Time Out for a Break! Sometimes Ya Just Deal with it....

....And we had one, a break that is, literally when a powerful gust of wind caught an umbrella and shattered the tempered glass on top of an aluminum table around our pool.  Little bits of glass everywhere! Two of my five sisters are visiting this week and they helped me clean up with brooms and dustpans and then vacuuming with the shop vac. Larry was out and we didn't want to leave the mess for him to deal with when he got home. Fortunately, only a few small bits went into the pool. That's on the cleanup list for today -- a good thorough pool vacuuming.

Is this a metaphor for life? Things are going along fine and suddenly something happens to shatter your peaceful routine -- sort of like a detour. Oops...we thought this would be an easy road trip and now we're on a side road taking us off the main route. Is this an interruption or an opportunity? Maybe there's a stop along this "new way" we can enjoy.

Visiting with my sisters and a niece and her two little boys has made this a fun week. The boys, five and three, loved our chickens and collected eggs every morning. They were especially excited when Whopper laid her blue eggs. I sent home a dozen eggs, all brown except for two Whopper blue ones. "What do you think?" I asked them. "Are they blue on the inside?" They'll find out when they eat them for breakfast.

Life is a road trip journey, a real adventure. "What will happen next?" I wonder as the day unfolds. Whatever it is, I want to walk with my guardian angel and keep my eyes open for unexpected beauty and grace. 

I'm writing this in the middle of the night. While this has been a fun week, it's also been a week of disturbed sleep. I've been up most nights for a two or three hour sleep "interruption." The first thing I usually do is go outside and look at the stars. What a blessing to be up when they are out. How can one gaze at the Milky Way and not wonder at God's love for us? How can one fail to see Him when his fingerprints are everywhere? In Whopper's blue eggs. In the amazing organization of a beehive? In the glorious beauty of Queen Ann's Lace growing alongside corn flowers on the side of the road. 

God is good and life is beautiful -- even when "taking a break" means cleaning up shattered glass around the pool.