i love this verse...

I have to remind myself of this truth quite frequently!

Thank You Lord for forever.

❤️

PET scan update

I had to wait a week and a day to get the results.

I did fairly well with my thoughts, that is,

until I actually got to the doctor's office this morning.

Somewhere between shutting the door of my van and getting my blood pressure checked

 I must have lost it completely.

My normally perfect BP was over the moon.

She took it twice. It didn't get better.

I mumbled something about being nervous,

She nodded her head in sympathy.

She asked if I was dizzy,

I said no.

She let me go.

Once you have a run in with cancer,

The big question in the back of your mind is,

"Has it come back?"

You pray and you hope and then you pray and hope some more.

My doctor came in with a smile on his face and the report in his hand.

He told me immediately that the scan was normal...

no cancer.

Y'all, it was like a thousand loads were lifted from my body.

I felt weightless.

Thank you God my Father and the Father of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

Thank You Jesus!

You are the God who heals.

You are the God of mercy and grace.

To You belong all of the glory and the praise and the worship.

Thank You!

this morning on the river

This day dawned beautifully...

sunny and warm with a gentle breeze.

I took my camera to church to see what I could find.

This is the view behind the chapel,

right behind the pulpit.

One can see this river from every window.

Worship flows so magnificently from this spot.

I spotted this shrimp boat...

first time for this.

I wonder if he was catching anything?

This is the boat house.

On Sunday mornings it becomes the Hope baby nursery...

quite a bustling place.

This is the chapel bell.

It is used to call the people from fellowshipping to worship.

The children like to ring this bell also.

God has blessed Hope Bible Church

with such an amazing place to meet to hear God's word proclaimed,

to sing praises, to pray, to be with other believers.

Sometimes it takes my breath away.

Thankful tonight for all of this!

I know you must say...

...more flowers?

But, I'm obsessed right now.

I've waited so long to have a cutting garden in my backyard.

Now, it's starting to happen.

I am so thankful!

Flowers make everything more beautiful.

They are God's handiwork.

No man can make a flower,

can scent a rose,

can come up with the perfect, delicate colors of a petal.

Thanking Him today for these special gifts.

They always make me think of His loving ways with His people.

If you look closely you will see a blemish on one of the rich, green leaves.

It made me think of the sin in my life...

all of the things that make me so thankful for Jesus.

Because of the fall of Adam,

the very first man,

we are all polluted with sin at birth.

It is in our nature.

It is who we are.

It's kinda like we are in a huge, miry pit with no way out on our own.

Before the earth was set in place,

God knew our helpless state.

He took pity on us and provided a way of escape from that pit.

He decided then that He would send His Son to be the payment for our sin...

the way to be reconciled to Him,

the way to deal with that sin.

You see God is holy and cannot look upon sin.

There had to be a substitute.

There had to be a sacrificial Lamb.

I've been reading the first part of the Old Testament these last few weeks.

To take care of the sins of  the Israelites,

His chosen people,

God instituted the sacrifice of animals to atone for their sins.

It was a brutal, bloody and exhausting system,

but it was God's way,

 and that was how one's sins were forgiven.

Praise God, 

as was promised from the beginning,

in the fullness of time,

 Jesus, God's Son, 

came to the earth, 

 to accomplish salvation,

to shed His blood,

to die,

to be the sacrifice for the sins of mankind.

God was pleased 

and accepted Jesus' blood as payment in full for our sins.

No more animal sacrifices.

Jesus' death provided the one and only sacrifice that would ever be needed.

Jesus died for everyone.

This is for you and for me.

This is for everyone you know.

there are no exclusions.

It doesn't matter how bad you have been in your life,

how many dumb, crazy, stupid antics you have participated in.

It doesn't matter that you've waited this long to accept His free gift.

God sent Jesus to die for you.

He wants you to come to Him,

He wants to forgive you and give you the gift of eternal life and so much more.

How precious is our Savior Jesus Christ who did all of this for us.

backyard gardens

These are my flower creations.

After planting and nurturing,

fertilizing and watering,

pruning and cutting,

they are finally putting on a show for us.

I get much pleasure looking out of the back windows and seeing them in the yard.

Having flowers like these in the middle of the summer is not for sissies.

They require much attention and love.

But, they are certainly worth all the trouble.

Back porch beauties.

The Geraniums are just coming off of their annual slump.

Starting to bloom profusely again.

Bubba has some miracle bloom potion he applies every now and then.

I have Gerber Daises which I love.

I love these baskets.

They start blooming when the sun gets strong every morning.

At about four in the afternoon the blooms close up.

Bubba's Mom called them Four O'clocks.

The Hydrangeas are finally blooming.

When Bubba bought these they were a beautiful color of blue.

They are blooming pink.

The lady at the nursery said we have the wrong soil to produce blue Hydrangeas.

She gave him another potion.

We'll see if we can get them back to blue again.

This last picture is a peek out of the house onto the front porch.

I keep that shutter open every day so that I can see my pink Vincas as I pass by.

They make me happy.

So happy that the deer are leaving our flowers alone.

I don't want to think about what happened to them...

I'm just glad they're gone!!

🦌

@tybee...

...waiting for the sun to come up.

Look at that big wide ocean.

Just shrouded in darkness, now revealed again in the early morning light.

Calm and peaceful,

still as glass.

Look at the sky.

First rays of the sun revealing a new morning to come.

A new day, full of the promises of God.

(picture @riverrat productions)

Tomorrow I have to have another Pet Scan done.

My doctors keep a diligent watch over me.

This test is to see if the cancer has come back.

I'm trying to be brave...

to keep my mind set on things above.

All of my life is in God's hands.

I will wait and see what He has planned for me.

I won't get the results until Tuesday week.

So, so thankful for the book I am reading.

This book by Martyn Lloyd-Jones is an exposition of Ephesians Chapter One.

It is an in depth look at the prayer that the 

Apostle Paul prays for the Christians at Ephesus.

Truly life changing!

Mesmerizing!

I have underlined almost every word in every chapter.

Thank you to my husband for bringing it to me,

for insisting that I read it.

🌅

our long awaited bithday lunch

All of us went to Savannah High School together.

We also went to church together...

Calvary Baptist Temple.

 On Tuesday we celebrated the fact that we have all turned 70.

Sometimes that age thing seems hard to believe,

but it is really true.

We have all known some hard knocks but have survived quite well.

We bask in our children and our grandchildren...

all that has come since we graduated in 1966 and went our separate ways.

From left to right...

Cathy Cleland

Linda Thompson

Mary Kaye Christenson

Frances Dantzler

&

Loucinda Grambling

I remember so many fun times with these girls.

I think the funnest time of all was when we went up to spend the night

in a little cabin in the middle of the woods

in the middle of nowhere.

Lou's mom dropped us off and told us she would see us the next day.

What I truly remember best about this time is that we hardly slept a wink.

We were basically scared out of our minds that the bogey man was loose in those woods and would be bursting through the door to get us at any minute.

Somehow we survived and lived to see another day.

We had to have all been a little nuts!!

I love these girls so much.

I am so thankful for them and for the blessings they are.

We met at The Olde Pink House.

This place holds many memories for us as well.

We would ride the bus downtown on Saturday and eat 

because Lou's sweet Aunt Elma worked there.

The rolls were to die for.

So glad this place wasn't lost in the fire back before Christmas.

It has been beautifully restored and is thriving.

Thank you God for old friends and good memories.

our july 4th celebration

First and foremost,

a beautiful table setting.

Bouquet from Cathy's backyard garden.

Amanda enjoying some watermelon.

Wouldn't be July 4th without it.

Granddaddy with Jake and Eli.

Notice that it is storming outside.

Wouldn't be July 4th without a good thunderstorm.

Outside lined up for lawn darts.

David really gets into them.

He was keeping score and cheering someone on..

Our little Walt loves the American flag.

Spectators.

You can see some of my flowers.

They had just gotten beaten down by the rain.

We have that droopy, wet look.

We got these outside activities in between two major thunderboomers.

Next came the sparklers.

We had long Neons and Morning Glories.

So much fun!

Jake and Harry became Jedi's and used their sparklers as light sabers.

For some reason the sparklers created a large amount of smoke.

Kinda eerie looking.

Next came the fireworks.

Mark was our fireworks master.

He did such a good job of setting them off.

No one was injured.

David provided our music from his phone.

He chose a song from

 The Greatest Showman.

The Grand Finale was aptly named

Baby Bubba.

The fireworks went up to the top of the trees.

We were all in awe of the display, and,

It was in our own back yard.

They were very loud too.

So exciting!

I call this one

"Just hanging out in the backyard after the fireworks display."

We were all in a state of euphoria by this time.

What a wonderful 4th of July.

One of the best ever.

Hooray for the red, white, and blue!

🎆

*photos taken by amanda

happy fourth of july

It was a wild, stormy, wonderful Fourth of July here at our house.

All 13 of us laughed and ate and enjoyed the afternoon immensely.

We had ribs and barbecue,

baked beans,

corn on the cob,

(except for Lucy who got braces recently)

watermelon,

and Cathy's famous potato salad.

Lucy made lemon cupcakes for our desert.

We competed at lawn darts again.

Mark won!

It was his first try!!

We had sparklers and pop-its.

Mark set off some fireworks in our own back yard.

The grand finale was a

Baby Bubba

that exploded way above the tress.

David provided the music...

he used an excerpt from The Greatest Showman.

It was all so very exciting and fun.

Everyone has gone home now and the house is very quiet.

Lots of laundry and dirty dishes.

The floors need a good cleaning because of the storm 

that hit right about the time that the party got started.

And here is the silly picture.

We were drunk on fun.

A little blurry.

(Amanda took this on her phone from her watch)

And life keeps rolling along.

happy birthday amanda #43

Amanda turned 43 on June 20th.

We didn't get to celebrate until yesterday.

We had a beautiful party for our beautiful girl.

Love this picture of her with her boys.

She loves to be sung to and wished Happy Birthday.

Her cake was magnificent.

Tall and stately and delicious too.

Baker's Pride

She got a gorgeous new white bathmat from the Clelands.

Notice her shoes.

The black ones were gifted last year.

The gold gladiators were gifted this time.

Amanda posing in front of her gifts.

( she is definitely a poser) 😇

Amanda modeling one of her cute birthday outfits.

Notice to shoes! 👀

For dinner we had steaks cooked on the grill by granddaddy.

I made a Hash Brown Potato Casserole.

We also had David's famous salad.

Such a nice fun party.

Lots of laughter and fellowship.

Thank You God for all of Your blessings.