Father's Day!

On Father's Day morning, I took the girls to church. Unfortunately, I "enjoyed" the majority of the service in the nursery with other moms/ church workers and babies & didn't get to hear most of the sermon! Even so, I am glad that we were at church. The girls know that Sunday is the LORD's DAY and we have established that as a family we attend our local church to honor God, fellowship with other believers, and grow in God's Word. :-)

Jillian made an adorable Father's Day card in Sunday school that had a bunch of grapes ( her little finger made each individual grape) and it said, "I love you a whole bunch". :-)

Shortly after getting home from church, Grammie and Grandad arrived back to our house. We all loaded into the van to make our way to Union Station to see daddy who was still at his Harvey Fellowship conference. I did the driving and my dad was the navigator for our trip (he did a super job, I am thankful he had the GPS on his iPhone because my printed map didn't make provisions for all the construction downtown). It is STRESSFUL driving down-town (even on a "calm" Sunday afternoon), but God had his hand on us and we made it all the way there and back!

All four of Brad's girls were so excited when we finally got to see him again! He was a little sweaty from walking all the way from the National Art Gallery (he had a private docent tour of the Renaissance galleries with other fellows) but we didn't care and gave him lots of kisses anyway! :-)

Jillian faith helping Grandad open up his Father's Day gifts.

Grandad giving Jillian a thank you kiss for the sweet card she made for him.

My dad LOVED the photo collage of our fun Father's Day week we had spent together! YEAH!

Ths girls were proud of their gift to Grandad!

I gave my dad a book by Stephen Covey called The 8th Habit:From Effectiveness to Greatness. As a teenager, my dad gave me the book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens and I had enjoyed what I learned from it, so I thought it would be fun if I gave him one of Covey's more recent books. :-)

Growing up, my dad always encouraged me to do my best. I grew up believing that I was one "smart cookie" because of his many loving words of affirmation. And, because of all the engaging lessons I received at home, I grew to love learning and value a life-long pursuit of education. In particular, my dad exposed me to many of the great artists as we visited art galleries all over the country, read many pieces of classic literature & visited historical places on all of our family vacations.

Because of my love of learning and my desire to share that love with others, I chose to major in education. And while my dad has been called to a career in medicine (which he loves), he has mentioned a few times that if he wasn't practicing medicine, he would want to be a teacher. Thankfully (for him and his students) he has gotten to teach Sunday School of all ages for the past two decades and is a very engaging Bible teacher (in the mold of Chuck Swindoll). As a child, I can still remember my dad preparing for his SS lesson, using maps of ancient Israel and even costumes to re-enact the life of Biblical character. I love my dad so much and I am thankful for all the lessons He has taught me! :-) Happy Father's Day, DAD!