my day off

Today I had an extremely blessed day - it will by my mom's 81st birthday Thursday so today my sister and I drug her around to all sorts of places to celebrate early!

My sister, my mom and myself - loving on one another!

We began at Starbucks of course - then made our way to the Franklin Park Conservatory in Columbus.  It was beautiful and a great way to admire God's handicraft and care for amazing detail in the plants and flowers and colors everywhere!

cement faces hide among the cactus in the dessert display

Beautiful pieces of blown glass add color to this spot in the gardens

Private donors put up enough money to purchase many of the
Chihuly glass artwork pieces that are now a permanent part
of the Conservatory.

God's care about detail really was apparent in these
tiny 'pitcher plants'.  They looked just like water pitchers!

The Scary Plant display was up for Halloween.
This was all made out of plants and veggies - you can see the detail in the hand below!

There was an entire row of large jars with 'pickled pumpkin faces' in them

The Koi swam peacefully and were huge!

It was a great day of much laughter, reminiscing and plans for the Holidays fast approaching - it made me very, very thankful to have had such an amazing example of Godly mothering in my life... and she's still going strong at 81 years young!!

my day off

I loved my day off.

First half of the day was quiet...at home reading and working on a couple of things in preparation for the work week - but at a slow easy pace.  A pace that achieved what needed to be done without any stress or hurry.  With puppy asleep in the sun and hubby nearby also catching up on his computer.  No music, no TV just silent sun beams through windows and an occasionally faint typing sound.

Then the second half of our day - I drove my parents to Columbus to see my sister and brother-in-law's amazing new church www.northwestchapel.org and to celebrate my sisters birthday!

We walked through their new ministry and celebrated how God miraculously moved them there!  It is SO obvious it's right where they belong.  And then we laughed and talked over food and gifts.

The simple joy of being together as a family is something I will never take for granted, and it is my favorite way to spend a day off.

Days off should all be just like today was (:

one more step

Tonight as a family we took one more step into the next period of our lives.  We went with Eric (our son) apartment searching in the Columbus area.

Since I have never lived more that 25 minutes from where I grew up,  am not the best person to advise anyone on relocating! 

This next step for our family is not sad by any means because we love our new daughter in law and we love how happy she makes our son.

And really when you think about it all of our life is just one more step. Jesus asks us to follow Him, and that requires steps.  If we follow Him than all of our steps matter, even the ones that move us away from our children.  God designed the process and from day one our children step away from us.  Tonight we took some of those 'away' steps.

Where are your steps taking you?  

friday fun

My Friday has been a blessing! I spent time working with our amazing Magnification Staff this morning, met with the other Directors of Crossroads that I love so much ...then after work we headed to Columbus just to hang out - here are some of the things we saw!

This was an amazing sand sculpture - it was so well done I wasn't sure if it was really sand or not...very cool!

I am so thankful for such a beautiful evening just to be outside and enjoy my parents and hubby!

Don't have much time to write tonight, going canoeing early tomorrow with the Performing Arts Small Group then off to church! Good night!