Chapel of Hope Stories

Dear Reader:

*Before we get started today I would like to send out a personal request…my wonderfully talented (jazz guitarist) nephew, Lee Barbour, is up for Musician of the Year for Charleston and we want him to win this year…he is so deserving and has come close in the past!!!

Hopefully this is the year that everyone takes him over the top. I am enclosing a link for the voting….just scroll down and click on the category Culture, Arts, and Entertainment…and then scroll down the varied categories until you find the Best Musician and check  ( Lee Barbour’s) box. I would appreciate it so much…and I know Rhodes would love for  you to vote for his daddy, as well as, his loving wife Vikki!

Tomorrow is the last day of the contest so if you could take time and vote today that would be terrific! Thanks in advance! Like my foot…we are ready to “seal the deal” or perhaps “press and seal the deal” on this most deserving nomination!  🙂

https://www.charlestoncitypaper.com/charleston/best-of-charleston-2019-voting-is-now-open/Content?oid=26707864

And now for the other “Press and Seal” story. The one thing I was sad about this time going to Pawleys was that I was forewarned not to get my foot wet and/or sand in the dressings. In other words stay away from the beach.

I told the Ya’s about this year’s limitation and I should have seen Libby’s mind ticking away. Suddenly she just had to go to the store…(very un-Libby-like)…and when she returned she had a big grin on her face. She told me to come over and sit down in a dining room chair while she got the roll of “Press and Seal.” Before I knew what had happened …she had wrapped my foot, bandages, and shoe all up into the best looking protective boot one could have. It stuck to the dressing like magic but pulled off just as easily!

It worked fabulously…to get across a small section of the sand and then onto a neighbor’s pier that went out over the beach towards the ocean. It was a beautiful day…I was able to breathe in the ocean breezes, take photos, and just laugh at the sheer joy of seeing the ocean up close and personal. Both Libby and I were so happy!

To me creativity is just an adult child having fun and unknowingly showing the very essence of the soul, within each of us, in the process!

And speaking of staying in touch with our souls…when I took these pictures from the front porch at Carolina Corner one evening…everyone’s soul was touched at the beauty of the greatest artist in the world…God.

So until tomorrow…Thank you God for the beauty of the earth…your greatest expression of love for us…and what a gift it is!

Anne and I participated in the B.I.R.D.S Sculpture Trail Saturday (a scavenger hunt of sorts around downtown)…It was a lot of fun…but longer than I thought and my foot let me know it. Still I can “water” it down for the grandchildren when I take Rutledge and Eva Cate on it soon. We didn’t do it in order and the owl came first…good thing we didn’t start with it…because it and even the Carolina parakeet were hard to find…until we did locate them and then we thought how in the world could we have missed them?

A shout-out to Lisa and Hollow Tree Nursery… 830 Hollow Tree Lane…Ridgeville, SC.  All the camellias were just out of this world…Lisa has so many original historical camellias…Anne and I thought we were in an enchanted forest…just gorgeous…some camellias were moon-pie sized with all kinds of shapes!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Of all the signs and beach houses we see each year during our winter retreat..none do we love more than Carolina Corner.…and the loveliest couple…who own it….The Amazing Eadons… Why they even allow three “Tigers” to roam around their premises during our mid-winter retreat. 🙂  The stay is always “magic.”

Dear Reader:

Like stories beneath the surface…so lies nature’s beauty. For years I have wanted a redbud tree and yesterday Anne and I returned to Hollow Tree nursery where I bought this sapling…ready to plant… with the first hint of its blooms in progress. (Fingers crossed for a long, healthy life.)  *Anne said its name should be “Hope” so “Hope” it is! Perfect name for such potential beauty!

*It is getting harder and harder for me to concentrate while typing the next blog post when I glance out the side window and there are the camellias still in full bloom, now accompanied by the bountiful azaleas…it takes my breath away.

The little chapel birdhouse is surrounded with beauty also….Summerville really is the “Flowertown in the Pines.”

…And check out this gorgeous camellia…it and several other buds are bursting forth from a planter where it sat for two years doing nothing…but now it is blooming away and about to be permanently planted. Lisa, at Hollow Tree nursery, said the excessive rain we had in July has produced these unbelievably beautiful and huge camellias this year.

I have discovered that there are also stories waiting to shine ..with just one question asked … a story in-waiting finally has its chance to unfold too like a beautiful bloom…and there is such beauty in stories. 

I couldn’t be at the Hammock Shops and not stop in for my annual visit with the owner of Whitmire Fine Jewelry shop, John Henry Whitmire…His story of the origin behind the “Legend of the Pawleys Island Shell” is still one of the most popular and favorite posts today.

However, this time when I asked for Mr. Whitmire… he was gone…traveling on vacation in Europe with friends and skiing…sounds fantastic! So I started looking around and decided to splurge and get myself a sterling silver palmetto tree (state tree) ring since I taught South Carolina history for almost three decades.

As one of the wonderfully warm employees was helping me try on ring sizes…we began talking and I asked her…her name. She replied Lani. I told her how much I liked it and she said it was Hawaiian for Leilani which translated means “Heavenly Flower.”

I was immediately intrigued. I wanted to know how she got from being born in Hawaii to Pawleys Island…and boy, was I in for a story!

Lani said her parents left Hawaii (on a ship called the Lurline) when she was just two years old… for a new job opportunity for her father. At that time he was associated with Voice of America. She said all she remembers about the voyage was her mother telling her that she didn’t have any diapers on board so Lani would have to be potty trained on the trip…it worked…she was.

They moved to Heightsville, Maryland, right outside Washington, D.C. and her father returned to school…training for a job at Lockheed…part of the NASA Space program. Lani had no idea her father was rising quickly to be one of the top Lockheed scientists but she does remember  her father getting her John Glenn’s autograph after he walked on the moon.

They then moved to California to the Lockheed Space Program …by now her father was moving in  ‘Top Secret” divisions….though neither she nor her mother knew or understood it initially. It came to a head when her mother wanted to take Lani (one summer) on a European vacation. Her father was adamantly opposed but when he finally reluctantly gave in he had an exact itinerary of where they were at all times. Lani remembers that she and her mother felt like they were “followed” all over Europe.

Lani’s beloved father died when he was 64 in 1983 in England where he was working at the Lockheed facility there. His body was returned to the United States….California.

At the funeral all these “Big Wigs” in the NASA Space Program showed up and one representative told the stunned gathering that Lani’s dad was one of the top 10 scientists who developed the USA NASA Space program.

Lani married, had two wonderful children and later divorced. At some point she just decided she wanted to live in a warm climate and eventually ended up at Pawleys Island. (And she was there, one day, in late February when an inquisitive woman from Summerville showed up and released a story, inside her, that was meant to be told!) 🙂

On a personal note…Thank you so much Lani for sharing your story and thank you for all your help in finding me the perfect ring to remember my by-gone teaching days. It was, is, and will be a day to always remember.

Intrigue, mystery….it is closer than most of ever know if we just take time to listen to others’ stories.

So until tomorrow…the  Press’n Seal story will be told tomorrow, along with some breath-taking sunset pictures we all witnessed on our “Blessed Isle” as the “Legend of the Pawleys Island Shell” tells us.

(Yesterday Anne and I share another adventure before going to Hollow Tree Nursery…will share some of the fun involved in this endeavor tomorrow also.)

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Dear Reader:

None of us wanted time to fly by…in fact the Saturday evening after arriving it was like none of us wanted to go bed because we would have, then, spent one day at Pawleys already…and we didn’t want time to keep moving…instead…to somehow freeze it for a little bit… so we could just be lost in a never never land for a few precious days.

The secret really is relaxing...time will still march on…but without stress or anxiety…just fun and laughter…and making the most of each moment together.

Brooke took me to Chico’s to pick up a jacket I got using my Chico gift card the Ya’s gave me for my birthday…(there is a funny story behind the jacket…but I will have to wait to tell you that one at another time.)

On the way home we decided to take the South Causeway (instead of the usual North) into Pawleys to check on the little chapel there. You might remember they were moving the Pawleys Chapel off  the moors in the water across the street (temporarily) to fix the foundation of both the chapel and the moorings.

So on our adventure to find the chapel we came across a lot of fun and or unusual surprises…like driving across parts of roads that looked like the beach…covered in sand from earlier recent storms that swept the sand from the beaches over the dunes and homes/properties onto the paved streets…covering them.

 We were delighted when we found the Pawleys Chapel sitting right back out in the waters….prettier than ever. Oh the stories that little chapel could tell!

What got us laughing and nodding, however, was reading the different names of the beach cottages along the “South” end of the island….creative, funny, and wise….a diverse array of names.

We loved the idea of mixing two names together…like this cute example: “Chillaxing”…the perfect word for what the Ya’s did at Pawleys!

I, especially, loved this house sign located near Linda’s beach house…it is so true. Sometimes we just have to physically get away in order to truly “get away.”

What can you say about “Beach Nuts” except that the name defines how we all should act at the beach…let the walls come down and the child, inside each of us, come out…. just be funny!

And there is always time for a little cocktail at the beach…a toast to each other for another year together…”tottering” on a lifetime of friendship.

Some of the smaller historic houses…almost lost among the newer big houses that have gone up recently…still show their pride…small but mighty…they survived the storms when some of their big neighbors didn’t!

It was a fun afternoon just “chillaxing” in the car and slowly driving to the very end of the island before slowly turning around…and taking some photo shots to remember the time together.

*I got a text ping one morning from Libby…who was already out on the porch… to let me know Sammy the Cardinal was looking for me…she included the picture. Later that morning I walked out on the porch and there was Sammy behind me on a bush…he stayed there as I crept closer and closer before flying away. It is nice to have someone checking on me… even while I am away.

The end is getting closer…with my foot wound…Dr. Stroud told me that that sooner than later…he would be telling me good-bye. So I stay in suspense…but hopefully the end must be in sight…in someone’s eyes. It will be a surprise.

Before I left to head to Mt. Pleasant for my appointment…I drove to Hutchinson Square and took pictures of the last minute arrangements for the official opening of the square later yesterday…everything looked beautiful! History and charm intermingled and I felt it quite longingly.

So until tomorrow…There are still island stories left to tell…especially one that was hidden inside Whitmire’s Fine Jewelry Store…home of the Legend of the Pawleys Island Shell…you just never know where a story will pop up…

…Like the story of one Ya who saves the day with….?

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

I stopped by Walsh and Mollie’s house after my appointment to give Rutledge some more Magic Tree books (in the series)…he is really into them and loves hearing them read each night…but now he is starting to read his own classroom books too…He wanted to read to me…kindergarten…wow! He did a great job reading the entire little book…in fact two books. Rutledge reads…and Eloise walks! 🙂

Dear Reader:

I didn’t even have to go look through my old books to find a copy of the Velveteen Rabbit for this title photo…I have my own “Velveteen” Rabbit! He started out as a garden Easter Rabbit, one spring long ago, until he became so worn out by the weather…(one eye is missing and one ear is doing a balancing act in the photo)…normally, it too is missing. Yet I love this little rabbit and have given him an honored place in my bedroom so he can live out his days in comfort.

As I think back over my favorite lines from the Velveteen Rabbit about being real and loved …and how the two go together…I can’t help but think of my abiding friendship with the Ya’s and this past week’s reaffirmation …reiterating just  how strong our friendship goes.

“Real isn’t how you are made… It’s a thing that happens to you,”

The Ya friendship today is beyond “real”…we know everything about each other…long kept secrets, hopes, dreams, weaknesses and strengths… And we love each other more and more for all of the “real” moments we get to spend together.

We have become each others best cheerleaders for whatever “crisis” develops and unfortunately as we all age…these situations, like waves in the ocean hitting shore, seem sometimes to be a constant in our lives.

“Few things in life are more consoling than an old friendship in which all the hair (as in the story of the Velveteen Rabbit) has been rubbed off.”

That pretty much sums the retreat  up for us….but I did save an ‘Uncle Billy’ joke (Mitford series) to tell the Ya’s to cheer ourselves up and just have a good old-fashioned belly laugh! We might be getting older but we still have it more together than the three old maid sisters in Uncle Billy’s joke.

*I will have to paraphrase from memory since I returned the Mitford Series books to K.C. (who loaned them to me before I left for the beach) ….so here goes.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………

There were three elderly spinster sisters who lived together in a big rambling Victorian home their father had left them. The youngest of the sisters was in her eighties, the middle sister…in her nineties…and the oldest sister, Hattie, had long passed the triple digit age line.

One day Hattie stared down (somewhat befuddled) at the floating water in her clawfoot tub. Soon after… the youngest sister and the middle sister (who were drinking their breakfast coffee on a long wooden farm table) heard her shout…

“Am I gitting in the tub or gitting out of the tub?” 

The middle sister sighed, put down her cup of coffee and told her youngest sister that she would go check on Hattie…the poor thing had no memory left at all.

The youngest sister sat back leisurely and continued to enjoy her morning coffee until she heard a cry from the middle sister….

” Sister Help! Am I going up the stairs…or going down the stairs?”

The youngest sister, sighed a deep sigh, and thanked the Lord that she still had her memory when her older sisters didn’t…she then knocked on the wooden table for a  good luck measure to ward off any memory loss.

Suddenly the middle sister stuck on the stairs and the eldest sister still staring down at the water in the tub heard their youngest sister yell:

“I’ll be right up to help y’all, you hear…as soon as I answer the door..somebody’s knocking on it.”

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

So until tomorrow…It can always be worse…so smile and just enjoy the day and the moment!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Remember: To say “RABBIT” first thing this morning to bring you the “Top of the Morning” Irish Good Luck”…(and you don’t even have to be Irish.) Since my bedraggled but  beloved garden (Velveteen) rabbit has on a green ribbon..I think he can teach us about love and luck for this upcoming month.

Next month I can put Easter eggs around him…Easter sure is late this year, isn’t it?

*Today I am heading back to the Comprehensive Wound Center and I am just betting that “the wound” will be really improved..how could it not with so much love around! This afternoon, when I return, I will gather all the pictures and funnies from the past week to share with you tomorrow!

….But I can tell you the weather was the best yet…in the mid to high sixties and low seventies…cloudy but with bright spurts of sunshine with blue skies intermingled. We kept the tradition and returned to the Chive Blossom for another fabulous meal Tuesday evening. Life is good!

*Eva Cate won ‘The Craziest Hat and Socks”  ( they wear uniforms at her school) Recognition for Dr. Seuss Day at her school (Read Across America) Way to go Eva Cate…way to go Mandy!

(Pink bow from the Race for the Cure and then the girls painted a paper mache elephant I used in a Christmas Eve story a few years back)

Dear Reader:

Haven’t we seen the candle used as a metaphor for life many times…particularly in celebrity passings? In popular culture it has made a come-back with its symbolism of the short passage of time we each are allowed.

 In Walking in Wonder ….remembrances of John O’Donohue’s eternal wisdom for a modern world…O’Donohue remembers the symbolism of a candle used at funerals while growing up in the Connemara region of Ireland.

He always believed that at the “heart of darkness we will discover there isn’t darkness but the ‘eternal candle.’

In Connemara, a popular phrase used during a funeral was an Irish phrase meaning…“His candle is quenched.” (His life is over) One day O’Donohue asked an old man why he used that expression at a funeral and he said, “I often heard as a small lad that when you’re born, there’s a candle lit for you in the eternal world, and the length of your life is the length of the candle.”

Most of us remember Elton John’s famous musical eulogy to Princess Diana when he re-wrote the lyrics to “Candle in the Wind” in ” Good-bye England’s Rose.”

And it seems to me you lived your life
Like a candle in the wind
Never fading with the sunset
When the rain set in
And your footsteps will always fall here
Along England’s greenest hills
Your candle’s burned out long before
Your legend ever will

I remember one professor I had used to write Edna Vincent Millay’s famous line of poetry on the board for the Monday 8:00 a.m. classes as bleary-eyed students gazed back at her.

“My candle burns at both ends, It will not last the night; But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends, It gives a lovely light”

(Burning the candle at both ends is definitely part of the college experience…I am glad I did it but I am also glad I survived it!)

The grandchildren love the Christmas Eve Service for the highlight…for them…the lighting of the candles…while singing Silent Night. For once they have permission to hold a live burning candle and their eyes are lit in delight each year.

Perhaps Father James Keller said it best…”The candle loses nothing by lighting another candle. “

So until tomorrow…Shouldn’t we share our light with as many people as we can for as long as our candle burns…we lose nothing by sharing our light…yet what a joy it is to illuminate another’s life.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Dear Reader:

I read the other day that the best ice-breaker in today’s polarized society is to start by introducing yourself (in a mixed group) and telling a stranger a little bit about the origin of your name and then asking them how their name came about.

Even if there is no deep ancestral hand-me-down story, or funny family nickname, famous and/or Biblical origins…there is always room for laughter or awe/appreciation for someone else’s name. And once that familiarity is shared…it is amazing how much more open two people are with each other….even if each has a completely different view on life and politics.

I think the best educational conference I attended was the one where we were purposefully given someone else’s name tag and then had to find that person wearing our name tag. It was a hilarious game of “Marco Polo” with so many different names being called out that it must have resembled the Ellis Island immigration station at its peak or, perhaps, the building of the Tower of Babel.

Quinn Caldwell talks about the importance of our names (Readings from…All I Really Want)…Here are a few short excerpts.

Names matter. What people call us and what we call ourselves, matters. What’s the deal with your name? Who gave it to you? Why? What does it mean? Is there a story behind it? Are you named for someone? Are you glad to be that person’s namesake?

Did you ever feel negative feelings about your name after kids taunted you with it…or parents gave you an embarrassing nickname…or did you ever decide to re-name yourself? Did you gladly add “Daddy or Mommy” to your name or ( *I had to laugh at this sentence) become somebody’s “Schmoopie” or somebody’s “Boo?”) 🙂

Did you know that your name is very very old? It contains the real truth of whom you truly are inside? It’s the name God gave you in the womb and every morning since…”Beloved.” 

So until tomorrow (Caldwell’s prayer)

Holy God, you gave me the only name that really matters. I can’t top that, but let me try just one more name that I think is pretty good, too: Just call me “Yours,” Amen

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

*I will have to say that I tried to avoid name tags as much as possible at big educational conferences because I have had two new blouses destroyed by those old cheap stick-on paper tags… that upon pulling them off left a mark that never came off in the wash…two blouses that became two expensive dust cloths. Thank goodness for necklaces with plastic name covers.

Dear Reader:

The best thing about living on Rainbow Road are the neighbors and the next thing is the fresh foods they bring ..eggs straight from their chickens and lettuce grown, not just by hydroponic methods but now aeroponics methods.

*“Soil farmers grow in the dirt, hydroponic farmers grow in the water, but with aeroponics the roots actually just hang and are frequently misted with high nutrient water.”  “This is all controlled by technology.”

Chelsey works for Vertical Roots which is an “innovative container farming system that delivers fresh chemical-free vegetables all year round.”  (All said and done…all I know is that the lettuce is as light as butter and taste so good I make lettuce sandwiches (instead of bread) now with chicken salad and use the fresh eggs in the potato salad. Unbelievably good!

Chelsey’s company is in the process of moving from Summerville to Clements Ferry in Charleston because the growth expansion has been phenomenal.  Vertical Roots now serves several local school districts as well as Whole Foods, Harris Teeter, Earth Fare, Veggie Bin, and Lowes.

Chelsey, herself, has been promoted to do more work in research and is actually creating new hybrids of lettuce as we speak. We are so proud of her!

It is a new world out there but with creative, healthier ways to grow food now…it is filled with such promise…especially when I see that hope shining in the eyes of our young neighbors, Luke and Chelsey.

So until tomorrow…Remember….”Everybody is trying to swallow something that won’t go down“…Unless you live across the street from Luke and Chelsey…then everything goes down better! 🙂

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Dear Reader:

Just a little thought today to encourage all my readers, who like me, continuously lose things….car keys, purses, remotes, drinks….you name it….I can lose it.

My problem is I pick things up but don’t put them back down…at least not where I found them. The remote, for example, I pick it up to turn on or off the television or simply change a channel and then I take it with me wherever I go from that point on…later finding it on the bed in the back bedroom or on the kitchen table where I decided to fix a sandwich…it could and usually is anywhere but where it belongs… on the coffee table in the den. ‘Oh me…of feeble brain…help!’

And every time we do something forgetful like this…and try to re-trace our steps… Don’t we find ourselves making comments similar to… “It’s like trying to find a needle in a haystack” and plop down on the sofa or recliner in total self-exasperation!

Well good news….guess what? You actually can “find a needle in a haystack.”

Case in point: In the Mitford series-by Jan Karon,  Father Tim is trying to cheer up a friend who has given up finding someone they are desperately looking for….making a discouraging sigh and falling back on the cliche…”It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack.” 

The familiar phrase makes Father Tim start smiling as he remembers a true story about such an incident following World War II. He tells his friend:

“It happened right after the Second World War when nobody had any money. A sewing machine company held a contest . . . whoever found a needle carefully hidden in a haystack would win a brand-new sewing machine. There were people swarming all over that haystack, hay was flying everywhere. And guess what?” “What?

“The chances were one in a million, but somebody found the needle!”

“Oh Yeah?”

“Yeah” said Father Tim beaming.

………………………………………………………………………………………………….

So until tomorrow… Every time we get discouraged about finding something that is lost….mundane/silly or a true treasure in wealth or sentimentality…think about how many “one in a million” moments we have already won…being born, being born in this country of freedom, loving families and friends…we never need fear losing anything because we already have everything…we are blessed beyond measure.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

One of my frequent visitors to the suet cage appears to be maybe a red-headed woodpecker…he has black and white stripes like he is dressed in a tuxedo with a beautiful red head. I love watching him eat at the feeder…he adds “class” to the place in his natural attire!

Dear Reader:

Today you don’t hear too many people saying “Glory, Glory” as part of our daily dictum. When Grandmother Wilson said it …it was usually on two different occasions…1) Something unexpectedly good had happened and she would throw her arms up in the air and yell out “Glory, Glory” while looking upward. 2) Or if something bad went down she would shake her head and holding it in her hands utter “Glory, Glory…this too shall pass.”

So obviously, as a child, I was a little confused whether “Glory” was something good or bad. When the preacher talked about “Glory” it usually meant heaven which I figured was a  good thing so I kind of just left it at that.

Today we see famous paintings by the Renaissance artists portraying their ideas on how “Glory” looks …at least in their eyes. The only time I ever used the word was when I sang it…the refrain in the “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” It is something so stirring about that melody that it becomes immortalized in our memory.

Julia Ward Lowe actually wrote the lyrics to this popular song while staying at the famous Willard’s Hotel in Washington.

 Julia Ward Howe remembered years later that she had awakened around dawn in her room in Willard’s Hotel with the lyrics floating in her head. It was November 1861, and she was on her first trip to wartime Washington, with her husband and her minister.

The day before she  had heard union soldiers singing “John Brown’s Body” as the carriage entered wartime Washington. Her pastor challenged her to compose and publish another song since she was much the better lyricist. She took the challenge.

Now, in the dim morning light of her hotel room, new words began to form.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord

He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored.

………………………………………………………………………………………………….

How many of you, like me, can hardly wait to get to the refrain in the Battle Hymn of the Republic to sing/shout out “Glory, Glory, Hallelujah, Glory Glory Hallelujah, Glory Glory Hallelujah…His truth  goes marching on.”

What really has stuck with me (as an impressionable teenager at the time) was an incident caught on television around the country and/or world regarding Bobby Kennedy’s funeral. Some of you might remember this….

On June 8, 1968, as the 21-car funeral car bearing the body of assassinated U.S. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy from New York to Washington crept through Baltimore, a lone mourner in the crowd began slowly singing, Mine eyes have seen the glory . . .

Others in the throng of stricken bystanders picked up the lyrics and the melody:

Glory, glory, hallelujah

Glory, glory, hallelujah.

Soon, as millions watched on television, thousands of people lining the tracks were singing Julia Ward Howe’s century-old lyrics — somehow still fitting, and comforting, as an American song of grief.

So until tomorrow…Whether we think of glory as a place we hope to go to one day, or as a special honor, a magnificence of great beauty or even as a verb…glorying (taking great pride or pleasure) in my morning glories each day during the late spring, summer, and early fall…Glory is a word that stands alone….”Glory to God in the highest!”

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

*When I get back from Pawleys you will find me planting morning glory seeds..“Glory Glory! Spring is coming!”

Dear Reader:

…And we are off! Finally! It is getting harder and harder for us Ya Ya’s to plan a time…even a short stay…together any more. It is truly frustrating…but after much pre-planning about medical appointments and special grandchildren activities…we did it!

The only thing positive I can think of for this befuddling problem is that it makes our gathering even sweeter for all the obstacles overcome to get there.

You know you have best friends…when they wait on you to go to your weekly scheduled “foot” appointment on Friday before heading out on Saturday… when normally we leave at the beginning of the week and stay until Saturday. Sacrifice and creative alter-planning is needed these days…but we did it!!! Thank you girls from the bottom of my heart!!

We have talked about our mid-winter retreat since Christmas and now it has finally come to fruition. Brooke is picking me up at 10:00 this morning and we are heading to Georgetown to the River Room for our annual rendevous lunch with Jackson before we head on to Pawleys.

God’s Wink came into play to help me gather some thoughts to leave with you each day while I am gone…Jo Dufford gave me some of the little tiny magazines called God’s Little Acres years ago and I found the bag of them the other day….filled with little thoughts to tuck away for a rainy day. I hope you enjoy them while I am gone.

Brooke and I will be returning Thursday so I can make my scheduled Friday foot appointment. But until then…it is time for some R&R with the girls.