Wednesday, May 8:
One afternoon, all the younger ones were busy playing Lego—such fun! (And I couldn’t decide which picture to keep, so you get both.)
Thursday, May 9:
The table next to my desk showed remnants of the day’s work: Time spent on some studies on American History, and my first handwritten letter in ages! (So much fun to do! I hope you get it soon, Marlène!)
Well, my grandma has inspired me once again. Last month, she decided to do a photo-a-day challenge, and I had such fun seeing pictures of her normal life! I’ve done something similar before, but it’s been a few years. Somehow, I always got caught up taking flower or landscape pictures because I couldn’t find anything else worthy of photography (or so I thought). After seeing Grandma’s lineup, and especially enjoying the pictures she shared of parts of the family I don’t see very often, I thought it would be fun to try the challenge again.
So, without further ado, here goes:
The strip canoe project my brothers have been working on for nearly a year now—ready for more epoxy coating! They brought it out in the sunshine one afternoon so the epoxy would harden faster.
This morning, I woke up feeling ready to go, wide awake and encouraged for the day ahead. I had gotten just enough sleep last night, and was ready to hit the day with a vengeance. Which was fortunate today, because I had a full day ahead at work teaching school, making lunch, and getting some cleaning out of the way.
Note: The pictures are from a birthday party we had out at a local beach last Sunday evening.
And this evening as I was finishing up, the song Be Unto Your Name got stuck in my head. So as I scrubbed bucket tops, mopped floors, and cleaned out the vacuum (again), I sang.
And here is part five and the final instalment of my trip’s pictures! It was so hard to choose which ones to share, and which not to. I’ve delighted in looking through the ones I was able to print, but seeing them here is special, too.
We took a walk down to the Detention River one warm afternoon, so the children could enjoy cooling off in the water. It was a beautiful setting, and I enjoyed seeing the little “peek” out to the ocean across the river flat! This particular river, at least near the sea, is a tidal river, and it was nearing high tide when we were down there.
Sometimes I wonder what makes one place stand out to you as being extra-special, and what makes another one just, well, ordinary. I think it has a lot to do with where one feels loved and accepted (such as my family home, for example), but I’m convinced there’s more to it that I don’t see, too. Perhaps it’s spiritual, or some other sort of tie like that that resonates with me—I don’t know. But whatever it is, when I am able to connect with others and share in the joys and struggles of walking this walk of faith with them, even for just a short time, I come away feeling very enriched.
Before I ever set foot on Tasmania, the girl I was traveling with told me I needed to see the Nut. And before you think that it’s some place where there are a bunch of almond or cashew or walnut trees, no…there are trees, but it’s a mountain along the northeastern edge of Tasmania that is a wildlife reserve. Apparently one of the best times to go there, wildlife- and beauty- and amount of people-wise, is at dawn. So, one evening just a couple days before I was supposed to leave, we arranged to meet up at 5 am the next morning and drive the 30 minutes or so to the Nut.
(Need to catch up on the previous posts? Here are the links: Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.)
I think we ended up leaving about 5:10 or 5:15, which was pretty good, since at least one person who ended up coming wasn’t even awake until 5! We had a beautiful, peaceful drive out there.