Josh's 5k and some odds and ends...

Bless his heart. Josh got to run a 5k this morning. With all of his caregiving responsibilities it's so nice to see him have the chance to just do something he loves for a bit. Jess and Nathan stayed home and watched a movie. (Nathan can get bored waiting and you can't predict how he might act. Better not to take him to this type of thing.) I couldn't bear to stay home and not cheer him on. I think he would have been  fine with going alone, but in my late 40's we ran these together, and it's kind of a sentimental thing for me. I don't mind admitting that I teared up when the lady blew the air horn and the runners took off. This was in a tiny neighboring town as part of their Paul Bunyan Festival. It was a small group of runners and lots of walkers. Josh came in a mile ahead of everyone else, ha ha. I think he's the only one who trained at all. This was their first year doing this. It's a fundraiser to help local people battling cancer. Everyone got a t-shirt and a finisher medal. Anyway, it was a nice little morning jaunt.

My farmer neighbors got their hay baled. I hope it was dry enough! I wanted to take a picture of all the bales in the field. It was so picturesque. I made the mistake of taking my daily walk first, and when I got back they had already removed about half of the bales! They are busy little bees! I suppose they have to make room for that second crop!

Here are the second four cards for the #6 Altered Playing Card swap. The theme of the first four I showed you was "Birds". The theme for these is "Stamps".

I was prowling around outside in my yard a couple of days ago. Kind of looking for flowers to press, but mainly enjoying being outside in the beautiful weather.

A mingling of oak and hazelnut leaves.

The hugging trees. :)

Josh made me aware that I have ferns growing in my underbrush. I pressed a few of these to frame.

Yarrow leaves also make pretty things to press.

I imagine these are some sort of phlox? I picked some of these to press, too.

What's on my desk you ask? Well, my current swap theme is "Inspired by Vincent Van Gogh". We can paint something original, but do it in his style. Or, we can try to copy something of his. Always the copier, I'm attempting his self-portrait. I don't know if I can create something that looks even vaguely like his painting, but I'm trying to lay down solid base colors, and then I'll go back with a pointy tool and add in some of the lines like he does. It should be a mess! But I'm going to try.

This was my first attempt.

The children look on in this 25 year old picture. Josh (10), Micah (3), Jordan (12).

I'm currently reading The Remnant from the Left Behind series. I think I read the first three books of the series many years ago and then realized there were going to be tons more and kind of gave up. So, now I'm leapfrogging over a bunch of books and reading this one. Maybe I'll go back and fill in the rest later, but my library only had this one and Armageddon, which I also got. I'm aware that end time events are a controversial thing, and people can disagree on how it's all going to go down, but let's face it; none of us really knows. I trust God will take care of it in His own way and in His own timing. But this series of books gets me excited about Jesus coming back and keeps my mind on Him, and I think that's a good thing. The world can seem humdrum, or too challenging, and sometimes it seems like it will just drag on forever this way. It's good to have a reminder that things are happening in the heavenlies, and we have to keep looking up! Anyway, that's my take on things. :)

Looks like I have some blog reading to catch up on! Thanks for stopping by!
Shalom!