the ground by digging up the soil and composting, then planted my seeds. I was so excited when my lettuce, butternut squash, broccoli, eggplant and melon seedlings began to emerge in the days and weeks later! I diligently tended to that garden as I watched everything grow. I felt that God would surely begin teaching me lessons in fruitfulness, planting seeds in my heart as I had in the ground. As my plants grew, I noticed that my lively squash plants suddenly seemed to start deteriorating. My melon vines weren't doing very well, either. But I continued to water, weed, and nurture my little plants.

During that time in 2011, we decided that my husband would fly to the U.S. to celebrate his dad's 60th birthday. As we prepared for him to go, we realized that I was pregnant with my 4th child. Tyren went off to America and I soon began to feel tired, weak and nauseated. My already struggling garden didn't get all of the attention it needed in that time, though I continued to put care into it. By the time Tyren returned a couple of weeks later, the weeds had overtaken much of the garden, my lettuce had bolted, and most of the plants had died! Where was the fruit of my labor? What lessons of revelation was God going to teach me from a failed garden? I was so disappointed! I stopped trying to see or hear anything that God might have wanted me to learn from my gardening experience because I felt that there was not much to learn from a failed garden with no harvest. I gave up gardening.

Now it’s 2013, 2 years later, and I've planted another garden. It is very fruitful! We have kale, mustard greens, Chinese cabbage, snow pea plants, broccoli, mesclun lettuce, local lettuce, and herbs all growing beautifully. The local lettuce was grown from the seeds I saved 2 years ago when all of my lettuce plants bolted quickly and went to seed. I have since learned that I planted the lettuce in the wrong season before! Now that I know the right time to plant it, we have beautiful and bountiful lettuce to eat in its season. Some time last year I began to revisit the lessons that I felt I was supposed to learn from my gardening attempt 2 years ago and I realized that God had taught me quite a bit during that time. In the next 1 or 2 blog posts I will share some of the lessons God has taught me through my gardening experiences in Lichinga. 

 

Just back from the garden with my very first broccoli harvest!

 

 

This was part of our dinner that night with garden fresh broccoli!

 

 

 

 

Until next time, be blessed in the Lord!

Blessings!

Tiffany   

Semolina Flour in Lichinga?!

Lichinga is not known for it's availability of special food items...or even for the availability of lots of items that we think of as normal, everyday items.  That's why I was so surprised when Tyren found a bag of semolina flour in one of the shops one day.  He wasn't sure what you could do with it; but he knew it was some type of special flour and that I would probably know what it was, so he bought it!  I knew exactly what I wanted to do with it-make sesame semolina bread!  I had seen a recipe for this bread probably about 10 years ago and had always wanted to try it.  Last month, I found a recipe on King Arthur Flour's website and whipped up a batch!  We all loved it!

(We happened to have purchased some sesame seeds on one of our trips to Malawi.)

 

There wasn't enough flour left to make another batch of sesame semolina bread, so I made a batch of homemade herb noodles with some of the flour...

 

(I miss my Atlas pasta maker collecting dust in CT!  I had to hand roll and cut these!  Next time we go back to the U.S. I hope to bring it back here!)

 

...and homemade pizza with the rest of the flour...YUM!


(This pizza has homemade cheese on it that we purchased from some local missionaries and pepperoni that was mailed to us in a box!)

 

 

 

Blessings!
Tiffany

Photo Update...

Happy Easter!

 

 



Since I haven't gotten around to finishing the blog I wanted to post next, I figured I'd do a photo blog in the meantime...

 





I took this photo right after church one Sunday last month.  (Our church in Assumane village has grass/bamboo walls, a roof made of grass/bamboo/plastic sheets, and a mud floor.)  It was raining more inside the church than outside!  Two people were sitting on a bench holding an umbrella over their heads during the service!

 

Our passion fruit vines are growing well!

This huge watermelon from our garden turned out to be totally white inside...we found out that watermelon don't ripen during the rainy season here.  Go figure!

 

Holding a snail found in our yard.

Hopefully, I'll get some broccoli out of this plant!

Our new favorite family pastime...making homemade bean burritos!  Last week, we made them twice!

Just hanging around...in a hammock we just put up in our gazebo!

During the rainy season, we have to go through this huge muddy ditch and many others just to get out onto the main road from our house.  We don't get many visitors because of the bad roads out to our place!

 

A rainbow just behind our house...reminding us that God's promises never fail! :)

 

 

Have a blessed Easter...

celebrating the joy that Christ has given

through His death and resurrection!

 

Blessings!

 

Tiffany