Wednesday Snap Shot

Good morning! I hope your week is going great :). The last several days have been busy, busy, busy. But it was the best busy ever. I fell behind in my blogging but am planning to try and catch up on last weeks grocery haul before I post this weeks.

On Thursday my daughter, Sierra, and I drove about 2 ½ hours north to pick up my friend Laurie. She was at her brothers house visiting from Tennessee. He lives in Gig Harbor and she had been visiting him for about 5 days. We drove back to our home and she spent the next 5 days with us.

The visit with her was a total blessing to us both. I haven't talked and laughed and shared so much with a friend in a long time. We also shed our share of tears as she shared more of her story and heartache about her daughters death. All I can say is her loss is horrible, her strength is an incredible a testimony to God's work in carrying her through such an unimaginable loss. Grief is hard stuff. But slowly, she is walking her way forward and I continue to pray for her and her family. The loss of a child is not something you get over and move on, it's more of a learning process in how move forward in a new normal you never wanted.

The break she was able to have was a beautiful time of refreshment and renewed sense of direction and maybe a little more healing happened a long the way. That would be my prayer.

My daughter did an amazing job in capturing some sweet pictures of the two of us...

And one of my favorites..

 

Prior to Laurie coming I had a fun afternoon with my daughter Hannah and my grandchildren. Sierra was here as well and once again captured some beautiful photos of my grandchildren picking blackberries here at our homestead...

Goals

After taking Laurie to the airport yesterday we (hubby and I) ran errands and picked up the groceries for the week. Today I plan to spend at home and catch up on housework. During my visit with Laurie housework took a backseat as I focused on the precious time we had.

Today's goals:

~vacuum

~catch up laundry

~clean the bathroom

~mop floors

~reorganize my pantry shelves – they are a bit of mess after so much company in the last month.

~do a freezer inventory and reorganize my freezer – it's in the same state as my pantry

~try and do a little more blogging

As I write this to-do list I realize I may not get to it all today but I hope to make a big dent in it all.

Fitness and Health

Water, water, water.. We've had some hot days and it's easy for me to be preoccupied with so many other things that I forget to drink my water. I had a day that I was feeling the start of a headache and realized that I had not had enough water. I drank down about 20oz of water and my headache went away. I've had to be diligent to get my 60oz (my daily goal, I have a 20oz water bottle and I try and drink 3 of them) per day.

Just a reminder that in the summer heat we need to keep ourselves hydrated!

View from my Deck

Smoky and hazy continues to be the pattern. The horrible fires in Northern California and Southern Oregon continue on and our skies are seeing that smoke as well.

Everything is dry and brown and the fire danger is high in our area too. The memories of last years terrible forest fires in my area are still a vivid memory.

The sun would normally be bright, the skies blue, and the mountains across from me very clear to see. But this morning it's all covered in smoky haze..

This is the view from my deck to the east. You can see the sun behind the large fir tree and the haze that prevents it from shining brightly this morning..

Today's weather: High: 92    Low: 62

That is all for this week! Hope you are having a fantastic week!