Limitless Hugs

Our life and times are connected. I believe there is an inherent knowing that is passed from one generation to another. This little hug from one person to another to say “I see you and I love you”. Decades ago our sweet Grammie – the sweetest lady who ever lived – painted this picture of this sweet kitty.  When our little Rachel was 6 years old she miraculously convinced daddy to get our little Snowflake. Coincidence?  I don’t think so. I believe Grammie was able to sense into the future and painted this kitty. She did not know it but her creative expression was an offering of a limitless hug. This connection makes us feel close to her even though she’s been gone from us for three years. We love her. And she loves us.

I would also like to state that our creative Rachel hopes to one day open a coffee cat shop where people can come to sip her delicious coffee and have an opportunity to adore and adopt a sweet kitty. Did Grammie had a sense of this as well? Maybe.

Coming Home

We traveled over 3,000 miles to find a dream come true. Family reconnected. Memories were made. Hearts were reconciled. Visions fulfilled. I had no idea what this trip would mean to us.

I remember the moment when we made the decision to book the travel arrangements. It was a nudge that seemed to come from out of ourselves. We were immediately girded with strength in the matter. It was about the same feeling we had when we decided to finally remodel our kitchen, return a car we had just purchased a couple of hours before, support a widow, and granting ourselves permission to ask for professional help when caring for aging parents.

These things all were an invitation to step into trust. We heard the call and felt sure that it would all work out as it was supposed to without having the details laid out. But I like knowing details – like the details you are given when going through high school and college. There is a course and schedule. But as we engage past guarantees we experience intuition and the call to step into the promise. We actually are given a guarantee. We are given a Promise. The details may be unclear but ultimately we know He Redeems.

Wendell Berry wrote some comforting words in the offering of Jayber Crow:

“I can remember those early years when it seemed to me I was cut completely adrift, and times when looking back at earlier times, it seemed I had been wandering in the dark woods of error. But now it looks to me as though I was following a path that was laid out for me, unbroken, and maybe even as straight as possible, from one end to the other, and I have this feeling, which never leaves me anymore, that I have been led.”

Cooking with Papa

Daytona Beach

The BEST golfing

Front porch of Aunt Kathy’s and Uncle Danny’s 95-year-old family home

Making friends

Dairy cows

Psalm 107:1-2  Oh give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever! Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom he has redeemed from trouble and gathered in from the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south.