I Salute You

Photo Credit: Debbie Caddell

We were honored to sing as a family during one of the patriotic selections at this year's musical. The song was entitled "I Salute You," and while we only had a few lines, they expressed our heart-felt appreciation for the sacrifice made by our servicemen and women. During the song, the different branches of the military are honored. Immediately following "our" song, one of the local high school drum lines precedes the Fire Department's Honor Guard, and then all the veterans and active duty servicemen and women come to the stage to be honored. It is a proud moment to see around 100 servicepersons flood the stage, and sobering to see that many of this group, though a symbol of our nation's strength, need help up the stage. We may not have them for long, but we were honored to sing our thanks to them.

By the way, the older girls did a great job with no stage fright, so they must have gotten that from their Daddy! I held Madeline, and while she fussed a bit from being so close to the band and brass, she calmed down pretty quickly with some soothing from Mama before our part. When we sang, she mouthed the words along with us, in time, and with some correct word formations, too! :)

{This Moment} Posing

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

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Olivia-isms

Olivia came up to me and said, softly and sweetly, "Wherever I go, I'll still love you." (I can hear the collective "Awwwwww.")

Since it was rainy one day, I let the girls watch Disney's Pocahontas (as a tale and not a history lesson, by the way, since there was a tsk heard 'round the world), and Olivia was singing "Savages, savages" in her own way: "Samwiches, samwiches..."

While looking through a bowl of shells collected from a Florida beach: "Mom, was this one made in China?"

Part of her bedtime prayer: "Help us to have a fun day tomorrow. Help it to be the right size of warm, no cold and no hot. Nevermind, I want it to be hot so that [?? Mama doesn't remember why!]."

An Ode to Family

Okay, perhaps it's not exactly an ode...but I bet I had you going there for a minute. My brother and his family were on their way back to South Dakota last week and we got to spend a whole day with them. As you can see from this series of shots, Jordan was in vacation mode. Picture-taking wasn't evidently on his list of priorities, so he kept being silly and lengthening the time between pictures and eating those incredible pork chops Glen grilled.

I'll cut him a little slack though, because he also was in the act-like-Daddy mode. He banged our front door into submission (after our home-health company left it open in a wind storm, while we were gone) and replaced a faucet we've been trying to get to for a long time.

My lovely sister-in-law, Kayla...love her much, and desperately wish she lived closer! (Does it say something about me that all my sisters-in-law moved so far away? They are currently in South Dakota, Alaska, and Virgina. You can't get too much further apart and be in the same country....unless I move to Florida! :)

Kayla and I took off for The Pointy Pencil here in town to shop for stuff she can't get in South Dakota. What fun! I entered notes into my phone for things I had wanted and were cheaper there than I had thought they would be. (Es, it's reloacated downtown and it is beautiful! They have crafts anytime of the day for the kids, and a play area that would be a dream school room!)

And the kids...Brianna, 5 (6 weeks younger than our Olivia); Daniel, almost 3 (2 weeks older than our Madeline); and Alyssa, 16 months (?)

Daddy's Bible

The Bible I will take to church with me today was held in my father's hands. It was a gift from my mother in 1973 and it is soft with age and love. Her tiny script marks the flyleaf, and I wonder if her matching Bible was a gift from him?

Later Bibles belonging to Daddy are very marked and full of notes, but this one only has a few marked passages and a few sermon outlines scrawled on so-small pieces of paper. It always amazed me how he could preach such beautiful sermons off of a scrap of paper, just a few words jotted down.

I read these words last night, and my first thoughts were of the Bible of Daddy's I treasure.

A Book I have - a friend gave -
Whose Pencil - here and there -
Had notched the place that pleased Him -
At Rest - His fingers are -

Now - when I read - I read not -
For interrupting Tears -
Obliterate the Etchings
Too Costly for Repairs.

~~Emily Dickinson, c. 1862

Happy Father's Day in Heaven. Are you with your father around the Father's throne?

Daddy's photography

{This Moment} Reading in Bed: Favorite Time of Day

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

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Kissing Cousins

Daniel and Madeline, exactly 2 weeks apart