Day 355

April 11

Today we drove down to San Francisco to start at a friend's house overnight so we could get an early start to a fun day on Sunday at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom (formerly known as Marine World).

The weather was perfect, which was funny because it was pouring rain in the Rogue Valley but as soon as we crossed into California, it looked like this:

Day 320

March 7

Spent a beautiful Sabbath in the Redwoods at Crescent City. We drove through the woods past the Stout Grove.  Then, even though it was foggy at the coast, we enjoyed a picnic overlooking the ocean. At least it wasn't too cold. We found 3 out of 5 letterboxes that we looked for, found some decent sized agates near Pebble Beach, and all in all had a relaxing day.

Day 319

The only howl rooms we could find in Crescent City, CA only had one bed. So we packed our camping cots for the girls. Our room is quite small, so Sarah's cot is right next to the door. At the end of Hannah's cot, we have about 6" to walk past on the way to the restroom. Oh well. We're looking forward to a glorious Sabbath on the coast tomorrow! Perhaps some letterboxing, maybe some hunting for agates. Definitely the picnic lunch we packed. Can't wait!

Day 313

February 28

A gorgeous Sabbath afternoon. We went out letterboxing with a Sarah's best friend, and her mom and brother. One of our stops was in Lithia Park in Ashland.

Day 285

January 31

Hannah helped lead the praise music for Pathfinder Sabbath at the other church in Medford.

Day 272

January 18

We went to Lowe's for some stuff and looked at ovens while we were there. This one said "Sabbath mode" instead of "delay start".

Day 257

January 3

We have a great Sabbath afternoon activity for the winter months - chord praise. I started attending a couple years ago as a complete novice at playing the guitar. I'm feeling fairly comfortable playing in a group like this now.  Even though I still can't play an F chord. This was the first Sabbath back this season. We had about 11 guitars and a couple of violins. Not a bad turnout!

Day 256

January 2

Another busy couple of days and the only picture I took was this quilt top kit I wanted to list for sale.

Nope. I found another picture. Hannah made the cottage cheese loaf for Sabbath potluck. 

Day 249

Tonight was Candlelight Communion at church. Every other year, on the last Friday of the year, we have this beautiful service. Charlie and I put together these topiaries somewhere around 13 years ago and we still use them to decorate for the evening. Charlie, Sarah, and our friends Kayla and Kody did the decorating this year.

Day 243

December 20

Sorry for the gap in pictures. We were mostly sick all week, and I was slammed trying to get caught up at work. I just never took any pictures!

This afternoon the Children's Ministries department at church put together 20 bags of essentials (toiletries, first aid supplies, warm socks, hats, gloves, etc., plus some non-perishable ready-to-eat healthy foods, etc.) for homeless in the area. Then they split up into a couple groups and went to visit several of our church members who are shut-ins, and sang some Christmas carols for them.

Day 209

One of the beautiful sights from our church.

Day 195

Pathfinder Sabbath

Day 188

The camera couldn't do this justice. It was actually a triple rainbow. Absolutely beautiful symbol of a beautiful promise.

Day 181

A beautiful Sabbath birthday at the coast. We went for a walk by the Coquille River Lighthouse, then went down to the beach near Devil's Kitchen State Park. Then over to the fish hatchery where we fed some fish and laughed at the little ones trying to swim "upstream" where the water jets were pouring into the growing pond.

Oh, and did I mention, there were letterboxes at all those places?  :D

Day 125

This morning I was invested as a Master Guide! For anyone not familiar with the Pathfinder program, it's similar to Scouts, and is the highest level of classwork. Kind of like becoming an a Eagle Scout, I think. Anyway, it took me about five years of working on it on and off to finish the program.

I was so excited to find out an old, dear friend, like a second mom to me, was going to be here at Oshkosh and would be able to invest me. She was a staff member in the pathfinder club I belonged to as a kid. It was somewhere over 15 years ago I last saw her and her husband.
After lunch we went to the ventriloquist program.  Then Sarah and I went to the White Estate tent and sat in on the class for the newly released God's Messenger honor. She was so happy to have earned an honor this week! And especially that she could call grandma,  who worked at the White Estate for over 20 years, and tell her about it.

The evening program is just getting started. Can't wait to find out two things... is God going to answer the prayer of nearly 50,000 pathfinders and send the rain past us without drenching us? And,  is Daniel going to get out of the lion's den??

Day 98

Another day where I didn't take any pictures. Had a nice church service, potluck, etc. Then the girls and I, plus Bob & Sue, Jen & her sister Trish, all went over to see my grandma.  Sue brought her guitar, and I took my guitar and Sarah's violin. Sarah played a couple songs for Great-Mom, then we all played and sang some of the hymns that she loves. Came home and jumped in the pool with everybody. Just never got around to taking any pictures! But here's a picture of a picture I drew in church...

Day 83

Nice way to end the 4th as well as bring in the Sabbath. Bonfire with friends and family.

Day 56

My view from the pool on a beautiful Sabbath afternoon. Birds singing, a breeze blowing through the trees, not a cloud in the sky.

Day 21

We went for a bike ride on a beautiful Sabbath afternoon with friends today. We'll be having a pathfinder bikeathon in a couple weeks so we wanted to calculate the mileage of the trail we plan to use. Just about 4 miles one way. Beautiful ride!

Day 14

Last day of the season for "chord praise"... My fingers are always so sore after a fun Sabbath afternoon playing guitar with 8 or 9  others.