Sunrays & ocean waves.

In late October, at our favorite beach spot with some dear friends! :)  

 Lots of beach football.....

 Sour Warhead cereal??? :)

 Trying a little bit of a Beatles pose. :)

 As our family changes and gets older, we are learning a new normal. Our oldest brother is not able to travel with us now that he is in law school which has been a hard and sad adjustment.

Sometimes it feels like time is an enemy pulling us away and forward into new things when we were quite okay with the way things were. I once heard a soul say (paraphrase), "it is a blessing to us that we are passing away, that things are always changing, that we are all getting older. It reminds us that this world is temporary and will end soon. It draws our eyes to eternity." I love this truth!!

 "Stand on the shores of a site unseen, the substance of this dwells in me, 'cause my natural eyes only go skin deep but the eye’s of my heart anchor the sea - plumbing the depths to the place in between the tangible world and the land of a dreams.  Because everything ain’t quite as it seems. There’s more beneath the appearance of things.  A beggar could be king within the shadows of a wing.

 
And wisdom will honor everyone who will learn - to listen, to love, and to pray and discern and to do the right thing even when it burns and to live in the light through treacherous turns.  A man is weak, but the spirit yearns to keep on course from the bow to the stearn and throw overboard every selfish concern that tries to work for what can’t be earned.  Sometimes the only way to return is to go, where the winds will take you. 

And to let go, of all, you cannot hold onto - for the Hope, beyond, the blue."
(Josh Garrels. Beyond the Blue.)