243/365

maybe 16 drive-in movie theaters left in Texas- and one just 20 minutes from home. $10 a carload, and we didn't even have to stuff anyone in the trunk...

242/365

"If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one."
- Mother Theresa

(at the Food Bank of the Rio Grande Valley)

241/365

First week of school- a hopeful work in progress, but mighty exhausting as well.

240/365

There is something just a little bit sad, to walk past the splash park on a bright and hot August day and realize that school started this week.

239/365

This life therefore is not righteousness, but growth in righteousness, not health, but healing, not being but becoming, not rest but exercise. We are not yet what we shall be, but we are growing toward it, the process is not yet finished, but it is going on, this is not the end, but it is the road. All does not yet gleam in glory, but all is being purified.
- Martin Luther 

238/365

Holliday Academy 2013-14.

(and the dog? NOT homeschooled. But a terrific mascot!)

237/365

A day 18 years and a week and a day in the making. I am still amazed that sending your son to school can be so exciting and so dang miserable all at the same time.

Psalm 127:4 says, "Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one’s youth." The launching of arrows continues.

236/365

Two things to love about where I live:
the sky.
roadside burgers.

235/365

Here comes the sun, here comes the sun,
And I say it's all right.
- George Harrison

(but, I am NOT making this up, it was James Taylor and YoYo Ma who came on my shuffle as I drove by early this morning...)

234/365

some days look like this.

233/365

Whether the flower or the color is the focus I do not know. I do know the flower is painted large to convey my experience with the flower - and what is my experience if it is not the color? 
- Georgia O'Keeffe

232/365

God’s glory is on tour in the skies,
God-craft on exhibit across the horizon.
- Psalm 19:1, The Message

231/365

Prescription sunglasses.
Why on earth did it take me 20 years to figure this out?

230/365

We see every individual as a unique creation of a wise and loving God, deserving not only of our abiding patience and respect, but of boundless awe. We cherish diversity in all forms and eschew narrow-minded notions of normalcy.
- from the Brookwood Community, Brookshire, Texas.

Thankful for worship, for music, for fellowship, for faithfulness, for beautiful art, for fried chicken dinners, for a safe return home.

229/365

'We are helpers of your joy' (2 Corinthians 1:24).
One Christian conversing with another is a means to confirm him. As the stones in an arch help to strengthen one another, one Christian by imparting his experience, heats and quickens another.
'Let us provoke one another to love, and to good works' (Hebrews 10:24)
How does grace flourish by holy conference! A Christian by good discourse drops that oil upon another, which makes the lamp of his faith burn the brighter.
- All Things for Good by Thomas Watson, 1663

228/365

"Houston is one of the most racially/ethnically diverse metropolitan areas in the nation as well. It is the most diverse of the 10 largest U.S. metropolitan areas."
"Houston Region Grows More Ethnically Diverse...," A Report of the Kinder Institute for Urban Research, March 2012

Time for ESL training.

227/365

Negative- no gym.

Positive- first basketball-not-really-a-practice and maybe 10 girls on the roster.

We'll dwell on positives.

226/365

so the truth is, I really needed a couple more domino players so I enlisted two willing suspects, ages 6 & 8. It was a great time. 

And I'd say that even if I didn't win. 

:-)

225/365

oh so tempted to procratination, a timely exhortation from georgianne serves to press me onward-

"Do it immediately, do it with prayer, 
do it reliantly, casting all care. 
Do it with reverence, tracing His hand 
who placed it before thee with earnest command. 
Stayed on omnipotence, safe 'neath His wing, 
leave all resultings, do the next thing." 

"Do the Next Thing," Elisabeth Elliot & Back to the Bible. 

(photo from Quinta Mazatlan- you call them chicks, we call them chacalaca.)

224/365

A rare treat- one kid away tonight and no one is left out!

223/365

O Day of Rest and Gladness

1. O day of rest and gladness,
O day of joy and light,
O balm of care and sadness,
Most beautiful, most bright:
On Thee, the high and lowly,
Through ages joined in tune,
Sing holy, holy, holy,
To the great God Triune.

2. On Thee, at the creation,
The light first had its birth;
On Thee, for our salvation,
Christ rose from depths of earth;
On Thee, our Lord, victorious,
The Spirit sent from heav’n,
And thus on Thee, most glorious,
A triple light was giv’n.

3. Thou art a port protected
From storms that round us rise;
A garden intersected
With streams of paradise;
Thou art a cooling fountain
In life’s dry dreary sand;
From Thee, like Pisgah’s mountain,
We view our promised land.

4. Today on weary nations
The heav’nly manna falls;
To holy convocations
The silver trumpet calls,
Where gospel light is glowing
With pure and radiant beams,
And living water flowing,
With soul-refreshing streams.

5. New graces ever gaining
From this, our day of rest,
We reach the rest remaining
To spirits of the blessed.
To Holy Ghost be praises,
To Father, and to Son;
The church her voice upraises
To Thee, blessed Three in One.

©1997 Christopher Miner Music.

222/365

At The Sea-Side

When I was down beside the sea
A wooden spade they gave to me
  To dig the sandy shore.

My holes were empty like a cup.
In every hole the sea came up,
  Till it could come no more.

by Robert Louis Stevenson

221/365

The Cowboy-
Pepperoni,
Black Olives,
Mushrooms,
Sausage.

220/365

But I say, wake up and look around. The fields are already ripe for harvest.
- John 4:35 (NLT)

219/365

3 gifts of summer-
friends who house-sit homes with pools,
friends who laugh and splash and jump and dive and sit in the morning sunshine and share their lives,
friends.

218/365

in season:
corn on the cob,
peaches,
nectarines,
ice tea,
ice cream,
ok,
ice in general.

217/365

Mall massage multi-tasking.

216/365

Another year,
but the first with sparking candles and an accordion serenade.

215/365

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
His mercies never come to an end;
They are new every morning;
Great is Thy faithfulness.
"The Lord is my portion," says my soul, "therefore I will hope in Him."
- Lamentations 3:22-24 (ESV)

(sunrise, Reynosa, Mexico)

214/365

The greatest thank you's sometimes come without spoken words.

213/365

It was so hot outside this day that we watched the paint peel off the wall moments after we rolled it on.
And I am not joking!

212/365

Nothing, nothing, like a Coke break,
an ice-cold,
sit-down-in-the-shade-under-a-tree-on-the-curb,
and-slowly-sip
the-icy-cold-real-sugar-liquid-goodness,
Coke break.

211/365

"It's goin' to be hot and it's goin' to be hard."

Ain't that the truth?

210/365

Volare y para Dios,
Nada es imposible,
y durante el dolor,
confiando en Dios 
y dejando atras el temor.
Volare! 

- from Vuela

209/365

Sunday worship.

What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed, and in that I rejoice. Yes, and I will rejoice...
- Philippians 1:18-19 (ESV)

208/365

 Where relationships are warm and expectancies fresh, we are already beginning to enjoy the life together that will be completed in our life everlasting.
- Eugene Peterson, "Community," A Long Obedience in the Same Direction

(photo taken at Isaiah 55 Kelly's House, Reynosa, MX)