Merry Christmas

How to Remember Someone You'll Never Forget

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I made this video  last year on Dad's Birthday. Tomorrow is his birthday again. Posting it in his honor.

Yesterday

Yesterday...another person we love passed from life on this earth to new life in a place I've never seen before. Yesterday...another day that will be burned in our memory. Yesterday...rain fell and tears fell and we had to say another "goodbye". God has a way of walking us through the things that we can't imagine, the loss, the grief, the "goodbyes". God is not just walking us through it...He's walking beside us all the way. He's there in the dark when the curtain falls around our heart. Sometimes we're so deep in the hurt that we can't tell He's there, but He is. His promise was never that we would escape the pain...but that He wouldn't leave us there alone with it. Death feels like such a  final separation.
But I believe there will come a time when the yesterdays will be no longer...there will only be tomorrows. I know where my tomorrows are waiting. In the arms of Jesus, in that place He has prepared for me. I can't imagine what it will be like, but part of me is already there. Those that I love that have gone before are waiting there...for a great reunion! Death has been conquered! It is not the final separation if we have a relationship with Jesus! He holds the key to the tomorrows!
Jesus said, "Don't let this throw you. You trust God, don't you? Trust me. There is plenty of room for you in my Father's home. If that weren't so, would I have told you that I'm on my way to get a room ready for you? And if I'm on my way to get your room ready, I'll come back and get you so you can live where I live. And you already know the road I'm taking. I am the Road, also the Truth, also the Life. No one gets to the Father apart from me." John 14:1-4...6,7
"So we can cry with hope, we can say goodbye with hope... 'cause we know our goodbyes are not the end. And we can breathe with hope, 'cause we believe with hope, there's a place where we'll see your face again."~taken from "With Hope", a song by Steven Curtis Chapman

Papa-sicle

The day I took this photo was bad...a very bad day.  This is my late father and my niece, Allyson. He was very sick and almost died 5 hours after I shot this, and that was the kick off to the last 7 and a half  months of his earthly life.
His life was our life, his heart was our heart and in a way, his death was our death. I won't go into any details because they don't matter. It's not the part I want to remember, even though I will never rid my memory of the pain of that time. When I look at this photo, I remember the pain...but I see love. I can see the love he had for Ally and then I remember why we were together that day. We were living, celebrating a summer day by gathering at the little league field to watch Ally's sister play T-ball. Dad was there because he loved his family and no matter how sick he was, he wouldn't have missed it. My Dad lived every day to it's fullest. He set that example for us and he would want us to live, laugh and love to the utmost everyday until we can be together again, in Heaven.  So, even though a part of us died when we lost him, we continue to honor his memory by living.
I call this photo "Papa-sicle". It makes me smile...through my tears... with love for my Dad.